Orlando Opera is “All for Art” in the 2023-2024 season. No opera better exemplifies the tragic artistic spirit than Tosca. The new Steinmetz Hall is in many ways unsettling. I asked to see the play from the highest possible vantage point. Each of the upper levels has a knee high railing, and from this height vertigo set in. Pam and I sat on the end and had to stand to let late comers squeeze by. Gathering my art supplies became a challenge as people pushed by. I am amazed no one was pushed over the edge.
Coughing echoed throughout the hall.
The singing in Tosca is in Italian. I sketched through the first act, so I didn’t have the advantage of reading the subtitles above the stage. I had seen Tosca many years before however so I had a general idea of what was happening. An artist worked on a sensual portrait of a Madonna. His lovers, a famous singer, was jealous because the eyes in the portrait did not match her own dark eyes. When the artist was not in the studio she climbed the scaffold and painted a dark slash over the eyes.
Sketching in absolute darkness, I think my sketch doesn’t come close to capturing the gorgeous set. I suspect I would have capture the gorgeous candle light better with a digital sketch, but I didn’t think I could get my digital sketchbook into the hall. Huge paintings defined each plane of the set. A child in a gasket, perhaps Moses was placed at the back of the stage, I think Jesus was on house left and the Rape of the Sabine Women on house right. The floor was also a framed painting and I think it repeated the painting at the back since the child’s face repeated on the floor.
The opera was absolutely tragic.