Arts Partnerships & Tours are delighted to collaborate with Marina Abramović on the revival of her opera performance 7 Deaths of Maria Callas which makes its UK premiere at the English National Opera between 3 – 11 November 2023.
In this highly anticipated UK premiere, renowned performance artist Marina Abramović explores the life, work and death of one of opera’s greatest stars. Callas — whose private life was never quite able to be separated from her performances – has fascinated Abramović for decades, conceiving this operatic project as a homage and exploration of the great prima donna. This staging marks 100 years since the world-renowned American-born Greek soprano was born.
Abramović first heard Maria Callas when she was fourteen years old in Yugoslavia. Since Callas’s voice caught her attention at a young age, Abramović has been drawn to their similarities; from their shared physical features to their personal attributes and relationships.
Immortalised through her place in popular culture, Callas (sometimes referred to as ‘La Divina’ – the divine one) is invoked on stage through a series of her most famous arias from La traviata, Tosca, Madam Butterfly, Carmen, Otello, Lucia di Lamermoor and Norma, with new music by Serbian Composer Marko Nikodijević. Accompanying each of these aria performances are a series of short films starring Abramović and actor Willem Dafoe. Present on stage throughout the performance, Abramović plays the sleeping Callas, haunted by her greatest roles in a set that recreates the Paris apartment where Callas died.
