Q. Why was the art of Rene Magritte used as the basis of the set decor for Lyric Opera’s “The Barber of Seville”?
A. John Conklin, set designer for the original 1986 production of “The Barber of Seville” at Lyric, which is in revival through Saturday, said the Magritte connection was his idea. “I’ve always felt that Rossini comic operas are comic — but they’re also sort of terrifying. They create this complete world that seems familiar but is somehow upside down, juxtaposing things we know in a strange, different way. [The Rossini operas] also seem to be a very self-contained world, a closed-off world with their own rules. Then I thought, Well who is a painter who does the same thing? Magritte is witty, almost frivolous sometimes, but essentially serious and rather disturbing. What we tried to do was think, What would have happened if Magritte had been a 18th Century painter? So instead of men in bowler hats falling from the sky, we had men in tricorns falling from the sky.”