About the only thing less pleasing than having to sit through Hans Neuenfels’s production of Mozart’s 1781 opera “Idomeneo” is the news that Berlin’s Deutsche Oper, citing an “incalculable” security risk from enraged Muslims, has decided to cancel its scheduled showing of the piece.
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Mr. Neuenfels’s version is Modern German–i.e., gratuitously offensive. It is more Neuenfels than Mozart. Instead of appearing as the harbinger of peace, Idomeneo ends the opera parading the severed heads of Poseidon, Jesus, Buddha and the Prophet Muhammad. How do you spell “anachronistic balderdash”?
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There is a certain irony in all this. Our avant-gardist artistic establishment preens itself on being “transgressive,” “challenging,” “provocative,” etc. But it prefers to exercise its anti-bourgeois animus within the coddled purlieus of bourgeois security. It has discovered that there is a big difference between exhibiting photographs of Christ on the cross in a bottle of urine or Madonna having herself “crucified” on her current concert tour and poking fun at Muhammad.
Read the whole thing. You may want to open a dictionary in another window.
The solution here, of course, is a renewal of the art world so that productions like this will never leave the producers’ minds. Nothing is above criticism, but can we return to life, beauty, and community in our artwork? Can we leave behind the tired idea that artists’ must always challenge what they preceive to be the ideas held in the public mind?
This is such a deep subject one doesn’t know where to begin. A few comments.
– there’s a big difference between challenging god’s word and man’s opinion.
– the modern art world operates on the tactic of criticism as a method of fomenting revolution; so it’s criticize everything. (This kind of a thing had went on for a few decades before the russian revolution.)
– I think christians have been far too lax on allowing any kind of anti-christian ‘art’ to have a free ride. (Muslims think no one cares.)We have the question; are we really ‘liberal’ or are we apathetic? or worse, spiritually dead?
– I could go on and on, but I’d prefer to hear comments by other people. (I for one found the planned production grossly offensive.)
Ok, sr.
1. “There’s a big difference between challenging god’s word and man’s opinion.” You’re right, though I don’t see the application here.
2. “The modern art world operates on the tactic of criticism as a method of fomenting revolution; so it’s criticize everything.” I don’t know if you’re right or a little off on this one, but it does seem to be true. The biggest problem I see is that they don’t seem to know what their revolution is supposed to accomplish. Irony of its own sake is not ironic, usually unfunny, and sometimes idiotic, but it is still praised as good art in some circles.
3. “I think Christians have been far too lax on allowing any kind of anti-christian ‘art’ to have a free ride.” What do you mean? What does an non-free ride look like?
Take the protests of the movie, “The Last Temptation of Christ.” Offensive movie, but I don’t think protesting was the best method of rejecting it. In fact, I think the best ways to fight smut and blasphemy in art or pop culture is to love, talk, write, and provide alternative artwork. Boycotts work in measure too. What are your ideas?
I favor boycotts, protests, letter-writing, etc., just as long as we make it clear that we’re not trying to shut people down or prosecute them. There may be an argument for censorship, but it’s a non-starter in today’s climate of opinion. And the Christian case for freedom of speech goes back at least to John Milton.
It seems that the cancellation will be revoked and this opera will be shown after all. What a clever publicity stunt the opera house made by first announcing the cancellation. Usually hardly anybody would be interested in that opera, but now it is the talk of the town. That’s the way to go to get folks into the opera and make money. Just hype up some threat and pretend to cancel something because of it.
I think I am in a very small minority in Germany who approved of the cancellation. That opera is an insult to other religions (since it shows the severed heads of Jesus and Buddha as well) and to Mozart, the composer, himself.
What benefit would we get if we had this opera? It seems the only reason to defend this stupid opera is to avoid giving the impression of appeasement to the Islamofascists. That’s not enough for me. I think this opera would only strengthen Islamofasicsm since it would help their propaganda. To win the war on terrorism, we need to have moderate Muslims on our side, so that they don’t support the terrorists, but give us information about them. And we want the moderate Muslims to win over their autocratic governments and fundamentalist groups in the Arab world. This opera, however, alienates the moderate Muslims and helps the fundamentalists.
Let’s not forget that theater plays critical of Christians and Israel also get canceled. Earlier this year:
“A New York theatre company has put off plans to stage a play about an American activist killed by an Israeli bulldozer in Gaza because of the current “political climate” – a decision the play’s British director, Alan Rickman, denounced as “censorship”.”
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/theatre-gets-stagefright-over-play-on-israeli-death-of-activist/2006/02/28/1141095740986.html
I am not a fan of Rachel Corrie. Not at all. However, if one criticizes the canellation of the Mozart opera for fear of offending Muslimes, then one should also criticize the canceling of that play for fear of offending supporters of Israel..
Besides:
“On May 23, 1998, the New York Times announced that the Manhattan Theatre Club would be canceling its scheduled production of playwright Terrence McNally’s newest play, Corpus Christi, due to bomb and death threats made against the theatre, its personnel, and the playwright. The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights disavowed responsibility for the threats but did publicly applaud the decision, calling the play “blasphemous.””
http://muse.jhu.edu/cgi-bin/access.cgi?uri=/journals/theatre_journal/v051/51.2pr_mcnally.html
When Corpus Christi was shown in Germany in 2000, there have been death threats and bomb threats as well:
http://www.cityinfonetz.de/tagblatt/thema/thema39/
Thus it could very well be that the threats against the “Idomeneo” opera are not only coming from Muslims, but from Christians, who don’t like to see the severed head of Jesus… Having said that: The concern about attacks from Muslims is bigger.
Greetings from Berlin,
My blog: The Atlantic Review, A press digest on transatlantic affairs edited by three German Fulbright Alumni
Josh, thanks for dropping by. I know a couple people in Berlin, though I don’t remember if they are there right now.
I agree that this production of Idomeneo sounds horrific and shouldn’t see the light of day, but the opera house should have rejected it in the planning meeting. If this isn’t calculated hype, then almost any production which is pulled at the last minute over public outrage is a shame because it shows the producers to be out of touch with their community–more so for radical Muslim outrage. From the way I understand modern terrorists, this kind of submission to forecasted retaliation beckons them to kill in Berlin, maybe even at the opera.
And for the record, Christians should not treaten to bomb or vandalize. That’s shameful no matter what the cause.