Opera score immortalized in SentryGlas® Expressions™ at Erfurt Theatre, Germany

The newly-constructed Erfurt Theatre in the historic city of Türingen, Germany, commissioned a new opera for its opening in October 2003: ‘Luther’ by Peter Aderhold. A part of the opera score has been immortalized within SentryGlas® Expressions™ decorative laminated glass so that music-lovers of the future will be reminded of the Theatre’s glittering opening season.

The Luther score is composed of 16 unique images and carries the fine lines for over 40 m.

Christian Fiedler and Ulf Sturm, partners with architects Friedrich und Partner of Hamburg, Germany said: “The whole Erfurt Theatre has a very contemporary look, using a lot of laminated glass in the façade in dramatic contrast to the surrounding medieval architecture of this small city in Saxony (between Frankfurt and Dresden). We wanted to build into the interior design of the theatre a permanent memento to commemorate the opening of the building.

“The enlarged score of Luther is laminated into a striking, 50 m-long (45 cm wide) counter top at the theatre’s cloakroom, where people check in their coats and hats. You have to walk along the counter to see the whole score. The counter-top is very striking and the effect is remarkable.”

Josef Failer of laminator Flachglass said: “We used 16 pieces of laminated glass, 14 with a length of 2.4 m and two slightly smaller pieces at the two ends. Because each glass panel displays a unique image, a different few bars from the opening libretto of ‘Luther’, this was an ideal application for SentryGlas® Expressions™. The score is in black while the background is in translucent white. The glass for the project was supplied by Glas Wiedemann of Weissensee, Germany.

A scene from the opening night of Luther at the new Erfurt Theatre in October 2003.

“The main production challenge in this particular application included being able to hold extremely fine lines of about 1 mm thick – the musical score lines - along the 50 m of the entire laminated glass counter top. The architects were very pleased with the quality and the job was finished successfully and to schedule. Screen printing would have been a lot more complicated and expensive – particularly because the pattern on each pane of glass is different and but equally because the quality of the fine music score lines we achieved would have not been possible with screen printing.”

Martin Luther, the reformation cleric and thinker whose movement helped lead to the formation of the Protestant church in sixteenth century Europe, was made a priest in the city of Erfurt. Peter Aderhold is a young composer from Berlin.

Article copyright and used with permission by DuPont Laminated Glass News