As reported by the FAZ, Händel’s oratorio ‘The Triumph of Time and Insight’ celebrated its premiere as a Frankfurt first at the Oper Frankfurt’s depot. Director Katharina Kastening relocates the Baroque work to the present day, turning it into a reckoning with beauty obsession and self-optimization.
Even before the performance, the audience is confronted with quotes from interviews and TV shows: ‘A crooked nose can be corrected with a few needle pricks’ and ‘Attractiveness makes you successful.’ With this, Kastening dives straight into the subject – and shows the repulsive sides of cosmetic surgery.
Baroque music meets modern staging
The music of the then 22-year-old Händel, who premiered the oratorio in Rome in 1707, fits surprisingly well with this modern interpretation. The Frankfurt Opera and Museum Orchestra under Kapellmeister Simone Di Felice plays on historical instruments, bringing the affects of anger, sorrow, and pain to the fore in many virtuosic solos.
The often-criticized discrepancy between historical orchestral sound and modern staging is bridged here: Kastening’s staging has something stylized, Baroque about it – without hoop skirts and powdered wigs. The four allegorical figures – Time, Insight, Pleasure, and Beauty – acquire human traits but remain typified.
Drastic images and strong singers
Particularly striking is the scene in which Pleasure treats the anesthetized Beauty bloody on the operating table while singing: ‘Sleep and dream of something beautiful.’ Beauty (Monika Buczkowska-Ward) awakens and laments in a painful aria: ‘I had hoped to find fulfillment in my new reflection.’
A large convex mirror floats as a central stage element (Ashley Martin-Davis) above the scene – a symbol of lack of self-confidence, not vanity. Video projections by Tal Rosner complement the staging. Katharina Magiera as Insight wears a fatsuit with implants, revealing scars and wounds underneath – a shocking truth beneath the surface.
The singer cast with Monika Buczkowska-Ward (Beauty), Younji Yi (Pleasure), Michael Porter (Time), and Katharina Magiera (Insight) is convincing. Magiera impresses with her dramatic courage and her dark contralto, making her the ideal choice for this profound role.
Source: www.faz.net
