A view from the stage of the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden
(Picture: Getty Images)The arts can expect “a golden period” after London emerges from lockdown, according to one of the leading lights of the capital’s cultural scene.
Antonio Pappano, music director at the Royal Opera House, said he expects “an explosion of desire” from audiences when they return to theatres, concert halls, museums and galleries.
It follows a torrid 12 months with thousands of jobs lost and artistic institutions struggling to survive social distancing and lockdown to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic.
Exhibitions have been pulled, performances postponed and a whole generation of artists have found an already uncertain business become increasingly impossible to work in.
The damage goes all the way from big institutions such as the V&A to smaller museums operating on fine margins.
But there are positive signs among the wreckage — Pappano’s Royal Opera House is one of many venues finding new audiences online while preparing to return to live performance.
Pappano said: “I believe there will be an explosion of desire from the public to hear, feel and share music when gathering becomes normalised. In my opinion a golden period awaits which will sustain the rebirth of arts institutions, but crucially I hope we’ve learned from all this that our culture is indispensable to our well-being and identity.”
It has been highlighted that the weekend Netflix released The Dig — the film about the excavation of Sutton Hoo starring Carey Mulligan and Ralph Fiennes — more than a million people visited the British Museum webpage about the Anglo-Saxon treasures discovered there.
West End producer Sonia Friedman, who brought Harry Potter to the stage, is putting on a trio of new plays at the Harold Pinter theatre with Gemma Arterton and Emma Corrin, fresh from playing Princess Diana in The Crown, in her stage debut. Playwright Joseph Charlton admitted it had been “nail-biting” watching Corrin’s star rise.
He said: “It’s quite humbling that she still wants to do the play because she’s got TV and film offers left, right and centre. I think it’s the same thing as why people still go to gigs ... it’s that sense of communion between people all doing the same thing.”
