Richard Wagner’s “The Ring of the Nibelung”
Shortly after viewing the entire Metropolitan Opera production of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, I was inspired to create this drawing. As I was trying to distill one scene from each of the four opera’s that make up the Ring Cycle, I found I could connect them to the four elements. I concentrated on only female characters who drove the narrative in each part of the Cycle
Water, where we begin the story, to find a teasing Rhine maiden guarding the ring from “The Rhinegold”. Air, where we find an angry sky goddess, Frikka voicing her displeasure at certain events in “The Valkyrie”. Fire, where a lovelorn fallen Valkyrie, Brunhilde waits for her love in “Siegfried”. Onto Earth, where a Norn sister sees the impending doom of the twilight of the gods from “Gotterdammerung”. Finally I interweaved notes from the score of the opera, the structure from which this epic story unfolds.
This Pen and Ink original received a Best of Show award in the Page to Palette Open Exhibit at The York Art Association.
