Viola, Wagner; Wagner, Viola

From the prologue (lines 129–130) to The Tristan of Gottfried von Strassburg:

Ein man ein wîp, ein wîp ein man,
Tristan Isolt, Isolt Tristan.

[A man, a woman; a woman, a man
Tristan, Isolde; Isolde, Tristan.]

Those are some of my favorite lines in all poetry: elegant, economic, symmetric. In my mind it is a testament to the strength of the Tristan poem/myth and the work it did as effort to describe heterosexual love that a very similar (and similarly lyrical) theme emerges centuries later in Richard Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (Act II, Scene 2):

TRISTAN: Tristan du, ich Isolde, nicht mehr Tristan!
ISOLDE: Du Isolde, Tristan ich, nicht mehr Isolde!

[TRISTAN: Tristan you, I Isolde, no longer Tristan.
ISOLDE: You Isolde, Tristan I, no longer Isolde!

So I was terrified to read about the newest take on T&I—The Tristan Project, a new interpretation of Wagner's opera by director Peter Sellars, contemporary video artist Bill Viola, the Los Angeles Philharmonic's musical director Esa Pekka Salonen, and the artistic director of the Paris Opera, Gerard Mortier. Terrified not because it might work, but because the L.A. Disney Center performances this month were the only performances. But it looks as if it's coming to the Lincoln Center at some point. That's fantastic news—Viola's stills are stunning. I was hoping that Caryn from art.blogging.la might have a review, but it looks as if she missed it, too.

Bill Viola, Still from The Tristan Project, 2004

Posted by Kriston at December 21, 2004 12:55 PM