Active at the height of the apartheid regime, the Eoan Group treated South Africans to operas ‘in the true tradition of Italy’. The group relied on elaborate, naturalistic stage settings and the most stereotypical of operatic conventions to construct a hereditary link between itself and Italy, thus creating an alignment with the cultural ideal of Europe and its colonial representative – whiteness. This article offers a materialist reading of the Eoan Group's first operatic endeavour, La traviata in 1956, to argue that their invocation and emulation of the ‘Italian tradition’ served to situate them within a class-based discourse of racially inscribed civility. Drawing on archival records relating to props, costumes, advertisements and funding, it shows how the group constructed an imagined Italian heritage both to emphasise the quality of their productions, and to create an affinity with their white audiences. In this reading, the construction of an Italian operatic tradition functions not as a neutral aesthetic category, but as a historically situated politics of race and class.

中文翻译：

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居住白色：Eoan Group La traviata，1956

在种族隔离制度的鼎盛时期，Eoan Group 以“意大利的真正传统”为南非人提供歌剧。该团体依靠精心制作、自然主义的舞台设置和最刻板的歌剧惯例在自己和意大利之间建立了一种世袭的联系，从而与欧洲及其殖民代表的文化理想——白人——保持一致。本文提供了对 Eoan 集团第一次运营努力的唯物主义解读，茶花女1956 年，他们争辩说，他们对“意大利传统”的援引和效仿有助于将他们置于基于种族的文明的阶级话语中。借助与道具、服装、广告和资金相关的档案记录，它展示了该团队如何构建一个想象中的意大利遗产，以强调其作品的质量，并与白人观众建立亲密关系。在这种解读中，意大利歌剧传统的建构不是作为一种中立的审美范畴，而是作为一种历史定位的种族和阶级政治。