Orbit – A War Series
{{ time.start_TS | TS2dateFormat('MMM') }}
{{ time.start_TS | TS2dateFormat('YYYY') }}
| Ticket sales start in mid-February |
| Duration: 60 min |
| 16 years and older |
| No language skills required |
| Ground Floor, Hall 2 |
Orbit – A War Series appeals to our inner imagery: Brigitta Muntendorf’s immersive 3D-audio space oratorio appears like an electroacoustic parkour of narratives, in which sounds, text, voice, and space become transmitters of power structures.
The texts are based on interviews and reports from Afghanistan, Iran, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Poland, the USA, as well as from the Second World War in Asia. The musical spaces of violence, protection, exhibition, or escape form the acoustic living space of those voices who have left their bodies behind to become voice clones and immortal fighters, forming a posthuman and techno-futuristic choir that sensually and politically proclaims an opera of the future.
The title Orbit – A War Series references New York artist Nancy Spero, who, deeply moved by the photos of the Vietnam War circulating in the media at the time, explored the connections between sexuality, violence, and power in her series The War Series (1966-70). The theme of oppressive power structures, laid bare in her art, seems strikingly relevant today.
Trailer
Composition, Artistic Direction:
Brigitta Muntendorf
Concept:
Moritz Lobeck, Brigitta Muntendorf
Dramaturgy:
Mehdi Moradpour
Audio Programming:
Lukas Nowok
Lighting:
Begoña Garcia Navas
3D Audio:
Banu Sahin, Ralf Zuleeg (d&b audiotechnik)
Field Recordings:
Alfred Wegener Institute / NOAA-Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory
AI Voice Cloning Models:
Respeecher, Lisa Aithnard, Arjopa Limburg, Nikka Mae-Lopez
War Correspondent (Prologue):
Christina Lamb
AI Voice Cloning Technology:
Respeecher
Participants
German-Austrian composer Brigitta Muntendorf explores the fragility of our techno-social and socio-political reality, developing new concepts such as Radical Listening, Environmental Storytelling, and Immersive Theater. Her work spans instrumental settings, 3D audio productions, and transdigital music theater, often realized in artistic-scientific collaborations with d&b audio and S+T+ARTS/Ars Electronica.
Muntendorf has been recognized with prestigious awards, including the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation’s Young Composer’s Prize and the German Music Authors’ Prize. In 2023, her Trilogy for Two Pianos received the German Record Critics’ Award. She has held artist residencies in Kyoto (Villa Kamogawa) and Paris (Cité des Arts), and her works have been featured at international music and art festivals such as Kyoto Experiment, ULTIMA Oslo, Donaueschinger Musiktage, Wiener Festwochen, Munich Biennial, Festival d’Automne Paris, and Hollandfestival.
Since 2018, Muntendorf has served as a professor of composition at the HfMT Cologne, and in 2024, she became a full member of the North-Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities, and Arts.
Moritz Lobeck studierte Musikwissenschaft, Stadtsoziologie und Psychologie an der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Er arbeitete als Kurator und Kommunikationsberater in Berlin sowie als Dramaturg mit der Regisseurin Andrea Moses an den Staatsopern in Stuttgart, Berlin und Wien, unter anderem mit Dirigent*innen wie Daniel Barenboim, Sylvain Cambreling oder Ingo Metzmacher. Ab 2011 arbeitete er als Dramaturg und Leiter Marketing/Development an der Staatsoper Stuttgart in der Intendanz von Jossi Wieler, ab 2014 als Kurator bei den Wiener Festwochen in der Intendanz von Markus Hinterhäuser. Seit 2019 leitet er das internationale Festival DTZM – Dresdner Tage der zeitgenössischen Musik und ist Programmdirektor für Musik und Medien in HELLERAU – Europäisches Zentrum der Künste. Hier initiierte er 2022 das Festival HYBRID Biennale sowie zahlreiche internationale Projekte und Kooperationen, unter anderem mit der Biennale di Venezia, IRCAM Paris, ZKM Karlsruhe, Ars Electronica und MUTEK, Künstler*innen wie Chaya Czernowin, Ryōji Ikeda, Maria Hassabi, Ulf Langheinrich und Claudia Märzendorfer oder Ensembles wie Les Percussions de Strasbourg, Ensemble Modern, Zeitkratzer, Pisse und Staatskapelle Dresden. Seit 2020 arbeitet er regelmäßig mit der Künstlerin Brigitta Muntendorf zusammen. Gemeinsam konzipierten sie seitdem innovative Konzert- und Opernprojekte wie „Covered Culture“, „MELENCOLIA“ oder „ORBIT – A War Series“.
A collaboration with the Staatsoper Unter den Linden
Produced by La Biennale di Venezia and ECHO Factory
With kind support from the Kunststiftung NRW, the Goethe-Institut, and the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation