Sydney Town Hall's interiors are transformed with sand and song as an award-winning opera on climate change kick starts the city's biggest arts festival.
Sun & Sea takes place on Sydney's newest beach created with over 28 tonnes of sand packed with holidaymakers of all types walking their dogs, throwing frisbees, sunbaking and just soaking in the sunshine.
The performance, written by all-female Lithuanian creative trio Rugile Barzdziukaite, Vaiva Grainyte and Lina Lapelyte in 2019, includes songs which together describe the impacts of climate change.
"Beachgoers sing gentle elegies for the natural world whilst conveying a deeper message about climate emergency and climate justice," Sydney Festival artistic director Olivia Ansell said.
The play won the Golden Lion Award at the 2019 Venice Biennale and arrives in Australia for its national premiere at Sydney's Town Hall from Friday to Sunday.
Barzdziukaite said that when the trio were writing the opera, they first settled on the beach landscape and then added the climate change theme later.
"The beach is a place which is packed but it's becoming hotter and hotter ... We though it was a good spot to talk about climate change," she said.
Barzdziukaite, Grainyte and Lapelyte first worked together on a play called Have a Good Day which tackled issues of consumerism. This topic remains in Sun & Sea which examines our consumption of global resources and its effect on the climate.
"We also thought it was a nice parallel of seeing a wide variety of bodies (on the beach) which are mortal and fragile in comparison with the bigger cosmic bodies which are also fragile," Lapelyte said.
Climate change is the central "axis" which runs throughout the performance with individual songs on certain aspects of life such as work, travel and family relationships collectively creating a wider climate change picture.
The songs are at times sad and at other times light and ironic but the play is not moralistic, Ms Lapelyte said.
The sand itself also echoes themes of sustainability, being gently laid down seven centimetres deep on protective layering designed to conserve Town Hall's historic flooring.
After the final show, the sand will be thoroughly cleaned and ethically removed, Ansell said.
"It's been sustainably sourced from a local company and will go back to that company and be repurposed for construction and other projects."
Sun & Sea features vocals from 19 international guest artists and almost 100 local choristers. The play also boasts canine performers, babies and families on the beach.
The festival's principal partners are the NSW government and the City of Sydney. Its principal philanthropic supporter is actor Peter Friedman.
Sydney Festival will run from January 5 to 29.
