The Silent Twins (Dayen Team)

(Dayen/Okafor/Hunter/Chae/Rosenmeyer)

2020 OPERA ACCELERATE WINNER

The Silent Twins Drawn from Marjorie Wallace's book of the same title, April de Angelis's libretto for Errollyn Wallen's new opera tells the enigmatic story of identical twins June and Jennifer Gibbons. Malena Dayen and Sangmin Chae created this video of the last sections of Wallen’s opera for their participation in the ACCELERATE competition. In a virtual stage using facial recognition technology singers Victoria Okafor and Briana Hunter ‘animate’ the original images of the Gibbons sisters, using deep fake technology, a sort of modern day puppetry that reflects on the issue of individuality versus uniformity that is a the core of the piece.

CREATIVE TEAM
Victoria Okafor, soprano
Briana Hunter, mezzo soprano
David Rosenmeyer, music director
Malena Dayen, director
Sangmin Chae, video designer