D'ARC

Produced to celebrate the 80th anniversary of Warsaw Uprising, D’ARC is a contemporary opera written in three time frames and dreams, in which three heroines meet: Joan – a photographer from Paris, the daughter of Polish emigrants; Joanna – a cellist from Warsaw and also an insurgent, and Giovanna – a French national heroine, the Maid of Orléans. 

Especially commissioned for the Warsaw Rising Museum, director Krystian Lada creates a performance encompassing the museum space as well as the museum’s surrounding district Wola. The opera’s libretto by Anka Herbut and Łukasz Barys is based on themes from the diaries of artists participating in the Warsaw Uprising and the story of Joan of Arc. Leading Polish composers of the young generation – Dobrawa Czocher, Teoniki Rożynek, Wojciech Błażejczyk and Rafał Ryterski – have contributed compositions, alongside rarely performed works by Julius Eastman and the artist-insurgent Roman Padlewski. Following the heroines of this story, we travel through the opera to visit Paris in 2024, Warsaw in 1944 and Rouen in 1429. The world that was, that is, and that which only happens in dreams will be guided by cellist Dobrawa Czocher as Joanna, actress Agnieszka Grochowska as Joan, soprano Gabriela Legun as Giovanna, and baritone Szymon Komasa as the Angel of History. More than a tribute to bravery of the Polish nation, D’ARC is also a journey through musical and theatrical conventions, in which the creators experiment with form, structure and space.