Lyric Opera 2025-2026 Issue 10 - El último sueño de Frida y Diego

27 | Lyric Opera of Chicago VICTOR ZAPTERO LIGHTING DESIGNER Lyric debut The Mexican lighting and visual artist is currently collaborating at Teatro Conde Duque in Madrid, Spain, designing the set and lighting for Antígona González , starring Marina de Tavira, consolidating a practice that bridges contemporary performance and expanded visual creation. In 2025, he was invited to serve as an Honorary Juror at World Stage Design, an event at which he was awarded First Prize in Lighting Design in 2021, for his work on Omphalos by Danish choreographer Damien Jalet. In 2022, alongside producer Diego López Rivera, he created the videomapping spectacle A 100 Years of Mexican Muralism , which premiered at the International Cervantino Festival. Beginning in 2020, he formally transitioned toward immersive visual art, premiering The Forest at the International Cervantino Festival. The piece has since been presented in Mexico, Slovenia, and the United Arab Emirates. In 2013, he served as Lighting Coordinator for the production of Einstein on the Beach at the Palacio de Bellas Artes under the direction of Robert Wilson. That same year, he designed the lighting for the inauguration of the amphitheater created by James Turrell at Hacienda Ochil in Yucatán, featuring a musical performance by Philip Glass. Lighting designers are supported by the Mary-Louise and James S.Aagaard endowment in honor of Duane Schuler. MICHAEL BLACK CHORUS DIRECTOR The Australian chorus director joined Lyric full time in the 2012/13 Season, after having served as interim director the season before. He was named Head of Music at Lyric, a new position, in the 2023/24 Season. Black was Chorus Director at Opera Australia in Sydney from 2001 to 2013, and has worked in this capacity for such distinguished organizations as the Edinburgh International Festival and Opera Holland Park (London), and, in Australia, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonia Choir, Motet Choir, the Cantillation chamber choir, and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. In Chicago, Black became the first chorus director to work with the choruses of Lyric, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and the Grant Park Music Festival, where he served for six seasons, including preparation of The Damnation of Faust chorus and Haydn’s Creation . He has lectured or given masterclasses at the University of Chicago and Northwestern University, and in 2025 worked with the Young Artists at Opera Australia and the apprentice singers at the Santa Fe Opera. Black has served as chorus director for close to 140 different operas on four continents, and his work has been recorded and/or aired on ABC, BBC, PBS, for many HD productions in movie theaters, and on television. Michael Black is supported by the Howard A. Stotler Chorus Director Endowed Chair. AUGUST TYE CHOREOGRAPHER Previously at Lyric: Choreographer since 2004/05, most recently Le Comte Ory and Don Carlos (both 2022/23). The American dancer, choreographer, and ballet mistress has worked on nearly 50 productions at Lyric since 1993/94. She remounted the choreography of Lyric’s Iphigénie en Tauride at San Francisco Opera and the Royal Ballet and Opera. She has presented a 20-year retrospective of her work at Chicago’s Vittum Theater and Ruth Page Dance Center, as well as in her hometown of Kalamazoo, Michigan. A graduate of Western Michigan University, Tye performed with the Kalamazoo Ballet, dancing leading roles in Sleeping Beauty , Cinderella , and The Nutcracker . In addition to Lyric and Joel Hall Dancers, she has performed in Chicago with Salt Creek Ballet, Second City Ballet, and Chicago Folks Operetta. Tye is Artistic Director at the Hyde Park School of Dance, which she founded in 1993. Four years later she founded Tyego Dance Project, which has performed at Steppenwolf, the Athenaeum, and throughout America in a revival of Spike Jones’s Nutcracker . JOHN METZNER WIG & MAKEUP DESIGNER The versatile designer first joined the staff of Lyric for the 2022/23 Season. He has previously collaborated with Chicago Shakespeare Theater, Lookingglass Theatre, and Court Theatre. He served for nine years as Head of Wig and Makeup for Webster University’s Conservatory of Theatre Arts, and designed hair and makeup for more than 50 performances at The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis. Other regional credits include work at The Muny, Great River Shakespeare Festival, and Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, where he designed for The Pirates of Penzance , among many other productions. His advanced training includes wig styling at the Wig Room Training Academy and London School of Wig Making. John Metzner is supported by The Marlys A. Beider Wigmaster and Makeup Designer Endowed Chair.