MILO RAU, Swiss theater director, artistic director, filmmaker and writer, dropped in for some pre-Wagnerian opera production sleuthing. (credit: Magdalena-Blaszczuk)<\/p>\n
Rau, whose manifold professional purview includes heading the Vienna Festival, Europe\u2019s largest crossover cultural event, recently popped over here with a hefty sleuthing agenda for an exploratory expedition. The thinking behind the foray was to lay the theoretical groundwork for his forthcoming production of Richard Wagner\u2019s The Flying Dutchman at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, which begins a run in October and runs through February 2027.<\/p>\n
Rau has been accused of all sorts of things during his stellar, storied professional timeline to date. But that\u2019s par for the course when you ruffle a few feathers and put several noses out of joint. And all in seemingly good, altruistic, and creative causes.<\/p>\n
He comes across as a \u201ctruth seeker,\u201d a man fired up by his convictions and single-minded pursuit of justice, as he aims to bring it to the attention of the Western world.<\/p>\n
Presumably, the hope is that his artistic endeavor will eventually bear corrective, or at least mitigating, political fruit, thereby improving the lot of the victims and possibly even obviating further cataclysmic developments.<\/p>\n
That is indeed a commendable, lofty goal. It also serves to emphasize the role of cultural endeavor in society and offer an opportunity for art to make a real, street-level difference.<\/p>\n
But, as Romain Rolland suggested, perhaps Rau should not hold out too much hope in that regard. The late-19th- to early-20th-century French Nobel Prize<\/a>-winning writer is quoted by the celebrated Jewish Austrian writer Stefan Zweig as saying that art \u201ccan bring comfort to us as individuals, but it can do nothing against stark reality.\u201d<\/p>\n When does altruism overstep the bounds that define it?<\/p>\n IS THAT the way the sorry things are? Judging by the ludicrously measly state support for cultural endeavor in this country \u2013 way below the average for OECD members \u2013 were Rau to try his hand at affecting the way the upper echelons of the local political hierarchy go about their business in the arts domain, he\u2019d be chasing a lost cause.<\/p>\n But when does altruism overstep the bounds that define it? We can also enter more philosophical-moral realms by asking about the character and modus operandi of the artist or protagonist, and the creative end result she or he ultimately delivers for performance or presentation to public consumption.<\/p>\n Is that what it\u2019s all about? Is it just about what we get to see or hear, or is there a place in the equation for, say, rectitude? Should we simply ignore the nature of the person who produced the work proffered for our wonderment and enjoyment, and just take an \u201cit is what it is\u201d attitude?<\/p>\n For the purpose of amplification, were we to posit an imaginary, extreme, simplistic situation whereby Adolf Hitler had made an oil painting that was considered by all experts in the field as a masterpiece, would the general consensus be that it should be hung in a museum somewhere? After all, art is art, right? Based on that aphorism, we should appreciate a work on the basis of its merits, regardless of any dark moral undergrowth that it may have navigated on its way out to the light of day.<\/p>\n That, in a nutshell, is the way Yonatan Livny sees things.<\/p>\n \u201cOnce a work has been completed, it no longer belongs to the artist; it belongs to the world,\u201d he intoned when I asked him how he feels about the performing of music by Wagner in Israel.<\/p>\n This wasn\u2019t any old rationale statement. Livny has the vocational cred to voice his opinion on the topic with authority.<\/p>\n He is the founder of the Wagner Association, established in 2016 with the express purpose of promoting the performance of works by the 19th-century German composer, who is lauded by musicians and fans of classical music \u2013 primarily opera lovers \u2013 alike for his brilliant writing.<\/p>\n But he is also known as a rabid antisemite whose oeuvre was lovingly embraced and powerfully endorsed by Hitler himself, albeit many years after Wagner\u2019s death.<\/p>\n Built on the ashes of the Nazi crematoria<\/p>\n HENCE THE problem and the blanket taboo imposed here on Wagner\u2019s music.<\/p>\n Sadly, Livny also has the bio collateral for his controversial stance.<\/p>\n \u201cI come from a German family that was wiped out by the Nazis,\u201d he explained to me. \u201cMy father was the only survivor. There were no aunts, uncles, or grandparents left. Nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n Personal devastation notwithstanding, Livny actively works to have Wagner\u2019s sheet music put to live instrumental practice here, in a country that was largely built on the ashes of the Nazi crematoria.<\/p>\n \u201cDespite that, I love Germany, I appreciate Germany, I certainly appreciate the music of Germany, and I certainly appreciate the music of that damned antisemite called Richard Wagner.\u201d<\/p>\n Livny even managed to see a darkly humorous side to that. \u201cIf, when I die, and I go up to heaven, and God \u2013 in whom I don\u2019t believe \u2013 tells me I am allowed to ask one question, I won\u2019t ask Him how the world works or anything like that. I will ask Him why He gave such a damned antisemite such wonderful musical talent.\u201d<\/p>\n With his Wagnerian backdrop, Livny was duly targeted by Rau ahead of the theater director\u2019s trip here. Livny wined and dined Rau and his associates at his home before settling down to answer Rau\u2019s questions about Wagner, playing his music in Israel, and the Holocaust connection.<\/p>\n According to Livny, a few shortcuts were taken in disclosing the full extent of Rau\u2019s plans during his brief pre-Berlin project visit here. \u201cI received a phone call from the Deutsche Oper. They said they were coming here to hold a concert of The Flying Dutchman.\u201d<\/p>\n I also received that information. In the end, the concert did not happen. Considering the muddied Wagnerian waters here, perhaps that is no surprise.<\/p>\n Then again, it seems that Rau\u2019s primary intention in coming here was to sound out Israelis about playing the Jew-hating composer\u2019s work in public, and to shoot video footage for screening at the concerts in Berlin.\\<\/p>\n There wouldn\u2019t be an interview, and he didn\u2019t want any articles<\/p>\n I WENT to Tel Aviv to meet Rau, ostensibly to interview him for an article about his venture to Israel and his intent vis-\u00e0-vis staging The Flying Dutchman here in the face of such weighty emotional-historical baggage and still-festering Holocaust-related sores. At least that was what I was told.<\/p>\n However, when we met up at his hotel, Rau offhandedly informed me that, in all likelihood, he would not perform Wagner\u2019s music during his 10-day stay. He said something along the lines of developing misgivings about it all on the flight over, when he sensed tension among the Israeli passengers. He thought it might be better to maintain a lower profile here.<\/p>\n He added that there wouldn\u2019t be an interview and that he didn\u2019t want any articles to run in Israeli papers while he was still in the country.<\/p>\n I was taken aback by this announcement and felt I\u2019d been duped into giving up over half a day of my precious work schedule on a wild goose chase. Rau had known, ahead of time, that he wasn\u2019t going to do an interview, yet failed to convey that to me so I could decide, based on that, whether or not I wanted to meet him.<\/p>\n The logical conclusion I drew from that, after I somewhat reluctantly sat down with him and his colleagues, was that I was being used, unwittingly, as fodder for his Deutsche Oper project. After all, I was a perfect guinea pig. I was an Israeli journalist who writes about culture and, as Rau was fully aware, I am the son of a Holocaust survivor.<\/p>\n He then proceeded to roll out a bunch of questions he had clearly prepared in the run-up to his trip here. He asked me, inter alia, if I thought Wagner\u2019s music should be played in Israel.<\/p>\n I replied that, regardless of how I felt about it, if there is a single Holocaust survivor who objects, who finds the German\u2019s music objectionable, the taboo should remain in place.<\/p>\n Judging by the blank facial expressions of Rau, his Italian assistant, and the German cameraman, that wasn\u2019t the response they were looking for. Neither did they seem moved when I told them that every single Israeli is traumatized by the events of Oct. 7. Repeating that three times also failed, as far as I could see, to evoke any reaction.<\/p>\n ‘What took place yesterday was purely anti-Israel’<\/p>\n