Matthew Barney
«Cremaster 5»

When total descension is finally attained in «CREMASTER 5» (1997) the concluding chapter of the cycle, it is envisioned as a tragic love story, a lamentation on separation and loss set in the romantic dreamscape of late-nineteenth-century Budapest. The film is cast in the shape of a lyric opera. Biological metaphors have shifted form to inhabit emotional states-longing and despair-that become musical leitmotivs in the orchestral score. The opera's primary characters—the Queen of Chain (played by Ursula Andress) and her Diva, Magician, and Giant (all played by Matthew Barney)—enact collectively, as a musical ensemble, the final release promised by the project as a whole.

(source: Matthew Barney, The Cremaster Cycle, Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2002 Ostfildern-Ruit)