The Things We Know    invites audiences into a shared moment of artistic discovery.

(Los Angeles) September 2, 2026 — LA Opera today announced that artist Enrique Martínez Celaya has been commissioned to create The Things We Know, a monumental curtain artwork that will become a distinctive visual element of the company's 2026/27 season.

Installed at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion for all mainstage performances throughout the season, the approximately 70-foot-wide work will greet audiences as they enter the theater. Moments before each performance begins, the curtain slowly rises, revealing an entirely different world hidden from view.

“A curtain is different from a painting on a wall because it has a life in time,” said Enrique Martínez Celaya. “A curtain waits. Then it moves. I wanted that movement to be part of the work rather than merely something that happened to it. At first, the audience encounters children absorbed by the small worlds before them. As the curtain rises, that recognizable world gives way to a field of stars, flowers and fractured light. The movement allows these different scales to occupy the same work without resolving them. What changes is not the world itself, but how much of it we are allowed to see. Eventually, the image disappears into darkness. And from that darkness another world—the world of the opera—begins.”

“Enrique has spent his career exploring how art communicates in shared spaces—not simply as something to be observed, but as something that can change our experience of a place and of the moment we inhabit together,” said Christopher Koelsch, LA Opera’s President and CEO. “He brings to that work the sensibility not only of an extraordinary visual artist, but of a poet and philosopher, which makes him an especially compelling artist for an opera house—a place where image, language, music and ideas converge. The Things We Know transforms the curtain from a boundary into a kind of visual prelude, making the audience’s arrival part of the artistic experience before a single note is heard. We are profoundly grateful to Mei-Lee Ney, whose extraordinary generosity and partnership have made this ambitious project possible. A passionate champion of the visual arts in Southern California, Mei-Lee shares our admiration for Enrique’s work and our belief in the power of this commission to resonate with our audiences and the wider artistic community of Los Angeles.”

Enrique Martínez Celaya is a Cuban-born artist, author and former scientist whose multidisciplinary practice encompasses painting, sculpture, installation and writing, often exploring questions of perception, memory and meaning. His work has been exhibited internationally and is represented in more than 60 public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. He has created major projects and installations for institutions ranging from the State Hermitage Museum and The Phillips Collection to the Berliner Philharmonie and the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Havana. Martínez Celaya is Provost Professor of Humanities and Arts at the University of Southern California and lives and works in Los Angeles.

As part of LA Opera's free Open House on Saturday, October 24, Angelenos will have the opportunity to experience The Things We Know outside a scheduled performance. Visitors can also enjoy a conversation with the artist, a demonstration of the artwork in motion, a recital featuring artists from the Domingo-Colburn-Stein Young Artist Program, and family-friendly activities on the Music Center campus. For more information about this event, please visit LAOpera.org/OpenHouse.

Learn more about Enrique Martínez Celaya and his artwork at LAOpera.org/TheThingsWeKnow.

About LA Opera
Inspired by the extraordinary diversity and creativity of Los Angeles, LA Opera embraces that spirit through performances that continually redefine what opera can be. Through imaginative new productions, world premiere commissions, and fresh perspectives on foundational works that make them feel immediate and compelling, LA Opera has become one of America's most exciting and ambitious opera companies.

In addition to its mainstage performances at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, LA Opera explores new artistic possibilities through LA Opera Off Grand, presenting adventurous works in venues throughout Los Angeles that expand and enrich the operatic repertoire. The LA Opera Connects department offers a robust array of educational programs and community engagement initiatives that reach people throughout every corner of Los Angeles County. Learn more at LAOpera.org.

The Things We Know by Enrique Martínez Celaya generously underwritten by Mei-Lee Ney

LA Opera Media Contact
Marlene Meraz
Director of Communications
mmeraz@laopera.org
213.972.7554

LA Opera is a nonprofit organization dedicated to serving the greater Los Angeles community.