IDFA presents two complementary versions of the same multimedia project: an individual VR experience of the opera and a live performance on the stage of Dutch National Opera. In the stage production, the life of Francisca de Angola, a free Black woman known to us from an Amsterdam archival document dating from 1632, is brought to life through singing, performance, Afro-diasporic music, and digital scenography. The audience itself becomes part of this immersive world.

Like the VR version, The Invisible Woman: an Immersive Opera in the Making moves between De Angola’s 17th-century Amsterdam and the same city centuries later, where contemporary journalist Idil, as a Black woman, recognizes herself in her ancestor’s struggle against rejection and oblivion. The central question: who decides who makes it into the history books, and who is omitted?
This version is a special preview, followed by a discussion with the makers, including Emmy-winning director Tamara Shogaolu, about the work’s further development.

This project has been supported through funding from the Creative Industries Fund NL, the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, and CIIIC and is presented by Nationale Opera & Ballet in partnership with IDFA DocLab