Ming Cho Lee’s set design for Bomarzo, the haunting opera by Alberto Ginastera, was a masterpiece of surrealism and psychological depth. Lee crafted a fragmented and dreamlike landscape inspired by the eerie, grotesque sculptures of the Bomarzo Gardens in Italy, mirroring the inner turmoil of the protagonist, Pier Francesco Orsini. His use of jagged, abstract structures and evocative textures created a sense of disorientation and foreboding, perfectly aligning with the opera’s themes of madness, mortality, and obsession. Through bold, expressionistic elements, Lee transformed the stage into a living nightmare, heightening the opera’s dramatic and emotional intensity. This design of “Bomarzo” iconically graces the cover of Lynn Pecktal’s “Designing and Drawing for the Theatre”
