Bushra El-Turk: The Open Fund for Music Creators
Woman at Point Zero is a new opera based on the classic 1975 novel by the Egyptian writer Nawal El Sadaawi. El Sadaawi describes her meeting with Firdaus, a woman on death row in Cairo, who shares her life story the night before her execution… From this, a universal story of exploitation, erasure and the search for freedom a new multimedia production is being created that weaves together diverse creative visions and challenges conventions, to reanimate opera as a powerful voice for a new wave feminism without borders.
Composer BUSHRA EL-TURK, author STACY HARDY, director LAILA SOLIMAN and filmmaker AIDA ELKASHEF turn this 1975 novel into a multimedia production that collages documentary film and fiction, poetry and narrative, Western and non-Western musical traditions. Together, they form an interdisciplinary creative team of four powerful women from the Global South. They are advocates of a new politics of solidarity, wanting to decolonise and democratise opera and engage key concepts in feminist thought, namely “sisterhood,” “experience,” “community”. Their work aims to make visible what was formerly and forcefully hidden: trauma, violence, liberation, strength, and joy.
Woman at Point Zero is the opening production of the All Arias Festival at De Singel Antwerp where it will receive its world premiere and is the jury nomination for the prestigious Fedora prize in 2020. Produced by LOD muziektheater and a co-production between All Arias Festival (deSingel Antwerp, Opera Ballet Vlaanderen, Concertgebouw Brugge & Transparant), Royal Opera House London, Shubbak Festival London, Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Snape Maltings.