BOOK-The reporter Laetitia Cénac and the watercolorist-dessinator Laure Fissore publish “behind the scenes of the Paris National Opera” in Éditions de la Martinière.
It was probably not wanted, but in the end, this book particularly resembles what it deals with: to the abundance of this institution that is the Paris Opera, so rich that it also sometimes seeks to keep – if it is not to be found. Reading this 224 -page book is also comparable to the experience of number of spectators in front of many operas productions: the result does not correspond to what is expected, it offers something else, more often, with its own logic which is not the most obvious but which abounds in wealth …
The large shop
Indeed, this publication with approximately A4-sized paper, neither too thin nor too fine or lacking in pleasant light transparency, is above all like a beautiful cross-illustration book: images and interviews written, allowing to travel all the places of the opera (Garnier, Bastille but also the places of training and even to evoke the institution that is the café-restaurant Associates In front of the exit of artists and staff located on rue de Lyon). The encyclopedic side is there and well there, and yet it is a report, led from February 7, 2022 and for a year. The result therefore offers a production course then represented, with the courses of their artists and technicians and employees, even if, certainly, the challenges of a year allow us to understand those of a house. The logic of the publication even seems to be from everything except behind the scenes (again, the result therefore offers an interest that he did not announce, in particular with these very beautiful illustrations of plateaux by Laure Fissore formed in the print and watercolor in China).
When the direction of slide slides
The expression “behind the scenes of the opera”, already used in a very metaphorical way in everyday language (where behind the scenes come to designate everything that the spectator does not see and either only the sides and the back-scène) therefore takes more the appearances of a commercial slogan for the work and is found far too limited for the subject.
And this subject is extremely rich, like all these personnel and artists he presents and questions, these scenes and memories, the corn of Parsifal to the frog of Plated. The texts and interviews, sweeping so many subjects and interlocutors, remain very generalist, confirming (a little too much) the popularizing focal length and all audiences of this book. The audacity is to be sought in the illustrations, some more worked than others, the most interesting being those taken in the liveliness of the movements (with at the top the images of the dancers in formation, it must be said that France has a great tradition in the matter, and a master named Degas).
Why do we love?
- For the full course, even if the chronology limits the subject
- For illustrations, starting with the fine pencil for portraits
- Because he makes you want to read the other books of this collection in the very happy vein of graphic reports: behind the scenes of the Comédie-Française and behind the scenes of Chanel (of the same author) and then behind the scenes of the law, and the Louvre museum
Who’s for?
- Everyone in fact, except perhaps hyper-specialists but hey even they will be able to revise, and even the staff of the Paris Opera will be able to read with interest on their colleagues.
