An Exhibition of Madness in a Cabinet of Wonders: Results from an Experimental Process Into the Performative Space of a 17th Century Operatic Mad Scene

• As suggested by Schramm (2005) the performative space in the 17th century was considered a scene of knowledge for both artists and scientists. Examples of such scenes were theatres, laboratories, and cabinets of curiosities (kunstkammer, wonder-room), designed as collection rooms ”of the astonishing and the horrible, the wonderful and the strange”. The aim of this performance-presentation is to exhibit a singer’s close reading and experimentation with Deidamia’s mad scene in Francesco Sacrati’s and Giulio Strozzi’s opera La Finta Pazza from 1641. The purpose is to present this mad scene as an example of such a collection of curious wonders, connecting the past with the present, nature with arts, and emphasizing the importance of truly considering the imaginative artistic research process in close connection to historical facts and theories in the production of a 17th century music drama. The presentation provides information from a singer’s close encounters with ’theatrical spaces’ such as Teatro San Cassiano in Venice; a re-created 17th century costume; a libretto and a musical score. As an artistic method, the physical meeting and experience of the theatrical space allows for the performer’s mind to engage in a dialogue with the self but also with others, resulting in a mental transformation of the scene and the stage. This dialogue supplies the performance with an input of analogies representing fast shifting multilayered and inter-subjective movements between realities, revealing the complex structure of the on-going performance activity as well as the complexity beyond the historical material observed from an artistic perspective. This performance-presentation is a vocal solo-exhibition of reflections and acts involved in an artistic research process, showing how the performer’s physical and mental movements can be directly linked with the performative and historical space, thus providing a curious scene of reflections based on the past ”within the Theater of the present, and the future world” Ref. Schramm, Helmar Kunstkammer - Laboratory – Theater in the ‘Theatrum Europaeum’: On the Transformation of Performative Space in the 17th Century, In: Collection – Laboratory – Theater: Scenes of Knowledge in the 17th Century, ed. Helmar Schramm, Ludger Schwarze, Jan Lazardzig, Walter de Guyter, Berlin, 2005

Ämnesord

HUMANIORA  -- Konst -- Musik (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Arts -- Music (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Vocal performance practice

Mad scene

La Finta Pazza

Deidamia

Cabinet of wonder

Artistic research

Vocal performance practice

Mad scene

La Finta Pazza

Deidamia17th century opera

Venice

Francesco Sacrati

Giulio Strozzi

17th century opera

Anna Renzi

Teatro San Cassiano

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)