Wagnerlicht: A Reignited Ring Cycle
May 2013
Travelling multimedia installation Wagnerlicht intertwines light, music and ideas making Sydney’s Vivid Festival the ideal launch-pad for the project, which will continue to grow over the next three years, building momentum and extra limbs as it travels.
Wagnerlicht is made up of various multi-scale components which use different technologies in a way that allows viewers to interact with them, recreating sections of Wagner’s epic Der Ring des Niebelungen.
The construction of the installation so far has been divided between Australia and Germany with young and innovative light students, designers, sculptors and academics from both Sydney’s University of Technology and the University of Applied Sciences in Ansbach, Germany creating various elements.
“The average age of the people contributing is early 20s. It has been great to see them explore Wagner, often for the first time,” says Michael Day, creator of Wagnerlicht and Interior and Spatial Design lecturer at UTS. “They have taken very original slants, being more savvy with the technology; they have incorporated things which really engage the senses.”
The starting point for everyone involved was to put something ‘Wagnerian’ in a box no bigger than 750 cubic millimetres. This allowed ease of shipping but also left a lot to the imagination of participants. From the outside it could be just an unassuming box with a hole in it, inviting the viewer to peer in and explore. Inside could be an exploration of one of the characters, themes, scenes or emotions evoked from the operatic sequence. One contribution contains a wooden bird and forest made of straws, which light up upon the sound of a whistle.
This deconstructed and collaborative approach is only appropriate with The Ring Cycle, as it’s often referred to in English, being comprised of four progressive operas written over a 26 year period.
Most participants took from the first of the series, Das Rheingold, which contains whimsical elements and interesting creative platforms – think dragons and invisibility helmets. These were easy themes to retrieve inspiration from, says Day, as the attraction to texts frequently read today by people of all ages, such as Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones, stems from these basic elements of an enchanting story.
“The installations did end up varying in size. There’s a few dragon heads, which when passing by you can hear the growl and feel the heartbeat underneath you,” explains Day excitedly. “One large one has music stands with ten iPads which let you conduct the entire 16 hours of The Ring.”
Each interpretation and unique perspective adds a new layer to an intricate homage to The Ring Cycle.
After Vivid, Wagnerlicht will head to Bachaus Museum in Eisenach, Germany, and later in the year to Melbourne for the Opera Australia Ring Cycle and Wagner Arts Festival. The multi-layered installation has plans to visit light festivals and academic institutions in Moscow, Rio de Janeiro, Singapore and Lyon, with new additions inserted along the way. In 2015 it will be assembled in full within Prague’s Sceneography Quadrennial.
This initiation period within Vivid Sydney and the Conservatorium of Music commemorates the bicentenary of Richard Wagner’s birth. Just a series of boxes from the outside, the beauty of Wagnerlicht is internal and experiential. It beckons you in to explore its interior and, for the uninitiated, the world of Wagner.
Free as part of Vivid Sydney, showing now until June 7 at Sydney’s Conservatorium of Music
vividsydney.com/events/wagnerlicht/
wagnerlicht.com/
vividsydney.com/ideas/
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