Victory over the Sun

Victory over the Sun ( Pobeda nad solncem; Победа над Солнцем ) is the title of the first futurist opera, whose only performances on 3 and 5 December 1913 at the Luna Park Theatre took place in Saint Petersburg and led to one of the biggest scandals in the history of theater.

Authors

The opera is the result of an interdisciplinary collective work of the Russian artist Alexej Kruchenykh ( libretto ), Velimir Khlebnikov ( prologue ), Mikhail Matjuschin (music) and Kasimir Malevich ( lighting director, costumes and stage design), after the first panrussischen Congress of the Futurists (the " singer of the Future " ) in Uusikirkko, today's Russian Polyany, began in July 1913. The aim of the meeting was to write a futuristic theater as an attack on " the bulwark of artistic misery ," the Russian theater. The performances were organized by the group of artists Soyuz Molodeschi (Union of Youth). The rent for the theater should have taken a large part of the funding for the production to complete.

Construction

Victory over the Sun is divided into a prologue, two elevators and six images. Four images are provided for the first elevator, two images for the second.

Occupation

There were mainly presented as non-professional actors contrasting personal, highly stereotypical characters:

• First futuristic force man
• Second futuristic force man
• Nero and Caligula in a person
• Traveler through all times
• Someone with bad intentions
• The Contentious
• Enemy
• Enemy warriors
• The athletes
• Gravedigger
• Sun beam

• Gossips on the phone
• Colorful Eye
• The new
• The cowards
• Reader
• The thickness
• The long-time residents
• The attentive worker
• The young man
• The pilot
• Choir

Content

The prologue of the play is not related to the other contents of the opera, but to arouse the audience's attention. The real action then focused mainly on the experiences of a time traveler who tells of a changed society in the 35th century, " there is power without violence, and the rebels are fighting with the sun and although there is no luck, all look happy and immortal from ... No wonder I am quite dusty ... " the battle of the " futuristic force people " against the sun and the sun is obtained in an " enclosed concrete house ". The second act portrays the prospects of the company without sun "in the tenth countries," without past and without a reminder: "We have shot to the past. Is there anything left? . No trace "It shows that the Liberated can do much with their newly won freedom ," Allen was easy to breathe and many do not know what to do with it before unlikely ease. Some try to drown himself, the weak have lost their minds, they said, we can still be terrible and strong. She complained, " At the end, the conclusion:". Beginning well that ends well, we are without end. If the whole world zugrund, we are without end. "The course of action will be hidden by some incomprehensible and illogical episodes, which greatly complicate the linear understanding of history.

Background - Russian Revolution, Futurism and Suprematism

" We practice in an opera performance, the total destruction of the concepts and words, the old decorations and musical harmony. We created a new, liberated from conventional Experience Factory - fully in itself in seeming futility of words, the painting and the lute, - we created the new characters of the future " (quoted by Mona Foertsch ). The distance to the actual story, which is achieved by stylistic devices, such as intentional false singing or onomatopoeia and a vice determinedly piano instead of the usual orchestra, ultimately does not allow any conclusions regarding any political intentions of the authors, although the time in which the opera was and listed was is clearly reflected and commented. The intentions regarding a renewal of theater and culture of Russian art and culture in general were there obvious: " The actors were positioned in the middle of the audience, they cried throughout the piece in, grabbed them and spat on them. The real goal ... [ was ] ... the involvement of the audience in the presentation to provoke mental and physical outbursts, and so to make art noticeably " The Opera " makes present the struggle of the inhabitants of the earth against the sun -. Symbol of vitality, but also the. reason, the Enlightenment - and the final conquest of the star by modern technology, especially through the use of flying machines " Kruchenykh served in several locations of the trans- rational bridle language developed by him, a loud stick precursor of Dada and concrete poetry " The Zakuverkalaj itched [ ... ] Sprenkurezal stor dvan entel ti te [ ... ] Amda Kurlo tu ti caught and sucked [ ... ] LLL KR KR KR TLP TLMT VD TR KR VUBR DU DU RA LKBI SHR VIDA DIBA ". Matjuschin composed the music using quarter tone intervals ( first quarter-tone experiments ) and noises, so the propeller and engine noises, thunder of cannon. The stage curtain was the Black Square by Kazimir Malevich, the substance has become nothing, one of the key works of art history, Futurism and initial work of Suprematism. Through the Cubo-Futurist costumes the possibilities were reduced in motion. Sets and costumes were enhanced by the use of headlamps and light effects in their effect on the audience, the actors' bodies often only partially lit. The costumes made ​​of wire and paperboard oriented to the basic geometric shapes and the colors black, yellow, red and blue. One of the stated goals of the opera is to set the transition from Cubism to abstraction in scene was. More than many other historical and political events must, in particular, but also the artistic and cultural context for an interpretation be called the. The political background is - even if the intentions of the authors are difficult to assess - far more apparent than the artistic. Thus, the piece can be placed seamlessly into the pre-revolutionary developments in Russia since 1905. The fight against the sun symbolizes the struggle against the Althergekommene and reflects the industrial revolution of the flowering spätzaristischen Russia resist. The ironic refraction through the listed artistic twists can thereby different conclusions and presents the revolutionary content in part on the head. Conceivable open the scope for possible interpretations. The scandal erupted, however, probably about primarily through the consistent use of his time yet disconcerting stylistic device. But the content itself shows distance. After the capture of the sun it is said: " We are free. Smash is the sun. Long live the darkness, the black gods, her favorite - the pig " Light from the sun is transferred to the inside:". Face we are dark. Our light is in us. " The performances of the opera should have led to strenuous arguments with the audience, most critics rejected the work around from.

Reconstructions and effects

From the opera itself only fragments have been preserved. So far, there are few significant reconstructions of the piece. One comes from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in collaboration with the California Institute of the Arts under the direction of Robert Benedetti ( Victory over the Sun ) and was performed at the Berlin Festival in 1983. In this version of the aspect of spoken theater is considered stronger. 1984 developed the Theaterunie Amsterdam ( Director: Chaim Levano, Conducted by Huub Kerstens ) production "Over Winning op de Zon ", which emphasized the concept of biomechanical machines theater and in a version in German language, even at the experimental stage of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich theater was listed in the stables. A third version of 1993 is very much seen as a development of the material and comes from the Austrian K & K Music Theatre under the direction of Dieter Kaufmann, Music: Sergei Dreznin, stage and film: Klaus Karl Bauer, composer and pianist Sergei Dreznin trained in Vsevolod Meyerhold's biomechanics which has already been applied for the stairs scene from Battleship Potemkin. This formula takes into account more the operatic character of the original. Another version under the direction of Julia Hollander, Music: Jeremy Arden, was performed in London in 1999. In addition, the opera has influenced many artists in their work, as El Lissitzky, the Victory Over the Sun with a 1923 themed folio work.