Rusalka
This is a costume reimagining for the opera 'Rusalka' by Antonin Dvořák.I am trying to communicate the extent of female exploitation and oppression in a patriarchal society through this live performance. In the human world, I want to show how men play their power games and start and fight wars, where it’s always women and children who face the most critical consequences. The non-human world is rooted in nature, yet trying to fight back and take over with its thorns and overgrown brambles. The thorns are the very things that Rusalka found to be restrictive, soulless and suffocating about her world yet they are the same things that later become an act of rebellion towards the oppression, which is a constant struggle. I imagine Rusalka as the naive victim and the prince as the oppressor in this performance.
