Michael Gallen’s “The Curing Line” wins world’s largest award for new opera, the prestigious Fedora Prize

Awarded biennially for the best new opera in Europe, the winner is selected by an international jury of leading opera producers including the directors of the Paris Opera, Dutch National Opera, Danish National Theatre and the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence. The award is also supported by the Kiri te Kanawa Foundation and the European Union.

“The Curing Line” explores themes of healing, loss of culture and environmental collapse through the story of a woman who inherits a life-saving ancestral healing power but loses her capacity to use it. Drawn from ethnographic research into Ireland’s indigenous traditions of “making cures”, the opera considers whether, in thinking of the human and the environment as separate, we are failing to acknowledge that fundamental parts of ourselves and our culture are becoming extinct.

“Here and now, the global world is experiencing a turbulent and rather chaotic time. The theme for The Curing Line is more relevant than ever. What can we do as individuals, as communities, what can we learn from history and inherited traditions, how can we acknowledge the change we have to go through without losing hope for the future generations? The Curing Line will address many of the questions that we as human beings are faced with and do not have the answers for. This project is deeply immersive and multisensorial which gives the possibility to expand the boundaries of opera. The narrative, the musical language and the staging will resonate to the audience of tomorrow." (Birgitta Svendén, Chair Fedora Opera Prize Jury 2025)

Commissioned by the Centre Culturel Irlandais Paris, the opera is produced by Gallen’s own Straymaker company in association with Kilkenny Arts Festival, Miroirs Étendus, Once Off Productions and Copenhagen Opera Festival.

The development of The Curing Line has been supported by The Arts Council of Ireland and Creative Monaghan and the premiere is planned for August 2026 at Kilkenny Arts Festival before touring in Ireland and internationally in the 2026/27 season.

In presenting the award to composer/director Michael Gallen, choreographer/co-director Shawn Fitzgerald Ahern and producer Maura O’Keeffe, Fedora President Stéphane Argyropoulos remarked that the project “redefines the operatic genre by fusing tradition with multimedia innovation”.

Speaking at the ceremony, Michael Gallen said that “...for our independent, artist-led work to be selected as the winner of the award gives us a huge rush of affirmation that will carry us forward not just with this project but with all of our future plans and ambitions”

Patrick O’Donovan T.D., Minister for Arts, Culture, Communications, Media and Sport said: “I am delighted that the Fedora Prize for Opera has been awarded to an Irish company Straymaker, with Once Off Productions as producing partner for their new opera The Curing line. We are all very proud that Straymaker, a small company from the West of Ireland led by Michael Gallen, has been awarded this honour. I want to sincerely congratulate all involved.”

Director of the Arts Council, Maureen Kennelly said “Everyone at the Arts Council congratulates Michael Gallen and his artistic collaborators on this wonderful award. In recent years, we have been honoured to support his work in many ways and we are delighted that this award will bring an even wider audience to his ground-breaking work. Opera in Ireland is going through a very exciting period as exemplified by Michael’s visionary work”.

Artistic Director of Kilkenny Arts Festival said “ “We couldn’t be more thrilled for Michael Gallen and all the team at Straymaker – the Fedora Prize has recognised Michael’s process of making work, which expands and disrupts the boundaries of opera by developing the work in a truly multidisciplinary way with an ensemble drawn from opera, dance, traditional and pop backgrounds. The Curing Line is rooted in the indigenous culture, yet utterly contemporary. Kilkenny Arts Festival is proud to be a co-producer of this exciting new work from Straymaker.”