Opera as Hypermedium Meaning-Making Immediacy and the Politics of Perception
representation and perception opera performs within this context. This entails approaching operas as audiovisual events (rather than works or texts) and paying attention to what they do by visual means, along with the operatic music and singing. The book concentrates on events that foreground their
use of media and technology, drawing attention to opera's inherently hypermedial aspects. It works with the recognition that such events nevertheless engender powerful effects of immediacy, which are not contingent on illusionism or the seeming transparency of the medium. It analyzes how effects
like presence, liveness and immersion are produced, contesting some critical claims attached to them. It also sheds light on how these effects, often perceived as visceral or material in nature, are related to the production of meaning in opera. The discussion pertains to contemporary pieces such as
Louis Andriessen and Peter Greenaway's Rosa and Writing to Vermeer, as well as productions of the canonical repertory such as Wagner's Ring Cycle by Robert Lepage at the Met and La Fura dels Baus in Valencia.
Publisher Name | Oxford University Press USA |
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Author Name | Hagendorf, Col |
Format | Audio |
Bisac Subject Major | MUS |
Language | NG |
Isbn 10 | 0190091266 |
Isbn 13 | 9780190091262 |
Target Age Group | min:NA, max:NA |
Dimensions | 00.93" H x 00.06" L x 10.00" W |
Page Count | 200 |
Tereza Havelkov is Assistant Professor in musicology at Charles University in Prague. Her research concentrates on contemporary relationships between opera and the media, and the intersection of aesthetics and politics in opera and music theatre both present and past. She is the co-convenor of the
Music Theatre Working Group with the International Federation for Theatre Research.