Floris Visser Explained

Floris Visser
Birth Name:	Floris Jonathan Visser
Birth Date:	22 April 1983
Birth Place:	Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Education:	Theater Academy, Maastricht & Royal Conservatory, The Hague
Occupation:	Opera director, Arts administrator, Professor of Drama
Years Active:	2006, present

Floris Visser (born 1983) is a Dutch opera director and arts administrator. As an internationally acclaimed and award-winning director, he is considered one of the leading talents of his generation. Visser works in renowned opera houses such as Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Zürich Opera House, the Bolshoi Theatre Moscow, the Royal Danish Opera, Dutch National Opera & the Internationale Händelfestspiele. He holds professorships at several prominent institutes for the arts.

Education

Born in Amsterdam, The Netherlands,^[1] Floris Visser performed on the theatre stage from a very early age. During his years at elementary and high school he was trained as an actor, singer and classical pianist. Following his studies at the Gymnasium, he attended the Theatre Academy of Maastricht,^[2] where he was educated as an actor and director. After graduating at the Maastricht Theatre Academy in 2006, he went on to study classical singing at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague. While still a student there, he was appointed Professor of drama and dramaturgy at the Royal Conservatory, and served as assistant director at Dutch National Opera Academy and for Willy Decker at Dutch National Opera.

Early work

In 2008 he directed Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro at the Royal Theatre Carré, followed by productions of Menotti's The Telephone and Poulenc's La Voix Humaine at the InternationalTheatre Festival Amsterdam and the New Festival The Hague. In 2009, he produced Handel’s Agrippina for the International Handel Year at the, and the Teatro Communale in Modena.^[3] He then created a new production of Mozart's La Clemenza di Tito at the Lucent Danstheater. In 2011 he was dramaturg and assistant director for the production of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice on the lake of the Royal Palace of Soestdijk. In 2011, he also directed his own production of Rossini’s Il Signor Bruschino, which played at the Royal Concertgebouw Amsterdam and Konzerthaus Berlin,^[4] and staged Life with an idiot, after Alfred Schnittke's opera & Viktor Jerofejev’s novella, for Dutch National Opera.^[5]

Cultural professor and artistic director

In 2012, Visser was appointed Cultural Professor^[6] at Delft University of Technology^[7] In 2013, he directed the Dutch premiere of Benjamin Britten's Owen Wingrave^[8] ^[9] ^[10] ^[11] for the Dutch touring company Opera Trionfo. The same year he was appointed artistic director of Opera Trionfo.^[12] ^[13] ^[14] In 2013, he was awarded the Charlotte Köhler Prize^[15] ^[16] 2013 by the Prince Bernhard Culture Fund.^[17] His company's mission has always been to create productions of rare and unique opera repertoire and the development of young talent. Visser also turned the company into an international platform that coproduces with orchestras, theatres, and other opera houses at home and abroad.

Recent work

In 2013, Visser became the youngest and first Dutch director ever to be invited to the Bolshoi Opera in Moscow.^[18] ^[19] ^[20] Here he staged Mozart's Così fan tutte, which premiered in May 2014.^[21] ^[22] This production received five Golden Mask nominations, Russia's most prestigious theatre prize.^[23] ^[24] Amongst the nominations were those for Best Production and Best Director. His 2015 production of Gluck’s Orphée et Eurydice^[25] ^[26] ^[27] ^[28] for Dutch National Touring Opera got awarded Opera of the Year 2015 by Opera Magazine.^[29] ^[30] In 2016, he directed the world premiere of Pierangelo Valtinoni's The Wizard of Oz (Italian: Il Mago di Oz) at Opernhaus Zürich.^[31] In 2017 Visser staged Handel's oratorium Semele for the opening of The Internationale Händelfestspiele Karslruhe,^[32] which became a famous production with German and international audiences and press.^[33] ^[34] ^[35] ^[36] ^[37] ^[38] ^[39] ^[40] The same year he initiated a four-year plan for a series of newly composed operas called Sign of the Times in co-production with Opera Trionfo, Dutch National Opera and the Asko|Schoenberg Ensemble. The first episode, Fortress Europe,^[41] ^[42] was composed by Calliope Tsoupaki.^[43] and premiered during the Opera Forward Festival 2017.^[44] ^[45] In 2017–2018 he directed Verdi's La Traviata for Dutch National Touring Opera ^[46] ^[47] ^[48] & Antigona by Tommaso Traetta as a co-production of Theater Osnabrück and Opera Trionfo.^[49] ^[50] ^[51] ^[52]

More recent productions were Vivaldi's oratorium Juditha Triumphans at Dutch National Opera (a first in the company's history),^[53] ^[54] ^[55] Manon by Jules Massenet at Zürich Opera House with star tenor Piotr Beczala,^[56] ^[57] ^[58] ^[59] & Les contes d’Hoffmann at Staatstheater Karlsruhe. In the season 2019-2020 he directed Mozart’s Don Giovanni for the Badisches Staatstheater, Le Nozze di Figaro at the Aalto Musiktheater in Essen, and Madama Butterfly at Oper Graz. In 2022 he returned to the Händel-Festspiele to direct a highly praised production of Hercules, lauded as “outstanding” by Die Welt and “astonishing” by Frankfurter Rundschau. Opernwelt wrote: "Floris Visser shows Handel's oratorio "Hercules" in Karlsruhe as a visually powerful psychodrama. He turns Handel's oratorio Hercules upside down and tells the story from the end. With this ingenious setting…Visser transcends the conventional.” And Opera Now awarded it 5 stars and wrote: “an exciting production by Floris Visser. In a subtle analysis of Hercules’ relationship with his wife Dejanira he depicts the agonising abyss created by jealousy…. the great success of this pioneering production.”

In the summer of 2022 he made his UK debut at Glyndebourne Festival Opera with a highly praised production of Puccini's La Bohème. The Guardian lauded it as "A riveting show"^[60] and The Times wrote: "It’s rare to encounter a staging that presents the world’s most popular opera in a radically different way... I was transfixed by Floris Visser’s production."^[61]

Visser serves as an opera educator for Dutch National Opera Academy,^[62] the Conservatory of Amsterdam,^[63] the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, the Theatre Academy of Maastricht, and the International Opera Studio (IOS) Zürich. In 2018, he was invited to become a director at the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities'^[64] ^[65] ^[66]