WHAT is OP CULTURE?

What is Op Culture?? 

We’ve been asking ourselves this exact question recently, so I thought I’d take a stab at defining…

To me, Op Culture references three things: 

First, it references operatic culture. Or Operatic Culture. (Capitals and underlines for emphasis.)

It is an acknowledgement that the people who inhabit this industry each have a right and responsibility to shape the past, present, and future of the art form.

It points to the interconnected subcultures which constitute opera.

It celebrates that capital-O Opera is just an idea.

It revels in the knowledge that what we experience at Lincoln Center is only one possibility for the operatic experience.  

Second, Op Culture is OSSIA specific content that expresses our own take on Operatic Culture.

It is silly, vulgar, game oriented, heavily meme-d, and fun!

It is pleasure. It is internet adapted.

It is the recognition that when the personal perspective enters the larger culture, the larger culture changes for the better.

Our version of Op Culture is also incomplete. It is a starting point that requires engagement, challenge, and perspectives radically different from our own. It needs you.

And third, Op Culture is a digital space that blends Op Culture with Operatic Culture with Popular Culture. (Should any of this be capitalized? I may need to learn how to write if I am going to keep writing on this blog.) It is the four of us in dialogue with a larger community in dialogue with the global community.  

When we say we want to “build Op Culture with you and for you”, we mean that we want to underline the most vibrant parts of this industry and recognize that opera is nothing more than the individuals who make it. Opera is not a building, opera is not a company. Opera is human. Opera is you. You are opera.

Short sentences feel meaningful.