Project description
Premiered: August 20, 2020
This Intertwining Arts project is a multidisciplinary artistic collaboration in a theatrical setting. Multiple artistic elements are woven together to express a plot with a story of a young bird learning how to fly, growing and becoming mature over time, willing to take a risk in order to stay true to her aspirations.
Music: the 'Bird' piano pieces by Olivier Messiaen outside of the “Bird Catalogue”: “La Fauvette des Jardins”, “Petites Esquisses d'Oiseaux”, “Le Merle Noir” (with Katrin Szamatulski, flute), performed by Elina Akselrud
Dance: a mix of a previously developed base with improvisational parts, choreographed by Sarah Brower, performed by Marzia Zuliani (also involving interactions between the pianist and the dancer).
Visuals: 3D projections: fine art photos created by Volodymyr Zhdanov and moving ambient elements with a bird/nature theme created by the photographer and projection artist Ernst Kehrli.
Costume elements: by the designer Brande Wilkerson.
Ideas we aspire to develop as main philosophical and environmental messages of the film through choreography, and cinematographic symbolism:
The spirit of bird as an essential aspect of culture, art, and personhood: the idea of unlimited freedom
A spirit of the bird resides in every human being as calmness, blessing, enlightenment
The idea of flight, as a symbol of free choice, limitless possibilities for each and everyone
A bird symbolizing the complex self-search of a human being and a need to weigh a choice between freedom and risk (integrity) versus security and lack of ambition (aversion)
Bringing humanity (audience) closer to the nature through the world of birds: in this project birds are impersonated by the artists through the combination of the music, movement, costumes, and projections. It represents an opportunity to feel one’s self a bird in a metaphorical way, and to not separate humanity from nature. My team and I want to remind the public of the crucial necessity to take care of the nature, including birds and their surroundings, because we are all part of the same ‘living mechanism’, the World.
Messiaen's own creative themes
God – love, life, eternity
Rhythm – the universe, the pulse of time, perhaps even self-perception
Birds – on the one hand, keepers of mystery and the Blessing, on the other hand – rhythmists, actors, orators (i.e. the nightingale).
Birdsongs have inspired Messiaen and enriched his already masterful use of complex musical elements. For example, the use of limited transposition, unretrogradable rhythms, harmonic pedalization, as well as the unique technique of the program note, which he developed during his later periods, as a necessary addition to his 'bird style' works.
Although Messiaen attended scientific exhibitions and studied ornithology, his artistic imagination yearned for more. He saw a sacred meaning in these creatures. Maybe the birds know something about the supernatural world, to which he could perhaps be brought closer after his thorough and devoted studies. So, besides a scientific understanding, he also viewed birds emotionally and spiritually. He often listened to birdsong for an extended period of time, and as a result, entered a state of sacred meditation. During this time, he conceived of ethereal vibrations, which he then transposed into the core material of his works, implying its movement through the performer to the listener. The influence of the bird biorhythmics on Messiaen was so colossal that in some metaphorical sense, he also became a bird.
"In my hours of gloom, when I am suddenly aware of my own futility, when every musical idiom – classical, oriental, ancient, modern and ultra-modern – appears to me as no more than admirable, painstaking experimentation, without any ultimate justification, what is left for me but to seek out the true, lost face of music somewhere off in the forest, in the fields, in the mountains or on the seashore, among the birds."
- Olivier Messiaen
Each of us, as an audience member and/or an artist, will have a chance to indulge in Messiaen's meditation through a blend of his music, birdsong, dance performance, and experimental improvisation in this project. As we spiritually become birds, we perceive the freedom of our souls, and thereby we open up to new aspects of our identities, which we may have not discovered before.
We are thankful from the bottom of our hearts for the support of:
Stiftung Monika Widmer
Stiftung Anne-Marie Schindler
FUKA-Fonds Stadt Luzern
Marianne und Curt Dienemann-Stiftung
Migros Kulturprozent
Regionalkonferenz Kultur RKK
Strebi Stiftung
Musikhaus Gisler