Thirty Years Ago, Ai Weiwei Was an Extra in a Puccini Opera. Now He’s Directing One—and the Hong Kong Protests Will Figure Prominently

The ongoing protests in Hong Kong, which have drawn hundreds of
thousands of the city’s citizens to the streets to make demands of
their government, will now figure in two new projects by dissident
Chinese artist Ai Weiwei.

The first is a work for the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma (Rome Opera House), for which he will design and
direct a new version of Giacomo Puccini’s three-act
production, Turandot.

“This Turandot will be
from my point of view,” Ai said in a statement when the production
was first announced earlier
this year. “It will be an opera immersed in the contemporary world,
the present cultural and political struggles represented through
Puccini’s story.”

The protests in Hong Kong, sparked by a proposed extradition
agreement with mainland China that would have made it harder for
activists and journalists to seek protections, will now be the
focus of his production, according to the Art Newspaper. “The demonstrations will definitely be
reflected in the opera,” he told the publication.

In addition, Ai is also working on a documentary about the
protests. Earlier this month,
the artist sent a film crew to the city to gather
footage.

The demonstrators’ demands have grown since Hong Kong’s chief
executive, Carrie Lam, withdrew the proposed extradition bill.
Among them are a complete suspension of the proposal, which could
currently still make its way to law; amnesty for every arrested
protester; and an inquiry into allegations of brutal police
tactics.

The opera project, which was proposed by the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, also taps into Ai’s
personal history, according to the Art Newspaper. In 1987,
the artist, along with his brother, was an extra in stagings
of Puccini’s work at the Metropolitan opera House in
New York.

“I would never have accepted if
it had not been Turandot,” Weiwei said to the Italian newspaper
La
Repubblica earlier
this year. “I have never forgotten [that experience] at the Met
with my brother. I did it to maintain my studies, the work was
culturally very far from my interests.”

The details of how Hong Kong will figure into the opera are not
yet clear. (The artist did not
respond to artnet’s request for comment.) But the work, with a
libretto by Giuseppe Adami and Renato Simoni, is set in China
and follows a young prince who must solve three riddles to win a
princess’s love. The work was left unfinished when Puccini died in
1924 and was completed by composer Franco Alfano in 1926. It was staged in Milan for the first
time later that year.

Weiwei’s Turandot is set to run from March 25 to April 5 next
year.

The post Thirty Years Ago, Ai Weiwei Was an Extra in a
Puccini Opera. Now He’s Directing One—and the Hong Kong Protests
Will Figure Prominently appeared first on artnet
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