Chiharu Shiota: Idomeneo: Grand Théâtre Genève + artgenève 2024

For his first opera production as director of the Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui has teamed up with Chiharu Shiota for the set design of IDOMÉNÉE. Shiota and Cherkaoui have mustered the forces of the dancers, as well as the soloists, to realise a set where the red threads form and transform in continuous movement the spaces inhabited by men and gods - palace, raging ocean, garden or sea monster - and where their stories intertwine.

Red and black, pastel or thread feature throughout Shiota’s work. Rich in symbolism, the colour red alludes for the artist to our connectedness to each other, the interior of the body and the complex network of neural connections in the brain. Pastel or thread are fluid, expressive and immediate materials – and respond to the emotive associations of the colour. 

Although they incorporate the distinctive red thread/rope for which the Japanese artist has become well known, the application of her particular approach for a stage set has presented her with new considerations: 

“Usually, the visitor moves through my installations. But creating for the stage requires completely different conditions. For the stage, I must create for the performer, they interact with their environment and the audience watches from afar. With thread, I am drawing in the air, and for the stage, I have created everything out of lines... 

This installation represents the energy and movement of the opera. The chair symbolizes the King’s throne, but it is empty in the artwork, anyone can sit on it, creating a feeling of an “existence in the absence”, while music sheets from the opera are floating within the vortex of the red string, symbolizing the many complicated relationships within the opera. In my artwork, the string is like an extension of a brushstroke from the canvas, but on stage, the string is everything. I create the space, the ocean, and nature with this material.” 

Idomeneo premiered at the Grand Théâtre de Genève on February 21st 2024.