Actors Damian Lewis and Helen McCrory will feature in the opening weekend of the Royal Opera House's annual contemporary arts festival Deloitte Ignite which starts tomorrow, appearing in a pair of short films. Damian has read the story of Prometheus from Ted Hughes's Tales from Ovid, and Helen has read Yeats' Leda and the Swan and The Mother of God for films to be screened to festival goers in the Paul Hamlyn Hall.
Lewis and McCrory have also lent their voices to short animations telling the stories of Prometheus and Leda which will also be screened in the opening weekend and online. The films were commissioned from recent graduates from Kingston University's Illustration and Animation degree course.
Lewis said of the festival,
There's a cross-pollination of art forms so we've got dance, singing, we have the visual arts… where better to bring all these art forms together and for you to come and enjoy yourself, please don't miss it.
Tickets are available each day during the opening weekend of the festival, this year curated by The Royal Ballet and the National Gallery's Dr Minna Moore Ede centred on the theme of myth. Contemporary art installations from Bill Viola, Tom Hunter, Mat Collishaw, sound recordist Chris Watson and muralist Phlegm take over front of house spaces, with live storytelling, group yoga sessions, talks and insight events making for a diverse and exciting programme of performance and events.
Lewis said,
I think the important thing about a festival like this is that these different art forms can come together while remaining independent and expressive in their own way, and can also become a homogenous creative whole. That's what I think we will all see.
Deloitte Ignite
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden
Friday 5 September – Sunday 28 September 2014
Tickets are available at the Royal Opera House Box Office
www.roh.org.uk
0207 304 4000
r on the door throughout the first weekend on a first come first serve basis.
Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano') about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.
His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman's Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia' column for Dancing Times magazine.
