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 May 13, 14, 16, 18, 19, 2023 at 8:30 PM

HERE Performing Arts Center, Mainstage Theater

(145 6th Ave, New York, NY 10013)

 

Music by Eric Moe

Libretto by Rob Handel

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Tickets $30

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ABOUT

 

Introducing THE ARTWORK OF THE FUTURE by Eric Moe and Rob Handel, a lighthearted science-fiction opera about robot-loving artists and art-loving robots; about obsession and distraction, fame and obscurity, human and machine, change and end, the last days of humankind.

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CAST

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Omar Najmi, Spearmint Lodge

Emily Solo, Najeen Teflo

Daniel Klein, Ted / Dewey

Brittany Fowler, Amalia Habitué / Shirl

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PRODUCTION

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Dara Malina, Stage Director

Alex Wen, Music Director

Victoria Benson, Co-Production Manager

Jillian Flexner, Co-Production Manager

Zane Alcorn, Stage Manager

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Candace Chien, Pianist

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Karen Boyer, Costume Designer

You-Shin Chen, Scenic Design

Jon DeGaetano, Video Design

Dan Delaney, Technical Director

Joy Havens, Choreographer

Jillian Flexner, Sound Designer

Daisy Long, Lighting Designer

Henry Newman, Props Designer

Jiaying Zhang, Additional Sculpture Designer

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SYNOPSIS

 

Artwork of the Future begins with a TEDtalk (the first operatic portrayal of a TEDtalk, perhaps). The charismatic speaker preaches a romantic dedication to work, citing the examples of immortal artists like Bach and Van Gogh, whose efforts have remained part of the human experience long after their deaths.

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The speaker doesn’t know it, but he has changed the life of the TEDtalk sound technician, Spearmint Lodge, art-school grad and wholly unrecognized maker of “spectator-triggered musical robot installations.” Spearmint wanders the city, turning these ideas over in his mind. As dawn approaches, he stumbles into an all-night coffeehouse and meets singer/songwriter/barista Najeen Teflo. She contracts his new religion like a virus, and they return to his squalid apartment to begin a life of total dedication to their art in spite of the apathy shown it by the rest of the world.

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As time passes, however, their conviction begins to wane. They become haunted by a desire to know for certain that their work will finally be recognized three hundred years in the future. As fate would have it, Najeen has met a physicist, Amalia Habitué, working at the margins of science, whose lab has cracked the secret of time travel.

Spearmint and Najeen arrive in the future at the Guggenheim Museum, which proves to be, in fact, full of their work, honoring them as prophetic artists. There are, however, no people in the future. A robot docent explains that all the humans died out, barely noticing, while noodling with their phones, that this was happening.

Returning to the present, the lovers find themselves fiercely divided about what to do. She wants to abandon their dreams of immortality and devote their energies to saving humankind. He doesn’t see a problem with a future populated by robots, so long as the art survives. Will Spearmint and Najeen be torn apart? And can this species be saved?

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SUPPORTED BY

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NEW YORK STATE COUNCIL ON THE ARTS

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NEW YORK CITY DEPARTMENT OF CULTURAL AFFAIRS

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BMI FOUNDATION

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AMPHION FOUNDATION

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