WHAT JOY

Video work for opera by Zara Ali with a libretto by Hannah Dübgen, 2025

orange surfboard floating on clear turquoise water with sunlight reflections

‘’Opera WHAT JOY, a ‘spherical installation’ in the words of composer Zara Ali, brings the series to a close. The plot tells of cybernetically augmented humans who can modify and expand their spectrum of perception and thus adopt a new relationship to the world and their own emotional access to it. This transhumanist hybridity is also reflected in the music, where borrowings from historical baroque music collide or merge with electronic sounds and classical playing and singing styles are transformed to the extreme. In these ambiguous spaces, WHAT JOY explores core elements of human sensuality and pleasures.’’

Music: Zara Ali Libretto: Hannah Dübgen Director: Sergei Morozov Dramaturg: Clara M. Richter Stage designer: Sabine Mader Costume designer: Wiebke Horn Choreografie: Evgenii Livanskii, Yeva Trepilets Director of Photography: Maxim Pechersky Singers: Yutong Wei, Lilian von der Nahmer, Elizabeth Kim, Ravi Sund Rojo Photos of Nancy Jesse

IDEA

I joined the production as a video artist, primarily responsible for developing and realizing the concept of the digital avatars for the soloists. In the opera, three characters representing bio-cybernetic beings function as Mephistopheles figures to the protagonist’s Faust, seducing him into their world of sensory excess and pleasure. My challenge was to combine Baroque exuberance with a digital aesthetic while expressing the seductive, villainous, and inherently contradictory nature of these characters. As the main color reference, I chose the spectral palette used to visualize stem cells, reflecting the dual nature of the characters as both programmable and mutational life forms. The colors of the spectrum became the visual leitmotif throughout the project, appearing in the glow, lighting, reflections, and subtle color accents of the characters.

Character Design

After several technical tests, I selected a workflow based on MetaHuman for digitizing the singers. Each performer was photographed from all angles, and AI photogrammetry techniques were used to reconstruct detailed 3D meshes. These scans were then used to customize MetaHuman characters, followed by extensive manual sculpting and refinement to achieve accurate likenesses. To emphasize the narrative development of the characters, I designed a transformation sequence. They begin as dark, almost otherworldly entities with glossy, oil-like skin. As the story progresses and they reach a state of ecstatic, manic joy, they become surrounded by a luminous aura—a radiant digital halo inspired by the dramatic ornamentation of the Baroque

Animation

Facial performance capture was produced in Unreal Engine 5 using the Live Link framework. I performed and recorded the facial animation myself, using my own expressions to convey a wide range of emotional states —including doubt, desire, delight, and sorrow. Individual animation sessions were created for each character and carefully synchronized with the libretto.