On Saturday, September 5, the European cultural channel ARTE launched the third edition of the free online opera season ARTE Opera in partnership with major European festivals and opera houses. The third season opened with the live broadcast of Marina Abramović's "7 deaths of Maria Callas" from the Bavarian State Opera. The premiere was initially scheduled for April 2020, but had to be postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

In the 2020-2021 season, ARTE will continue to host outstanding opera productions every month thanks to its unique European network of partners. They will be available for free in the specially created online opera season. 

Marina Abramović has always been fascinated by Maria Callas. "7 deaths of Maria Callas" is an opera project in which the artist presents seven emblematic scenes of the death of opera characters. All the arias contained in the performance are the climax of the musical setting and the dramaturgy of the operas they come from, and are forever marked by Callas' interpretation.

After the two previous seasons, the balance of the European opera offer of ARTE is extremely positive: in total, since September 2018, the project has recorded over 1.9 million views, including 863,000 in the first season and 1,047,000 in the second. The project reaches out to a truly European audience: almost 30 percent of the viewers are from Germany, 30 percent  from France and the remaining 40 percent from other countries, mainly European.

(WBJ)