'Dronning Annabell' is a story about merging realities, sisterly love, and the experience of being both hospitalized and a relative in the psychiatric system. Opera, performance art, and sculpture are interwoven in this entirely new work.

In 2021, visual artist Faun Vium had her sister Katrine admitted to the psychiatric ward at Skejby Hospital. During a psychotic episode, Katrine perceived herself as a character—a queen—from one of Faun’s earlier works. From this emerged a complex and, at the time, involuntary artistic collaboration between the two sisters, which composer Amanda Drew later joined.

'Dronning Annabell' unites opera, performance art, and sculpture in a powerful, immersive experience. Fragile paper sculptures serve as scenography, costumes, and even instruments for the work’s three rising performers: vocalist and double bassist Thora Kidon Jæger, soprano Freja Højland Høj, and singer-cellist Amanda Drew. As bodies and sculptures are moved in a mesmerizing, secret choreography—perhaps by the ill, perhaps by the caregivers?—a raw and tender harmony forms among the performers. Amid fragments of conversation, we hear the two sisters together where the psychosis feels both magnificent and terrifying.