In 2006, the project of Marek Budzinski and Zbigniew Badovski won an open international competition with 14 participants. The full name of the theater is “Opera and Philharmonic Society of Podlaska. European Center for Art in Bialystok”. The theater is conceived as a grandiose center of all-European importance, capable of stimulating cultural life and increasing the tourist attractiveness of a small town [1] near the eastern border of the country. The construction was funded by the European Union and lasted for eight years.
The complex is located near the center of Bialystok, surrounded by parks. The author's idea takes into account the multicultural specifics of the eastern part of Poland: the theater building and the surrounding space are intended to establish a symbolic connection between the old Jewish cemetery and a small Orthodox necropolis with a small one-domed church. The idea of a dialogue between cultures is developed by the neighborhood of the Church of St. Roch.
The image of the theater is designed as a temple of art and nature. The colonnade of the main facade, characteristic of Marek Budzinski, and the open amphitheater are the main accents of the theme of culture and tradition. She is echoed by the theme of nature: the green space of the nearby park flows into the green facades of the theater, its green roof and further into the thickets of historical necropolises.
The complex includes a well-thought-out system of cultural and natural ties. Odesskaya Street, which faces the main facade, becomes the "axis of art" on which Budzinsky "string" the nearby puppet theater, as well as a cinema. At the same time, the street remained mostly pedestrian, with a designated one-way traffic lane at a low speed of 5-10 km / h. The authors continued this short street to link st. Mlynov with Kalinovskogo street; it was joined by Stanislav Manyushka Square in the form of a richly landscaped parterre square. There is a possibility of both a "front" entrance to the main entrances of the Opera, a puppet theater and a cinema, as well as an entrance to underground parking lots. Not only the new opera house, but the entire territory received a well-thought-out system of ground and underground parking lots.
Thus, scattered objects and green areas, interspersed with wastelands, were combined into an integral, meaningful space, permeated with visual symbolic connections and convenient communications.
The theater has a fairly free plan, the core of which is the box of a large auditorium and stage. Its cubic volume, overgrown with greenery, decisively dominates the surrounding space, while the rest of the rooms are located in two lower tiers and are inscribed in a gentle green hill. Stage holds and parking lots are located on two underground floors.
In addition to the main stage, the Podlaska opera has an additional small stage for chamber concerts and drama performances. An open amphitheater adjoins the northwestern slope of the "hill". The inclusion of the latter in the composition "Podlaski" is due to the memory of the place: earlier there was a musical Amphitheater named after the famous Polish organist Czeslaw Nemen, built in the 1970s.
The colonnade of the heavily spread main facade is clad with stainless steel and entwined with greenery creeping along special grids. The main entrance is displaced from the center and looks like an exedra covered from above with a flat glass dome with an openwork metal frame.
Behind the transparent glass wall is a spacious and extremely dynamic foyer space. When you get here, two perspectives open up to the eye: the first, with two narrow glass staircases and a line of simple cylindrical columns, stretches along the main facade. There is a wardrobe and an entrance to the parterre, as well as open narrow stairs leading upstairs.
The style is dominated by high-tech.
The second perspective, continuing the axis of the main entrance, through solemn propylaea and a wide staircase leads to the foyer at the level of the boxes - a space sacralized and mythologized. The original decor of embossed glass with musical texts adorns the propylaea and columns.
In the halls of different directions in style and location, there is a visible interaction of the traditional theatrical appearance with modern functionality. The foyer can be used as an exhibition area, regardless of musical performances.
The main auditorium, whose interior was designed by Georg Izenour, has 1,000 seats: 664 in the stalls, 241 in the balcony and 95 in the boxes. It can be transformed into different-sized spaces for the needs of a concert hall, drama theater and conference hall. In the rich polychromy of the modern space of the hall, the gray-blue color of the walls is combined with green and red armchairs. The intense contrast of green and red, which is not typical for historic opera houses, endows the space with emotional dynamics and permeates with a sense of life-giving energy.
Theatrical equipment of the Podlaska Opera is one of the most modern in Europe. The top of the auditorium is formed by movable glass screens that provide lighting and acoustics, while also performing an important decorative function. Huge stage holds provide for the possibility of transformation and quick change of scenery. Fences of the tiers are unusual, in which the motifs of the musical lines are used. The walls are decorated with realistic sculptures of musical and dancing figures.
Unlike the upper garden
the Warsaw University libraries by the same authors; the green roof of the opera in Bialystok looks like a natural meadow with field vegetation; it offers a panoramic view of Bialystok.
The huge pictorial complex is perceived not immediately, but as it goes around it, in the exciting development of monumental spatial drama. One can clearly read the idea of the theater as a sacred temple of the muses, which rises above ideological, national and confessional contradictions.
[1] The population of Bialystok is about 350 thousand people.
