Cosí fan tutte programme book 2023

POLLY GRAHAM
DIRECTOR
JAMIE VARTAN
SET & COSTUME DESIGNER
Polly read English at Trinity
College Dublin and completed her
masters at RADA. Her directing
credits include Olga Neuwirth’s
Orlando (Vienna State Opera),
Monteverdi’s Il ritorno d’Ulisse in
patria (Longborough Festival Opera), a triple bill which
included the world premiere of Freya Waley-Cohen’s
WITCH (Royal Academy of Music, London), Mozart’s
Die Zauberflöte (Royal College of Music, London),
Dani Howard’s Robin Hood (The Opera Story),
Orlando Gough’s Bloom Britannia (Barefoot Opera),
Ullmann’s The Emperor of Atlantis (Loud Crowd
at Bold Tendencies), Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas
(Blackheath Halls), Frank Martin’s Le Vin herbé
(Welsh National Opera and Theater St Gallen), Karl
Amadeus Hartmann’s Simplicius Simplicissimus
(Independent Opera Director Fellow 2016), Peter
Maxwell Davies’s Kommilitonen! (Welsh National
Youth Opera), Unheard Voices: CREW (WNO), and
Nighthawks (New Earth Theatre). Her associate
director credits include Rossini’s Mosè in Egitto
(Teatro di San Carlo, Naples), Gordon Getty’s Usher
House and Debussy’s La chute de la maison Usher
(San Francisco Opera). Earlier this season she
directed the world premiere of Pierangelo Valtinoni’s
Il piccolo principe at La Scala, Milan. Polly is artistic
director of Longborough Festival Opera.
Jamie Vartan studied Fine Art at
Brighton Polytechnic & Theatre
Design at Central St Martins. He has
worked extensively as a designer in
theatre, opera and dance in Ireland,
the UK and Europe. His designs for
opera include Donnacha Dennehy and Enda Walsh’s
The First Child, The Second Violinist and The Last Hotel
(Landmark Productions/Irish National Opera); Bartók’s
Bluebeard’s Castle, Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel
(INO) and Rossini’s William Tell (INO and Nouvel Opéra
Fribourg); Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia (Wide Open
Opera); Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos, Tchaikovsky’s The
Queen of Spades (La Scala); Verdi’s La traviata (Malmö);
Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin (Opéra national du Rhin);
Anthony Bolton’s The Life and Death of Alexander
Litvinenko, Puccini’s La bohème (Grange Park Opera);
Bizet’s Carmen (Lisbon); Ariadne auf Naxos (Salzburg);
Jake Heggie’s Dead Man Walking (Oldenburg);
Delius’s A Village Romeo and Juliet (Wexford Festival
Opera, winner best set design, The Irish Times Irish
Theatre Awards); Puccini’s Manon Lescaut (Bilbao
and Valencia); Verdi’s Falstaff (Grange Park Opera,
Oman and Parma). His designs for theatre include
Medicine, Woyzeck in Winter, Arlington, Ballyturk and
Misterman, winner best set design, The Irish Times
Irish Theatre Awards (Landmark Productions/Galway
International Arts Festival); Happy Days (Olympia/
Landmark Productions); Grief is the Thing with
Feathers (Complicité/Wayward Productions/Landmark
Productions/Galway International Arts Festival);
Bondagers (Edinburgh Lyceum); Ravens: Spassky v
Fischer (Hampstead Theatre); Knives in Hens (Perth);
Have Your Circumstances Changed? (Artangel), and
The Lost Child Trilogy (David Glass Ensemble). His film
design includes The Last Hotel (Sky Arts).
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