From the beginning of the project, we asked ourselves some questions. Does opera still matter? What could be its future? The Traction consortium thinks opera is extraordinary, and co-creation is central to its future. Traction was a partnership of opera companies, research institutes and universities established to explore how opera might tell new stories in new ways that resonate with today’s European societies. We worked with communities in Barcelona, Portugal and Ireland to co-create three exploratory operas. The foundation of our work was co-creation - a process in which professional artists work on an equal basis with non-professional artists to create new art. Everyone involved is an artist, just as everyone in a marathon is a runner. But they bring different resources to the creative process. Professional artists have skills, knowledge, experience and judgement. Non-professionals have fresh ideas, things to say and a need to say it. Together, they can co-create something that neither could have made alone.
Barcelona: A big-scale community opera production - The first community opera was led by the Liceu Opera House in Barcelona, working together with people from Raval to co-create a new opera about their own dynamic, diverse but often misjudged neighbourhood. La Gata Perduda is the story of a community’s self-defence against exploitation by those who would sell it off and enrich themselves. The opera drew on interviews with residents to shape a story of joyful resistance. Three hundred and fifty local people sang, danced and acted with professional opera artists, while hundreds more co-created the costumes, stage set and posters. So many people wanted to see the performances that a thousand were invited to the dress rehearsal - no one wanted to miss the Liceu takeover by Raval.
Portugal: Community opera in a youth prison - In Portugal, the SAMP music school has been producing Mozart with inmates of Leiria Youth Prison for several years, but Traction gave them the chance and the resources to co-create a new opera based on the lives of the participants and their relatives. The production used a Traction digital tool called Co-Creation Stage to link performers on the stage with others in the music pavilion at the prison, as well as people involved in the operas in Barcelona and Dublin. The opera reimagined the myth of Ulysses and Penelope, separated by their own decisions, to create a moving and original work that was performed twice inside the prison and twice in a Lisbon concert hall. This work involves long-term change, for the people who take part and for the prison service that has been an invaluable supporter of the opera project.
Ireland: The world’s first VR community opera - The Irish opera was original in a different way - it is the first Virtual Reality (VR) opera, co-created by professional and non-professional artists. Irish National Opera used the Co-Creation Space – a new digital tool developed by Traction – to enable people in different parts of the country to co-create the opera’s music, visual imagery and narrative. The 20-minute piece, experienced only through a VR headset, reworks Irish myths into a story of climate destruction and moral choices with alternate endings, according to the viewer’s responses. About a hundred non-professionals contributed to the process, including some who played or sang in the opera’s composition.
