My Blue Dot

created specially for the NYC Viennese Opera Ball, devoted this year to the 200 years of Strauss's Blue Danube Waltz,  raised money for Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York.

It’s a great honor to be invited to create a special new work for the Viennese Opera Ball 2025 in New York at the famous Casa Cipriani, with this year’s theme of 200 years of Strauss and his unforgettable waltz On the Blue Danube!

For this special occasion, I have created a new work, "Blue Dot," from handmade recycled laces from all over our blue planet, honoring our coming together in harmony and raising awareness for those less fortunate than us.

"Blue Dot" was auctioned at the Viennese Opera Ball among other interesting items, with all proceeds going for the treatment of cancer patients via Gabrielle’s Angel Foundation, partners of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York.

With Simone Long, former opera singer who purchased my donated Blue Dot in favor of raising money for cancer treatment and research.

My “Blue Dot,” named after the famous quote by Carl Sagan on our one and only fragile, precious planet Earth as seen from the ISS (International Space Station) that I include in so many of my performances… The quote goes: “When I look down at Earth, I see this incredibly beautiful planet. It looks like a living, breathing organism, but at the same time, it also looks extremely fragile. Look again at this dot, that’s here, that’s home, that’s us. On it, everyone you know, everyone you love, every human being who ever was lived out their lives, the aggregate of our joy and suffering…”

The Viennese Opera Ball, an annual white tie charity gala celebrates the cultural and economic relationships between Austria and America, connecting two continents, two cities and two centuries in one glamorous night. It was founded by Austrians immigrating to the United States 69 years ago, and is a tribute to both their former home town Vienna and their host city, New York.

Considered the most prestigious and oldest Viennese ball outside of Vienna, the gala draws an international audience while its charitable projects connect communities in New York and Vienna.

In front of Casa Cipriani in Middtown Manhattan, the place where the Viennese Opera Ball is organized every year since decades. 

Copyright ©Eva Petric, 2025, Bildrecht Viennna, All rights reserved.