Daniel Dvořák

Biography

Daniel Dvořák studied architecture and set design with Prof. Josef Svoboda at the University of Applied Arts in Prague, subsequently at Vienna’s Akademie der bildenden Künste under the tutelage of Prof. Lois Egg. In 1988, in tandem with stage director Jiří Nekvasil, he established the experimental Opera Furore. Two years later he became the intendant of the Chamber Opera Prague, which he and Jiří Nekvasil reorganised into Opera Mozart. Daniel Dvořák was the set designer and co-author of all Opera Furore productions and the majority of Opera Mozart productions. Between 1998 and 2002 he was the Director of the State Opera Prague, where as a set designer he among others prepared Bubu of Montparnasse (Emil František Burian), Phaedra (Emil Viklický), Die Physiker (Andreas Pflüger), Circus Terra (Trygve Madsen), Der Freischütz (Carl Maria von Weber), The Fall of the House of Usher (Philip Glass), Es war einmal (Alexander Zemlinsky), Tiefland (Eugene d’Albert), The Polish Jew (Karel Weiss). Between 2002 and 2006 Daniel Dvořák was the Director of the National Theatre in Prague, with which he has collaborated as a designer since 1983. Here he has created some thirty set designs – for example, for Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor and Don Pasquale, Bellini's Norma, Mozart’s Così fan tutte, Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur, Puccini’s La fanciulla del West, Adams’s The Death of Klinghoffer, Smetana’s The Bartered Bride and The Secret, Janáček’s The Excursions of Mr. Brouček and Jenůfa, Martinů’s The Greek Passion, and others. As regards theatres abroad, he has in recent years created set designs (costumes) for, among other things, Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen (Buenos Aires), Mozart’s La clemenza di Tito (Hamburg), Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer and Berg’s Lulu (Regensburg), Dvořák’s Rusalka (Münster), Puccini’s La bohème (Thessaloniki), Martinů’s Three Wishes (Rostock) and Verdi’s Requiem (Tampere). Daniel Dvořák was invited to collaborate on the largest Czech musicals of recent years and has also created set designs for music films on television. He has displayed his works at both independent and group exhibitions. At the Prague Quadrennial 1999 (the world’s largest set design show) the Czech display, to which he contributed, was awarded the main prize – the Golden Triga. He received the 1999 Alfréd Radok Prize for theatre set design (Bubu of Montparnasse) and in 2004 he was again nominated for this prize (The Death of Klinghoffer). In 2002 the French Government appointed him Chevalier de L´ordre des Arts et des Lettres. From the 2007/2008 season to October 2012 Daniel Dvořák was the Director of the National Theatre in Brno, Czech Republic. Update: March 2013