Director: J. A. Pitínský
Conductor: Miloslav Oswald
Moravian Theatre Olomouc
The opera mystery The Fall of the Antichrist (Der Sturz des Antichrist) by the Czech-German composer of Jewish origin, Viktor Ullmann (1898–1944) presents a prophetic vision of the rise and fall of a dictatorship which has consumed all freedom of thought and creation. The opera was based on a dramatic sketch of the same name by the anthroposophic writer and painter Albert Steffen from 1928. The plot involves a number of spiritual symbols and parables, at the basis of which is the fight between negative forces, represented by the tyrannical despot (Regent), and positive forces, which are symbolized by the character of the Artist. The Artist’s faith in the human spirit finally succeeds in overcoming suffering and defeats the Antichrist. Ullmann completed his work in 1935. At the time he would not have been fully aware that the vision of his opera would come true in the monstrous regime of Nazi Germany, and that he would be subjected to inhuman conditions at the concentration camp in Terezín and murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.
