Rusalka tells the story of a water nymph who longs to become human, a tale often read as fantasy. In Øyen’s staging, it became a resonant drama of separation, memory, and fragile love: a father losing contact with his daughter, a woman sacrificing her voice to be heard, and the painful distance between longing and fulfilment.

The decision to double each role — singers with dancers — revealed the duality already embedded in the opera. At times dancers mirrored the singers in unison, at others they embodied unspoken thoughts or silences, lending form to what words and notes could not capture. In the pivotal role of Rusalka, who falls mute in the second act, this doubling became especially poignant: the dancer’s body continued to speak where the voice could not.

Visually, Åsmund Færavaag’s set surrounded the performers with two vast wooden structures, undulating like waves or cavernous shells. These shifting shapes abstracted the world of the opera, evoking the underwater depths and the fragile spaces between dream and reality. Costumes by Stine Sjøgren and lighting by Martin Flack heightened the sense of transformation, shadow, and enchantment.

For Øyen, the task was daunting: to stage an opera with the integrity of its music while also translating its libretto into movement, gesture, and stage picture. The result was a production that reviewers described as both cohesive and expressive — a poetic staging where dance and opera became inseparable.