“In the often frantic process that goes into setting design, I need confrontations, disagreements, because that’s when great discoveries happen.” Leslie Travers tells K.. “When things seem to go wrong, materials and ideas often come together in unexpected ways and I discover things beyond my own imagination. Ultimately, work goes well when I feel like I am becoming a servant of the design as it develops, rather than its creator.”

The international set and costume designer is currently one of the leaders in his field. His extensive work includes opera, dance, music and theater performances on the world’s most famous stages, and he has won numerous important awards. Recently, he has left his city, London, and every day he is at the National Opera. The premiere of Bartók’s dramatic opera The Tower of Cyanopogon directed by Temelis Glinatsis will take place on March 9, and the preparation of the performance is now at the final stage.

Travers, who supervised the creation of sets and costumes, oversees rehearsals with the director. For this new ELS production, he created an impressive stage installation almost 10 meters high, a huge black sculpture that “swallows” faces as their mental world dissolves as the play progresses. “Kianopogonas” for Glinatsis is not a bloody opera, but one of the most penetrating sketches of the male soul, immersion in hidden memories and unhealed wounds.

“Set and costume design starts with a collaboration between a director and a designer. It’s always a very fluid and non-linear process for me,” says Leslie Travers, explaining how he approached the Cyanopogon Tower. “In addition to my own first, instinctive ideas, the director conveyed to me his own initial reactions to the project. I also collect atmospheric images that may be useful to us in the future. Gradually, I get a complete understanding of the work and how the action affects the dynamics of the narrative. Cooperation with the director is very friendly and open. Some data may be deleted, stored or re-processed. In fact, no step takes us back. Temelis and I discussed in detail the possibilities of implementing the project by testing various approaches.”

I wanted to create a space related to Cyanopogon, and not to a specific moment in his life.

The result is a contemporary room that houses the lord of the tower, Cyanopogonas, and his young wife, Judith, dressed in 1950s costumes.

“This is an exciting question! The most important thing is not always what someone decides to put on stage, but what remains behind the scenes,” Travers replies. “During design, I remove elements, and often this makes the work more poetic. I wanted to create a space related to Cyanopogon, and not to a specific moment in his life. It could be his childhood home, a place he visited many times, a place where pleasure and trauma coexist. It’s up to the audience to decide, or better yet, discuss it when they leave the show. I would like the world of the stage to be a landscape for the audience to explore with their imagination.”

Having worked on many productions together, following the global trend of opera, Leslie Travers starts with improvised 3D cardboard models before realizing her ideas. In addition, in each city the size and shape of the theater stage is different, and the models are adapted to given circumstances. He enjoys working, testing the color and texture of materials right from the start. As technology advances, work continues on virtual 3D models on the computer, allowing complex ideas to be tested very quickly.

“How do you translate sound into an image?” we ask him.

“Creating a visual world is very instinctive for me,” he explains. “I perceive music in big pictures, not in literal spaces. I feel the atmosphere surrounding the character. At the beginning of the process, I don’t confine my thinking to theatrical conventions, but think outside of them, trying to find the right way to tell the story. If any part of the process gets stuck, I always go back to the music.”