Richter/Meinhof Opera

Overview

The Art Gallery of NSW will be showing Australian-based composer David Chesworth's Richter/Meinhof-Opera for two nights only on June 8 and 9. Its base material is the life of German Red Army Faction terrorist Ulrike Meinhof and painter Gerhard Richter, whose 1988 set of paintings depicted scenes of the Baader/Meinhof Group, as they were also known.

Meinhof (October 7, 1934 to May 9, 1976) has become a mythical figure in Germany, inspiring Elfriede Jelinek's outstanding play, Ulrike Maria Stuart as well as the less interesting Baader Meinhof Complex starring German hottie Moritz Bleibtreu.

The RAF was active during a fascinating period in German history when some of the postwar generation responded to the capitalist recovery by committing violent atrocities in the name of revolution. It promises to be a short, sharp snapshot of this time.