ROME (AP) — Soprano Angel Blue says she will not perform in an opera in Italy this month because blackface was used in a production of a different production this summer on the same stage.
The American singer posted a note on her angeljoyblue Instagram page saying she would be pulling out of La Traviata at the Verona Arena this month as the theater recently staged another Giuseppe Verdi opera, Aida, which had performers in black face.
She called such use of “archaic” theatrical practices “offensive, degrading and downright racist.”
However, Angel Blue was still listed Saturday on Arena’s website as singing the role of Violetta in La Traviata on July 22 and 30.
The theater said it hoped Blue, who is black, would accept an invitation to meet with Arena officials in a “dialogue” about the issue. Arena, in a statement on Friday, said it had “no reason or intention to offend or offend anyone’s sensitivities”.
For decades, US civil rights organizations have publicly condemned blackface – in which white performers blacken their faces – as dehumanizing blacks by introducing and reinforcing racial stereotypes.
Arena this summer played performances of Aida, based on a 2002 production of the operatic classic by Italian director Franco Zeffirelli, who died in 2019. That production used blackface.
“Dear friends, family and opera lovers,” the soprano’s Instagram post began. “I have come to the unpleasant conclusion that I will not be singing La Traviata at the Arena di Verona this summer as planned.”
Referring to Arena’s decision to use blackface makeup in Aida, the singer wrote: “Let me be perfectly clear: the use of blackface under any circumstances, artistic or otherwise, is a deeply flawed practice based on archaic theatrical traditions that have no place in modern society. It’s insulting, degrading and downright racist.
She wrote that she could not “in good conscience be associated with an institution that continues this practice.”
The theater’s statement said that “Angel Blue has consciously committed itself to singing at the Arena”, although the “characteristics” of Zeffirelli’s 2002 production are “well known”.
Still, the theater stressed its hope that her protest would ultimately improve understanding between cultures as well as educate Italian audiences.
“Each country has different roots and their cultural and social structures have developed along different historical and cultural paths,” the Verona Arena Foundation said in a statement. “Common convictions are often achieved only after years of dialogue and mutual understanding.”
Arena’s statement emphasized dialogue, “in an effort to understand the perspective of others, regarding consciously undertaken artistic obligations.”
“Antagonism, judgments, labelling, lack of dialogue only feed the culture of contrasts, which we completely reject,” the statement said, calling for cooperation “to avoid divisions.”
It is not the first time that the use of black makeup for the production of “Aida” in Verona has provoked the soprano’s protest. In 2019, opera singer Tamara Wilson, who is white, protested against having her face darkened to sing the title role of an Ethiopian woman in the Arena Opera.
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