BARCELONA: Barcelona’s opera house, the Gran Teatre del Liceu on June 22nd , reopened for its first concert following the three-month coronavirus lockdown to an audience of thousands of plants.
2,292 potted plants, rather than music lovers, attended the unusual event, which came from the Spanish conceptual artist Eugenio Ampudia. A string quartet named UcaLi sang an eight-minute rendition of Giacomo Puccini’s Crisantemi for its leafy audience that was also made available to human listeners via livestream on the Liceu’s website. As the concert ended, the musicians bowed to plants, while sounds of wind blowing through the trees played in the background seemed like the leafy audience was giving them an applause.
Ampudia said that it was important to tell the plants what we have been going through this time in the form of music, which is probably a language they can understand. He added that at a time when a large part of humanity has been confined to reduced spaces and been forced to relinquish mobility, nature has crept forward to occupy the space we took from it. The performance also aimed to emphasize on the possibility of extending the concept of empathy to other species.
All 2,292 plants came from nurseries across the city of Barcelona and will be donated to healthcare professionals who have been battling the spread of COVID-19 pandemic.