Berthe Morisot was a painter
and a member of the circle of painters in Paris who became known as the
Impressionists. She was described by Gustave Geffroy in 1894 as one of
"les trois grandes dames" of Impressionism alongside Marie
Bracquemond and Mary Cassatt. In 1864, Morisot exhibited for the first
time in the highly esteemed Salon de Paris. Sponsored by the government and
judged by Academicians, the Salon was the official, annual exhibition of the
Académie des beaux-arts in Paris. Her work was selected for exhibition in six
subsequent Salons until, in 1874, she joined the "rejected"
Impressionists in the first of their own exhibitions, which included Paul
Cézanne, Edgar Degas, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and
Alfred Sisley. Morisot was married to Eugène Manet, the brother of her friend
and colleague Édouard Manet.
Today's
lecture is five operas featuring “Marriage”, which were introduced in “The 38th
ACJ Music Academy” on March 12, 2016.
1. Le
nozze di Figaro (Mozart)
It is an opera buffa composed by Mozart in
1786 and Lorenzo Da Ponte wrote the opera's libretto based on Pierre
Beaumarchais’ comedy, The Marriage of Figaro (1784).
Count Almaviva, who bought a barber, Figaro
and all the others with money, was married to a virgin he wanted in the first
episode of "The Barber of Seville.” Then, he appears as a playboy who gets
tired of his wife and habitually makes love affairs with other women in the
sequel, "Le nozze di Figaro." When Figaro, who made a big
contribution to the Count’s marriage and became his servant, tries to marry the
maid Susanna, the Count reactivates the “Jus primae noctis (the right of the
lord to sleep with the bride before the bridegroom)”that had already been
abolished by him, to take Susanna before marriage. Finally, Figaro, Susanna,
and Countess Rosina Almaviva make the Count succumb with their tricks.
2. L'elisir
d'amore (Donizetti)
This is a two-act opera composed by Gaetano
Donizetti based on Felice Romani's libretto.
In the early 19th century, everybody is
busy during a harvest in a rural village in Spain, but Adina, who is a daughter
of a landowner, reads a book in the shade of a tree and bursts into laughter as
she reads the story of Love Potion from the legends of Northern Europe Tristan
and Isolde. The town's bachelor Nemorino loves Adina
but she always rejects his propose. Nemorino thinks such medicine really exists
and wants to get it. Then, a drug dealer named “Dulcamara” comes to this town,
and Nemorino buys the love potion from him by spending all the money, but in
fact it is just cheap wine. The drug dealer says, “The effect of the medicine appears
exactly after 24 hours.” Nemorino, who thought the wine as the love potion and
drank it, finally succeeds in attaining Adina's love.
3. Don
Pasquale (Donizetti)
A three-act opera buffa composed by Gaetano
Donizetti, with an Italian libretto by Giovanni Ruffini and Donizetti based on a
libretto by Angelo Anelli for Stefano Pavesi's opera “Ser Marcantonio.”
An old bachelor miser and rich man, Don
Pasquale can't get married because he's afraid his wife will waste his
property. Pasquale has only one kin who is his nephew, Ernesto. He wants to
marry his nephew to a rich virgin, but Ernesto is secretly loving a young
widow, Norina. Pasquale opposes Norina who is a widow with a marriage history and
has no property and no dowry. But as his nephew resists, Pasquale declares that
he will marry. Then all the property is taken over by Pasquale's wife and
Ernesto cannot inherit anything. Surprised Ernesto confesses the physician of
Pasquale. The physician suggests an idea to disguise Norina into the physician's
younger sister and introduce her to Pasquale as his wife candidate. Pasquale loves
Norina at first sight and marries her right away, but as soon as Pasquale signs
his marriage certificate, she acts to get tired of him. Pasquale, who couldn't
stand it anymore, calls his physician for a divorce. The physician pretends to
make a trick again and says that marrying Ernesto to the widow is the only way
to get Pasquale's wife away. Since there is no other way, Pasquale allows
Ernesto's marriage, and those who succeeded in their plan reveal the truth
before Pasquale.
4. Orphée
aux Enfers (Offenbach)
It is a two-act comic opera composed by Jacques
Offenbach with a libretto by Hector Crémieux and Ludovic Halévy.
Orpheus is a music teacher who lives on
violin lessons, and Eurydice is a cheating wife with a shepherd because she is
tired of her husband. But this shepherd is actually a god Pluton in disguise.
When Eurydice is killed by her husband's trap, Orpheus is so happy, but soon Public
Opinion appears (a personification of 'public opinion') and says “Since the
reputation of the world is more important than love, although you don't like
it, go find your wife.” Then it makes Orpheus go to hell. Meanwhile, in
Olympos, the gods raise a riot against the dictator and the playboy Zeus, and
in order to endure the embarrassing situation, Zeus leads all the gods down to
the underworld, where he transforms himself into a fly and seduces Eurydice.
But when forced to send her back to the ground, Zeus offers a condition to Orpheus
not to looking back until he sees the light on the ground and then waits for Orpheus’
looking back with curiosity. Orpheus is surprised by the thunderstorm of
Zeus, who had lost control, and looks back. Finally, Orpheus and Eurydice rejoice
and break up.
5.
Prodaná nevěsta (Smetana)
It is a comic opera in three acts by the
Czech composer Bedřich Smetana, to a libretto by Karel Sabina.
Everyone is enjoying town’s festival, but
the main heroine Mařenka is in trouble. Because she has a lover but her parents are
trying to marry her to the landowner’s son. Mařenka's
lover, Jeník, who was driven by a bad stepmother, is living a tough life with
hard works. He meets and loves Mařenka but he is worried that
her parents don’t want to give their only daughter to a wanderer who has
neither parents nor property. The matchmaker hands Jeník the money and
asks him to write a note that gives up Mařenka to
earn money by making a successful marriage of Mařenka and
the landowner's son. Jeník accepts the proposal with a condition that Mařenka
must marry the landowner's son. Mařenka, meanwhile, describes herself
as a witch to the landowner's son who has never seen Mařenka,
causing him to give up his marriage. However, she misunderstands that Jeník
abandoned his love and sold her to the matchmaker. But at the gathering of the
villagers, Jeník reveals that he is the landowner's eldest son, who had been
driven by his stepmother long ago. After all, Mařenka and Jeník
get married in the blessing of everyone.
You
can listen to all thearias selected in this course from following YouTube
link.
1. Sull’ aria, Le nozze di Figaro (Mozart)
2. Una furtiva lagrima, L'elisir d'amore
(Donizetti)
3. Quel guardo il cavaliere, Don Pasquale
(Donizetti)
4. Viens! C’est l’honneur qui t’appelle, Orphée
aux Enfers (Offenbach)
5. I know a maiden fair, Prodaná nevěsta
(Smetana)
Modigliani Institute Korea (MIK) is
currently introducing artworks of Amedeo Modigliani one by one every week.
The 34th work to introduce for this
week is “Bride and Groom (1915)”.
This work is a portrait of an
expressionist style and an oil painting on canvas with the size of 55.2 x 46.4
cm.
It is currently owned by the Museum
of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City, USA.
This work has various titles such
as "The Newlyweds" and "The Couple".
Most of Modigliani's works are
portraits of individuals, but this work, which he painted a couple, is one of
the most unusual and rare works.
Modigliani also painted most of his
works using the poor as models, but it is also exceptional to depict rich
people.
In this work, the man can be
imagined as a rich man in his cool and expensive dress, and the woman’s dress
cannot be seen, but it is easily imagined that she also may be wearing a cool
and expensive dress that matches the groom's level.
This work is a good example showing
some of Modigliani's unique work styles.
In other words, the elongated face
and neck of the model are such examples, and the models’ small mouth, pointed
nose and empty eyes without pupils also show the typical style of Modigliani
influenced by African masks and sculptures.
The woman in this work also shows
the aesthetic ideal that Modigliani pursues: dark hair and pale skin.
There are only two works, which
Modigliani, who specialized in a single figure, depicted a couple.
They are the “Bride and Groom” and
a year later, in 1916, “Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz”. For that reason, this work is often
compared with “Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz”.
However, if the two works are
compared, this work is much more faithful to African masks and sculptures, while
the portrait of Jacques Lipchitz couple is much softer and more curved.
The actual character of this work
is unknown, but it is likely that they are acquaintances of Modigliani, as the
figures of his other portraits. However, Modigliani met a variety
of people while living in Paris, so they might be a couple whom Modigliani
doesn't know at all.
Jean Cocteau once said that this
work might be inspired by the upstarts whom Modigliani accidentally discovered
on the road.
This work also reveals the
influence of Cubism, which Modigliani was influenced, in many parts.
For the background, it looks as if
the puzzle pieces have been put together, by systematically separating it into
vertical and horizontal lines.
In addition, Modigliani divided the
canvas in half, and strictly confined the man and woman in each half of the
space and painted.
In each half of the canvas, a
vertical line was drawn at the center of the man and woman, respectively, and
the characteristics of the model were constructed around this vertical line.
In other words, to balance the right-sided
nose and hat and the larger ear, Modigliani painted the left-sided beard and
bow tie for the man and the left part of the dress darker.
For the woman, Modigliani painted
the larger amount of hair by drawing the left side of her head higher and
larger and the left-sided mouth to balance the right-sided nose, the earring on
one side, and the shoulder on the right side.
Modigliani also emphasized the
difference in height between the man and woman by using different background
expression.
In other words, Modigliani used
complex vertical and horizontal lines in the woman’s background while he did
not express a specific background for the man.
In this work, the man and woman
show opposite appearances: the man is tall and old, but the woman is small and
young. Therefore, the two don't look like
a couple.
Perhaps the reason why Modigliani,
who mainly painted the poor, drew the rich couple might be to maximizeridicule
and resentment against the rich by contrasting the unsuitable man and woman
under the title, The Couple.
Perhaps Modigliani might express
despise and ridicule for the rich who think of love easily by using the title,
The Couple, ironically for the man and woman who seem to be immoral.
This work borrowed some styles of
Cubism, but Modigliani still tries to stick to his subject of interest; human
body and face.
Giovanni Antonio Canal, commonly known as
Canaletto, was an Italian painter of city views or vedute, of Venice, Rome, and
London. He also painted imaginary views, although the demarcation in his works
between the real and the imaginary is never quite clearcut. He was further an
importantprintmakerusing the etching technique. In the period from 1746 to
1756 he worked in England where he painted many views of London and other sites
including Warwick Castle and Alnwick Castle. He was highly successful in
England, thanks to the British merchant and connoisseur Joseph "Consul"
Smith, whose large collection of Canaletto's works was sold to King George III
in 1762.
Today's
lecture is five operas featuring “Myth/Bible”, which were introduced in “The 37th
ACJ Music Academy” on March 5, 2016.
1.
Orfeo ed Euridice (Gluck)
It is a three-act opera composed by Christoph
Willibald Gluck, and set to a libretto by Ranieri de' Calzabigi, which is one
of the most important works in opera history.
Orfeo is a poet and musician of Thrace.
Born between Calliope, one of Musai, and human, Orfeo himself believes that Apollo
is his father. When he sings with lyre, the wild beasts and even rocks were
moved by his songs. Married to the nymph Euridice, but when she is bitten by a
snake and dies, Orfeo goes to the Underworld to get his wife back and moves the
hearts of the gods and spirits by his music. However, when he walks out of the
Underworld, he breaks the ban on not looking back at her until he sees the
light on the ground, and eventually loses Euridice. After crying for a week on
the border of the Styx, Orfeo never again brought the women close.
2. Les
Troyens (Berlioz)
It is a French grand opera in five acts by
Hector Berlioz. The libretto was written by Berlioz himself from Virgil's epic
poem, the Aeneid.
Trojan princess Cassandra is punished for
rejecting Apollon's love and fooling him. The punishment is that she received
the power of prophecy from Apollon, but no one believes her prophecy, because she
broke the promise that "If you give me the power of prophecy, I will
accept your love."
In Act 1, Cassandra feels ominous at the horse left by
the Greeks and opposes the horse to be brought into the temple of Troy, but no
one believes in Cassandra's prophecy and the horse enters the temple of Troy.
In Act 2, the Greeks hiding in the horse occupy Troy, and Aeneas escapes to Carthage
with his servants as the ghost of Hector tells. To avoid being humiliated by
the Greeks, Cassandra stabs herself, and all other Trojan women follow.
In Act 3, Aeneas is hospitalized by Carthage's
queen Dido and he stays there. When the Numidian king invades Carthage, Aeneas
leads the army and defeats the invading forces.
In Act 4, Dido, who loves Aeneas,
wants to marry him and hand over the throne to Aeneas. Aeneas tries to stay in Carthage,
but God Hermes appears and commands him to go to Italy and build a new country.
In Act 5, the gods are getting angry about the fact that Aeneas is still not
leaving Carthage, and realizing that he cannot disobey fate, Aeneas tries to
leave Carthage without telling Dido. When he tries to lead his servants and lift
the anchors, angry Dido appears to condemn Aeneas, but before the morning comes
Aeneas leaves Carthage. After all hope is lost, Dido builds an altar, climbs on
it, and dies for herself.
3. Götterdämmerung
(Wagner)
It is the last music drama of four music
dramas by Richard Wagner, “Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung)”,
following Das Rheingold (The Rhinegold), Die Walküre (The Valkyrie), and Siegfried.
Siegfried saves Brünnhilde, Daughter of
Wotan in Part 3, who was trapped in the fire wall in Part 2. In Part 4, Götterdämmerung,
the two swear love by giving and receiving rings and horses as gifts. However,
the ring Siegfried received from Brünnhilde was originally made by human’s stealing
gold from the fairies of the Rhine, and it was both blessed and cursed. The
owner of the ring is destined to “dominate the world, but to leave love.” Siegfried
doesn’t know the history of the ring, but King Gunther, his servant Hagen, and
his sister, who know the truth, devise their own schemes to get the ring. Knowing
nothing and drinking alcohol they give, Siegfried suffers from amnesia, forgets
about his vow with Brünnhilde and marries King Gunther’s sister.
Following their plans, Brünnhilde, who
became the wife of Gunther, is full of revenge and informs Hagen of Siegfried's
vital spot, and Hagen kills him. Then the rest of the people fight over the
ring, and Hagen also kills King Gunther. Finally, discovering that everything
was Hagen's conspiracy, Brünnhilde throws the ring into the Rhine, then mounts
her horse Grane, and rides into the flames. The flames that burned the castle on
the ground spread to the Valhalla, the palace of the gods, and the gods are
destroyed with humans.
4. Samson
et Dalila (Saint-Saëns)
It is a grand opera in three acts by
Camille Saint-Saëns based on the Biblical tale of Samson and Delilah to a
French libretto by Ferdinand Lemaire.
The main character, Samson, in the story of
Gaza in Palestine in 1150 B.C., is generally known for his immense power to
tear lions with his bare hands, but in the Old Testament, he is recorded as a judge
of Israel who excelled not only in power but also in wisdom.
He struck down the Philistines who ruled
Israel at that time and even killed thousands of people at once by swinging
donkey jaws as weapons. This situation led the Philistines to treat Samson as
an enemy and try to kill him, but he was so strong that such plans to
assassinate him were failed.
Therefore, in the end, the method Philistines
used was using beautiful women. It seems to be true that the Philistine women were
more beautiful than the Israeli woman, and Samson often fell in love with the Philistine
women, and Dalila, who lived in the valley of Sorek, was one of them. Dalila,
who has been promised a high compensation from the high class of Philistines,
actively seduces Samson and finally finds out the secret of his power that it
is from his hair. Then, she cuts his hair while he sleeps and hands him over to
the Philistines.
Samson, whose hair was cut and who became blind,
is turning the millstone while bound. In front of the stage, the Hebrew
prisoners chorus and resent Samson for selling them for the woman. Samson
repents of sin against God, asks for mercy, and soon the Philistines draw him out.
After the dance is over, the blind Samson comes out drawn by the hand of a
child. The priests, Dalila, and the Philistines mock him. The Philistines
praise Dagon and offer sacrifices. The high priest commands Samson to kneel
before the god Dagon and offer a cup. Samson asks the child to lead him toward marble
pillars. He took Samson between the two pillars. Samson cries 'Lord, give me
one moment back my former power! Let me crush them here so I can pay back’ and
pushes the pillars with his hands. Finally, the giant pillars slowly move, and
everyone is buried under the temple.
5. Elektra
(Richard Strauss)
It
is a one-act opera by Richard Strauss, to a German-language libretto by Hugo
von Hofmannsthal, which he adapted from his 1903 drama, Elektra.
The
stage of the opera begins with the Mycenaean palace after Agamemnon was killed.
The younger brother Orestes is in exile in a distant land, and Clytemnestra, Aegisthus,
Elektra and her sister Chrysothemis remain in the palace. Elektra is living her
life to pay back her father's revenge. Her sister, Chrysothemis, who is
weak-hearted, also feels the pain of her heart like Elektra, but she doesn’t
understand her vengeful elder sister. Chrysothemis' only wish is to marry, have
children, and build a normal family. Clytemnestra, who encounters Elektra in
the yard, requests her daughter a prescription for her painful dreams, but Elektra
responds with a cold answer that she has no choice but to offer just sacrifices
and it makes her mother almost faint.
Elektra,
who dreams of a day of revenge with Orestes, asks Chrysothemis to join in the revenge
when she heard that Orestes has died in an accident, but Chrysothemis is
frightened and runs away. Elektra decides to get revenge alone by the ax, that
killed Agamemnon, buried under the ground. Then, Orestes, who was rumored to be
dead, appears in front of Elektra and reveals who he is. Orestes first kills
his mother, Clytemnestra, and Elektra lures Aegisthus and hand him over to Orestes.
After the vengeance is complete, Elektra dances with ecstasy and dies.
You
can listen to all the arias selected in this course from following YouTube
link.
1. Che faro senza Euridice?, Orfeo ed
Euridice (Gluck)
2. Non, je ne verrai pas, Les Troyens
(Berlioz)
3. Grane, mein Ross, sei mir gegruβt, Götterdämmerung
(Wagner)
4. Mon Coeur s’ouvre a ta voix, Samson et
Dalila (Saint-Saëns)
