December 5, 2006

Tomorrow on stage we are about to see a real display of the costumes. Emi Wada, our costume designer, has been incredibly busy with her assistant and all of the people in the costume shop. As the costume shop bursts at the seams, so to speak, we are even seeing costumes appear in the hallways. In fact, yesterday when I went into my office, there were two beautiful kimonos outside in the hall, with brilliant emerald green central panels and multi-colored sleeves. Stunning. When I left the office 30 minutes later, these had been replaced with a rose kimono of Yue Yang, and several garments with vibrant “leaves” of embroidery. I do hope that there are pictures online so you can see how brilliant they are, in every sense. The amount of work in these garments is staggering and the symbolism in them is indicative of so much of the Eastern culture in this piece. Emi Wada has put patterns of bricks in them (remember the Great Wall?). As the opera progresses, the costumes of our principals become richer in hue and in bricks! Gao Jianli will go from a picture of a slave to one who has been elevated to the highest echelon in the emperor’s court as his composer. A great analogy. I wonder what Tan Dun will wear………

This entry was posted by Donna Racik on Saturday, December 9th, 2006 at 9:52 am and is filed under The First Emperor. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.