Goddesses of the stage: Dissecting the Diva

‘Diva’, translated from Italian means ‘goddess’, and that is how some of the greatest female opera singers have been viewed by their followers for centuries. The public perception of the diva in opera (and indeed more latterly in other genres too), though has changed quite radically from its origins in many ways. That is the starting point for the Victoria and Albert Museum’s  (V&A)  highly ambitious and multifaceted exhibition, DIVA, opening this month (24 June). It has a long run ahead, remaining open until 30 April 2024 and, considering its vast scale, that is well justified. It addresses a much broader legacy than might initially be imagined from its title, as its curator Kate Bailey, the V&A’s senior curator and producer, explains.

‘When I was curating the V&A’s Opera: Passion, Power, and Politics exhibition in 2017, as I was focussing on several world premieres of operas written by male composers, for balance I tried to draw out the stories of women’s contributions whether as singers, patrons, or muses – but I felt I didn’t give sufficient justice to the diva in opera: not just the diva as a singer of roles, but also as a human inspiration and influence through the ages. So, the concept of this new exhibition began to evolve from this, but as I explored it in detail it began to extend further. How has the title ‘diva’ been perceived over the centuries? What does the word ‘diva’ mean to today’s music-lovers, as distinct from the not-so-distant past when an artist such as Maria Callas, for instance, would automatically come to mind? What about artists with three or four octave voices who perform outside the genre of opera? Does someone like Whitney Houston (pictured below) or Beyoncé have a ‘diva’ voice? Are there similarities, are there differences and, whatever the answers may be, are the latter two perceived as divas by their audiences today? All this made me want to show that there is in fact a myriad of meanings to the term ‘diva’.

Whitney Houston performing at Wembley Arena, London 5 May 1988. Photograph © David Corio

But – where to begin for an exhibition? I decided that we wouldn’t go all the way back to the early origins of opera in late 16^th and early 17^th Century Italy because it was really in the 19^th Century that the image of the diva unfolded as a grand and powerful woman, even a society figure. It was then that the term became discussed in a more public way. The poet, novelist, and critic Théophile Gautier was one of the first to write about opera divas as not only artists with exceptional voices but also extraordinary women who exuded other-worldly and untouchable personas. The exhibition’s narrative begins here and then goes on to illustrate how the concept and image of the diva has evolved and shifted in the ensuing two hundred years up to the present time.’

So how do different kinds of people think of the word diva now? Favourably, critically or even as an anachronism? ‘It’s a complex situation, and so the exhibition is a reclaiming of the diva with as comprehensive a representation of her many-sided attributes and public perceptions as we can assemble. The term has certainly been used negatively sometimes, but in contrast it has had idealistic connotations for some people. There are those today who speak and write the word pejoratively for what they perceive as a kind of passé grandeur – but there are others, often ‘fans’ of other musical genres, that use the term with the kind of veneration it conjured up in the 19^th Century. We address this in breadth and depth in DIVA, but running through all the multifaceted varying intricacies we have a unifying thread that shows the timelessness of the opera diva: so, the personifications of the great heroines in opera, often powerful tragic figures, are seen as a constant stable force that to this day has lived throughout the diva’s crazy-paving trajectory into other disciplines and images.’

Indeed, opera itself has more recently adopted the essence of some of those other genres centrally in its subjects, settings, characters and also music – Turnage’s Anna Nicole, a notable success when it premiered at the Royal Opera House in 2011, especially comes to mind, with a kind of heroine – or maybe anti-heroine – diva that was well-nigh inconceivable on the opera stage until recent years.

Kate Bailey’s point about today’s diva followers in other music genres is evidenced by the figures in pop and rock music who have adopted elements of the traditional opera diva’s persona and even in a loose sense their art. ‘A few years ago, Beyoncé brought out a CD album called Lemonade, and it was conceived in a series of acts with a strong narrative arc. Here was a big rock and pop artist referred to as a diva by her fans who was presenting her concept in a kind of operatic structure even though,, strictly speaking, the music has no opera content or style at all. The point is that to her audience of our times she dramatically is a figure of a diva – and in a way one could almost term Lemonade a kind of pop opera with a dramatic story revolving around real events in its diva’s life.’

The structure of the exhibition gives visitors an insight into the development of the diva from the past into the present, as Bailey describes: ‘I have designed everything in a chronological narrative of three acts providing thematic links running throughout from the 19^th Century to today, so that by the time we reach the conclusion we see how the powerful original figure of the diva has reclaimed her persona in new contemporary ways in the 21^st Century. In Act One we begin by featuring 19^th Century and early 20^th Century opera stars such as Adelina Patti (pictured below), Jenny Lind, Nellie Melba, and Maria Malibran, as they commanded an enormous fanbase giving them the status and power that brought about the origin of the term ‘diva’. So much so that quite a number of the roles they famous for were written specifically for them. The extent of their kudos as women was historically something of an innovation, certainly in the arts, and in fact proved to be a springboard for similar developments in straight theatre. So, in this Act the exhibition also takes a sideways look at the Victorian stage with performers like Sarah Bernhardt and Ellen Terry.

Portrait of Adelina Patti by Franz Winterhalter ca. 1865-70. (Photograph reproduced courtesy of Harewood House Trust)

‘In Act One, I have included additional figures of dance in this period such as Isadora Duncan: in the exhibition she is a dance diva because of the influential way her artistry and popularity gave an empowerment to women in society. Other dancers we feature in this First Act are Tamara Karsavina and Josephine Baker. With Florent Schmitt’s ballet La tragoedie de Salomé the feminine power of Karsavina’s characterisations and costumes spread into contemporary fashion, while with Josephine Baker the image of a brilliant and original woman who sang, danced and acted took the world by storm (we also remind visitors that her power extended into being a Second World War spy!). And continuing outside the world of the opera diva in Act One, we also have Hollywood icons from the first half of the 20^th Century such as Bette Davis, Marilyn Monroe and Elisabeth Taylor, because in their ways they are links to today’s perception of powerful artistic women.’

Continuing the opera diva trajectory, the First Act goes on to feature the lineage of opera singers right up to the present day – and contextualises them socially as well as artistically. ‘From Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland to Joyce Didonato, to name a few – and also including Marian Anderson, because she sang at the Lincoln Memorial Concert in 1939 which was to me a key diva moment. She wasn’t an opera diva in the conventional sense, but she certainly helped reshape and redefine the term.’

The majority of classical music lovers, though, associate the traditional image of a diva with a grand and spectacular artist such as Maria Callas. ‘Callas in fact is a kind of lynchpin connecting the past to the present, and as such she features in a particularly crucial way at the end of Act One of the Exhibition. She closes the Act as what is seen as the personification of the diva: through her vocal and theatrical creativity, and through her entire life (on- and off-stage) in which she exuded an unprecedented appeal beyond just the world of opera. In timely fashion for our exhibition, this year marks the centenary of her birth, and she is unquestionably the most direct and timeless link from the past to the present. Although she died 45 years ago, her presence today arouses as much sensation on recordings and in journals and magazines as it ever has done – which is remarkable as there are not so many people around today who are old enough to remember her in her time. Altogether her historical position encapsulates pre-second wave feminism.’

The continuing power of Maria Callas today is borne out by Warner Classics which, in anticipation of large demand, is set to release a massive new commemorative box set of all her studio recordings and live performances this September. The set includes the few video recordings of her in existence, some never before released interviews and, most vitally, some never before heard clips of recording sessions during which she can be heard breaking off to request retakes of passages that she wasn’t happy with – a crucial insight into how intensely demanding she was of herself. Extracts from some of her recordings and indeed of many of the other featured artists can be heard as visitors progress through the exhibition, as Kate Bailey tells us.

Photograph of Maria Callas taken as Violette in La Traviata photography by Houston Rogers © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

‘There will be a headphone experience, as there was in the Opera: Passion, Power, and Politics exhibition back in 2017. As you move through the space, the audio will be triggered in response to what you see. So, for instance, as you approach the Callas showcases you will see her stage costumes and jewellery while simultaneously hearing her sing, and in the case of her famous portrayal of Tosca you can also see a video clip of her singing Vissi d’arte.’

And that’s just Act One! Space in this feature precludes anything other than only a cursory glance at the other two Acts, which are not primarily focussed on classical music, although Act Three provides an important full circle moment: ‘The Second Act looks at the second, third and fourth waves of feminism thematically, and this part of the Exhibition is strongly orientated to rock and pop. Six sections here deal with different aspects of a diva in a contemporary lens, and we include themes of status, power, freedom, protest, and ‘diva’ as a social and political liberating term, among other issues. There’s a strong illustration here of how the flamboyant diva concept of the past has been reborn in a very different kind of contemporary context, and so in this Act we are also featuring the arising of the male diva. Then in Act Three we bring everything together as a finale by projecting into the V&A Dome a conceptual image of divas in constellations and star maps. Here we juxtapose the different kinds of divas in their strikingly differing guises and unify the intergenerational threads of these extraordinary performers and their influence on audiences, while bringing visitors back into the sound of an opera voice in their headpieces.’