Opera For The Dead, OFTD

Monica Lim & Mindy Meng Wang

 
  • Lead artists
    composers/sound designers     Monica Lim & Mindy Meng Wang
  • Date 10.22.Tue. 7:30pm
  • Conversation with Artists 10.22.Tue. 7:30pm
    After the performance, a conversation with the artist will take place.
  • Rating 00 and over
  • Venue Arko Arts Theater, Small Hall
  • Duration 30min
  • Premiere 2024 Seoul Performing Arts Festival
  • Tickets 10,000
  • Cooperation Australia-Korea Foundation, APAM, Asia TOPA
  • *This performance is part of the Seoul Performing Arts Festival 2023-2024 Creative Lab ‘Next Mobility’ project, funded by the Australia-Korea Foundation and produced in partnership with the Australian Performing Arts Market (APAM).
  • guide *This performance is a Work in Progress and will be followed by an Open Talk with the participating artists after the performance.
    *This performance includes loud sound, music, darkness and intense lighting.

 

Global Interpark ARKO Tickets

Cathartic experience through an invitation to mourning rituals, between life and death.

A unique live music performance that offers a cathartic experience through mourning rituals, reflecting on loss between life and death.

Introduction

Opera for the Dead (“OFTD”) is a multi-artform performance inspired by rituals and beliefs surrounding ancestor worship, death and afterlife in Chinese and Chinese diaspora culture. It combines new/digital media, physical installation, performance culture and live music to create a contemporary experience of grief that allows audiences to reflect on how they would like to live by rehearsing death through reimagined mourning rituals.

Synopsis

In 2015, Mindy lost her father. As an only daughter, she was tasked with preparing his funeral. In the process, she experienced firsthand how rituals and traditions passed down for thousands of years clashed with contemporary life. As she prepared for the funeral in shock and grief, Mindy realized that funerals were filled with formal elements expected by society. The work explores the contradictions between the spiritual and material aspects of ancestor rites, asking us to reflect on how we commemorate our lives and our loved ones, how we want to be remembered, and how we want to live. Through these imaginations, it rethinks the relationship between life and death. For SPAF, we will show a work-in-progress that combines live and recorded acoustic and electroacoustic music, surround sound and 3D animation in a simplified format.

Lead artists & composers/sound designers

Monica Lim



Monica Lim is an Australian sound artist and pianist with Malaysian heritage whose work spans installations, performance art, contemporary dance and new-instrument-making. She is interested in cross-disciplinary genres and forms as well as combinations of new technology with music. Her work has been presented at Arts House, Science Gallery Melbourne, White Night, Liquid Architecture, Melbourne Fringe, Arts Centre Melbourne, Asia TOPA, Sydney Dance Company and WorldPride as well as international symposiums such as ISEA and NIME.
Monica is currently undertaking postgraduate research at the Faculty of Fine Arts and Music, University of Melbourne in movement-led composition and new technologies. She is part of the research team at VCA Dance's Motion-Capture Lab and the University of Melbourne's Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Digital Ethics. Monica was a 2023 Artist-in Residence at the Grainger Museum and the Melbourne Electronic Sound Studio.




Mindy Meng Wang



Mindy Meng Wang is a Chinese/Australian composer and world-leading guzheng performing artist merging traditional and contemporary practices. She is recognised for pioneering guzheng in non-traditional genres such as experimental, jazz, western classical, electronic, and improvisation. She has performed extensively internationally and nationally and is recognised as a cultural leader in the sector. Mindy has won many national and international awards including the 2022 Sidney Myer Fellowship, “Best Musician” Music Victoria Awards, and the 40 Under 40: Most Influential Asian-Australian Award. Mindy is the 2023 Melbourne Recital Centre Artist in Residence - the first to play a non-western instrument. Mindy's work promotes and advocates for cultural diversity and inclusivity in the sector. She aims to create a strong voice for young female composers and particularly artists of Asian heritage with a vision to establish deeper and reciprocal musical connections between Australia and Asia.

Credits

Lead artists & composers/sound designersMonica Lim & Mindy Meng Wang
DramaturgOphelia Huang
Set & lighting designerJenny Hector
Visual designerRel Pham
ProducerJin Yim
SingerYeseul Choi

Next Mobility Project(2023-2024)

Supported by the Australia-Korea Foundation (AKF), SPAF has carried out a joint project of Next Mobility with APAM for the period 2023-2024. Next Mobility is a project delving into what the exchange and mobility of the performing arts would look like in the pandemic/post-pandemic era. The project explores changes in mobility, focusing on trends such as digitization, hybrid exchange, concept touring and green mobility which have influenced the creation and distribution of performances as a whole since the onset of the pandemic. Its major research themes have been centered around these questions. What do we want to tell people through international mobility? What needs mobility and why?
In 2023, they did exchange-based research which gave support to the initial development of a performance from the perspective of Next Mobility. In 2024, they will unveil the performance produced through such research at SPAF and share the process and relevant discourse of the project during an open talk session at PAMS. Producer Jin Yim is collaborating to run the project.

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