Manuel La Casta completed his architectural studies in Valencia and Vienna with distinction, and went on to work at the interface between installation and architecture in Berlin, Geneva and Paris. At the same time, he assisted on productions at the Munich Kammerspiele and the Deutsches Theater in Berlin. In opera, he has worked for venues and festivals including the Salzburg Festival, the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, the Bavarian State Opera, the Zurich Opera House and the Teatro San Carlo in Naples. In 2019 he designed sets for the world premiere of Hochdeutschland, after Alexander Schimmelbusch’s novel, directed by Kevin Barz at the Munich Kammerspiele, with later performances at the Ruhr Festival, and in 2021 he was set designer for the world premiere of Nele Stuhler’s Gaia googelt nicht, directed by Sarah Kurze at the Deutsches Theater in Berlin. In 2023 he designed sets for Leoncavallo’s opera Zazà at Theater Bielefeld in a production by Nadja Loschky, and in the same year he and Ulrich Rasche created the sets for Lessing’s Nathan der Weise at the Salzburg Festival. He designed sets for Martin Sperr’s Jagdszenen aus Niederbayern at the Stadttheater Klagenfurt in 2024, and for Tosca at the Wiesbaden State Theatre in 2025.
