Abstract
In recent theatre and performance theory, intermediality-which is understood as the incorporation of media such as film, video and digital technologies into theatrical performances-has been endowed with the ability to disrupt the dominant logic of representation and to expose its transparent viewing conventions. While drawing attention to the processes of mediation within the media it incorporates, theatre itself figures as a surprisingly transparent medium in these theorizations.
In this chapter, I examine this paradoxical contention by looking at Rosa: A Horse Drama, an opera by Dutch composer Louis Andriessen and British filmmaker Peter Greenaway that premiered in Amsterdam in 1994. With its ubiquitous projections of text, still and moving images on multiple screens, Rosa seems to be the epitome of intermediality in contemporary music theatre.
However, I argue that this opera exposes the viewing conventions of not only the media it incorporates (most notably film) but also theatre itself. Rosa help