An International Symposium hosted by OISTAT History and Theory Commission
14.00 – 18.00 18 June, 2007, Architecture Hall, Prague Quadrennial
The Symposium followed on from the H&T Commission meeting in the morning. It was attended by approximately 40 people, though some were lost due to the extreme heat and noise of the space (above the central hall at PQ. The speakers valiantly battled against the adverse conditions and also kindly gave permission for their presentations to be recorded (sound only). These will be transcribed, edited and made available to members. A more detailed report is in preparation for the website.
Capturing Scenography demonstrated a wide range – but certainly not all - of the professional interests and experiences reflected in the membership of OISTAT. The following programme and list of speakers and subjects will give some idea of the scope of presentations.
The organising interim committee of the H&T Commission would like to thank all of the speakers for their time and fascinating insights into their practice and research subjects. Thanks also to Professor Aronson for his keynote which set a lively and engaged tone and to Randy Gener for his vigorous and thought provoking responses and round-up and the end of the symposium. Thanks also to Elizabeth Wright of the British Library Oral Histories Project (scenographers) for recording the event.
Introduction / welcome Kate Burnett (UK) and Lilija Blumenfeld (Estonia)
Keynote: Professor Arnold Aronson (USA)
Kathleen Irwin (Canada):
Double-crossing / Vying Representations in Crossfiring.
Thea Brejzek (Switzerland):
Captured and Devoured: Media as Expression and Representation
Inger Mattsson (Sweden):
The scenography model: an artistic vision, construction model, and museum object.
Fausto Viana (Brazil):
Capturing Brazilian Scenography since 2002
Tal Itzhaki (Israel):
Looking at Themes: Topical Ways of Capturing Scenography in the Israeli Exhibitions at PQ’03 and PQ’07
Irena Sentevska (Serbia and Montenegro):
‘Serbian Swinging 90s’: Capturing Scenography in Turbulent Times.
Caroline Noteboom (Netherlands):
A Moment in the Scenographical Continuum of a City in Transition: Bogotá
Summary and conclusions: Randy Gener (USA)
Abstracts and Biographies
| Kathleen Irwin | Dr Thea Brejzek |
| Double-crossing/ Vying Representations in Crossfiring | The Captured and the Devoured– Mediated Opera Scenography between Expression and Representation |
| This paper discusses Knowhere Production Inc.’s and Sâkêwêwak First Nations Artists’ Collective’s struggle to represent the cultural communities that encircled the production of Crossfiring, a site-specific performance located at the Claybank Brick Plant National Historic Site in Southern Saskatchewan, in September, 2006. The cross-cultural, cross-disciplinary event considered the resources of the Dirt Hills to aboriginal and non-aboriginal cultures, mapping the global economies that determined the site’s local viability and the way the dominant culture interrupted prior traditional land claims. The site now represents two cultures historically at cross-purposes in relation to the elemental resource, clay; one culture developed a spiritual relationship with it, the other recognized a commodifiable expedient in it. Over time, the site has been constituted by a range of associations: a place of healing, of expropriation, of commodification; once a vital community, it is now an example of twentieth century industrialization preserved within a tourist destination where the representation of its complex past is threatened by a desire to capture one moment while occluding another. The collaboration was an attempt to reconstitute, through performance, the narratives of the peoples who marked this land and it underscored the complexity of representation in the absence of shared strategies, values and aesthetic language. This paper will explore this performance as a vexed attempt to negotiate, represent and record pasts where, on one hand, oral history was interrupted by colonial intervention and, on the other, written archives reference economies rather than lives. The paper will also address the residual traces of the event through text, photography, internet and video. Biography Kathleen Irwin is Associate Professor of Scenography in the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Regina, Canada. Having designed for theatre, opera and dance for most of her career, she now focuses on making large-scale, multi-disciplinary, site-specific events centred around notions of identity as reflected through landscape. In August she will defend her dissertation at the University of Art and Design, Helsinki. |
Opera is the biggest, the most expensive and the most seductive of all theatrical machines and since its early days in 16th Italy has provoked scenographers toward the continuous development of new stage technologies. Biography |
| Inger Mattsson | Tal Itzhaki |
| The scenography model: an artistic vision, construction model, and museum object. | Looking at Themes: Topical Ways of Capturing Scenography in the Israeli Exhibitions at PQ’03 and PQ’07 |
| During this presentation I will discuss the importance of preserving set models and the beneficial aspects of displaying them in a museal context. A comprehensive project aimed at preserving, documenting and making accessible set models from The Royal Swedish Opera will also be presented. In addition, I will show examples of and compare similar projects with The Royal Swedish Dramatic Theatre’s set models and The Swedish Museum of Architecture’s collection of building models. The Architecture Museum has a long and comprehensive experience of both documentation and attractive exhibition of the models. Set models have a practical function at a theatre, A model is a 3 dimensional sketch of a stage set in miniature form and is used to present the scenographer’s and director’s artistic vision before the set is to be built. The models are also used, together with detailed drawings and sketches, as production models to be viewed by all of the many artisans involved with its construction at the theatre. Practical solutions to problems encountered when realizing the scenographer’s vision are often facilitated by the use of models during set construction. Set models can thus be viewed as a combination of a functional tool and a work of art. While 2 dimensional sketches of sets and costumes are viewed as original artworks, set models, though original works as well, are not always treated as such. In many cases the actual stage sets are not saved due to storage space problems. Because of this, the stage models provide an important archival record for the future. Many models are kept by the scenographer or can be found at the theatres afterward, rarely kept in suitable storage conditions and certainly not accessible. This is unfortunate, as many of these models could serve as valuable reference objects for students, researchers, and theatre professionals. In addition they can also have great potential as exhibition objects. Biography Inger Mattsson is Head of Archives, Library and Research Department at the Swedish Museum of Architecture in Stockholm. She is a theatre, art and opera historian with a background including Department Head at the Swedish Royal Opera Library, Archives and Collections. During her time there she has spearheaded several large projects concerning accessibility of the theatre’s large historical collections. Inger Mattsson is often invited to lecture on historical subjects pertaining to theatre architecture, theatre technology, opera and theatre history. She is a member of the Swedish branch of Oistat. |
I have been trying for some time now to create a model for analyzing scenographic works by breaking them down into two movements, or levels of action, thus creating a division similar to that inherent in media design. The suggested division distinguishes between "interface," or better yet, "user's interface," namely, theatrical design, involving the architecture and action design of a production on the one hand; and the scenographic "content," involving stage images, scenographic metaphors on the other. Using this model enables a discussion of visual themes in scenography and in the theatre in a cultural context, and captures thematic elements and attitudes underlying the theatrical design, and influencing and enhancing theatrical action. I devised the Israeli Exhibition at PQ03 around the theme of “Suitcases and Keys." The suitcases stood for the Jewish refugee and immigration experience, while the keys serve as a Palestinian icon for the lost houses and the experience undergone by Palestinian refugees. The Current Israeli exhibition in PQ07, which I devised as well, is related to the separation wall between Israel and Palestine. After almost 40 years of living without recognized borders, the separation wall is being erected, becoming an ominous visual entity as well as a real life border. Exposed natural concrete (Beton Brut) is hardly a new material in Israeli culture: it is an all too familiar element in our architecture and public sculpture. Its ubiquitous presence had to do with building in haste and the fascination with modernism, but also with our notion of fortification. My project is to explore the way the "wall' is represented in current Israeli scenography. Local stone would be the opposite of concrete. In use in the Mediterranean since ancient times, it represents for both parties, Israeli and Palestinians, the deep roots, the strongholds and claim on the land. Much of our theatre activity is held in old stone buildings, from crusaders times and Muslim times, converted into theatrical spaces. The stone thus joins the keys in evoking the theme of home ownership, and its loss. Biography Tal Itzhaki graduated from the College of Art Teachers in Ramat Hasharon and the Department of Theatre arts of Tel Aviv University. She taught art and theatre design at Tel Aviv University; the College of Art Teachers; the Wizo-Canada College of Design; created the Theatre Design program at the Department of Theatre, University of Haifa, and served as its Head for nine years. She was a Visiting Professor of Theatre for three years at Barnard College, Columbia University in New York, where she co-authored and designed productions such as Neighbors and Xandra. She now teaches at Sapir College. |
| Caroline Noteboom | Fausto Viana |
| Scenography and the City in the Context of Bogotá | CenografiaBrasil - Capturing Brazilian Scenography since 2002 |
| By investigating the socio-political and physical context surrounding scenographers and the scenographical event in Bogotá, this paper hopes to understand the reciprocal influence that scenography and the city have on each other. In the mid nineties, Bogotá awoke to its mega-city condition, with no means to identify itself, other than as “nobody’s city”. Through good governance, the diverse segments of the population are participating in building a socially inclusive and liveable city. Due to the importance of theatres in the cultural life of Bogotá, the municipal government’s recent interest in making this “Capital District” into a “Theatrical District” has been fuelling developments in the theatre world. Although scenographers in Bogotá predominantly learn their trade empirically, through apprenticeship, formal educational institutions are now beginning to set up programs based on international standards. This paper aims to investigate the inseparable ties between scenography and city in the context of Bogotá. Biography Caroline Noteboom, a Dutch Canadian architect from Montreal, is presently working at theateradvies bv, theatre consultants based in Amsterdam. She worked on several building types including stadia, before dedicating herself almost exclusively to theatre projects. Caroline has lived and worked in several cities including Amsterdam, Paris, Beijing and Montréal. During the last 13 years, she was in Bogotá for several long and short periods of time, where she has had the opportunity to witness the unprecedented urban cultural developments and the vitality and importance of theatre life within this changing city |
This is a paper meant to show and discuss how a group formed by scenographers, light,sound and set designers can get together and propose effective actions. We will take a look at the past and briefly see the various activities developed and how they worked (or not). Most important of all will be how we expect the future to be and how the group will keep going and proposing effective changes. Biography Fausto Viana is a set and costume design teacher at Escola de Comunicações e Artes (School of Arts and Communication) at Universidade de São Paulo (University of São Paulo). He does research on costumes used on the performances directed by great names of the 20th century, such as Stanislavsky, Brecht and Max Reinhardt. He is also very interested in the cataloguing of theater textile collections, specially those of historical value, such as those of the collection of the Municipal Theater of São Paulo (more than thirty thousand costumes). |
| Irena Sentevska | Randy Gener |
| ‘SERBIAN SWINGING 90s’: Capturing Scenography in Turbulent Times | |
| My current research on relationships between ‘scenography’ and ‘real life’ in turbulent times, is based on my ten years of work as a curator and program manager of the Biennial of Stage Design, the most extensive program dedicated to design, publicity and technical production in performing arts in the region of Southeastern Europe. The Biennial was launched in extremely harsh conditions, during the massive demonstrations in Belgrade against the regime of Slobodan Milosevic in winter 1996/1997, with a critical perspective to the artistic production in Serbia and the overall social conditions of the time. My presentation will look into relations between scenography /visualization of theatre events/ in Serbia from 1990 to 2000 (the period of ‘reign’ and political dominance of Slobodan Milosevic), and its audience’s perception of the consequences of this reign, i.e. ‘the real life’ outside the theatres. On the theoretical level, I aim at introducing a(nother) new perspective on the notion of ‘scenography’. ‘Scenography’ was traditionally, in the XIX century realist and romanticist traditions, later to be adopted by modernism (and not only in ‘provincial’ countries like Serbia), considered exclusively in artistic terms: either as ‘design’ /’decoration’ or ‘embellishment’ for a dramatic narrative/ or as ‘art’ /outstanding work of an ‘inspired’ individual/. Contemporary interpretative models based in the cultural and critical studies are still scarcely applied to scenography, that is, models which look at scenographers’ work as artefacts of a particular culture and specific society. In those terms, I hope that this presentation might meet some interest among colleagues - historians, theoreticians and writers on scenography, although it addresses a very specific context and a very particular (and recent) period in the modern European history. Biography Irena Sentevska is Interim Chair of the OISTAT Publication & Communication Commission was born in Belgrade, Serbia, in 1971, graduated at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Belgrade and completed postgraduate studies at the department for Stage Design and department for Theory of Arts and Media at the University of Arts in Belgrade. She currently works on her MA thesis: ‘″Swinging 90’s″: Theatre Design in Serbia during Milosevic’, due to be published in 2007 by CLIO Publishing Belgrade. From academic year 2005/06. she was lecturer in Theory and Criticism in Stage Design at the Interdisciplinary Postgraduate Studies at the University of Arts in Belgrade and guest lecturer at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Novi Sad, and Faculty of Architecture, University of Belgrade. From 1994 to present she worked as a project manager in YUSTAT, Performing Arts and Technology Centre, OISTAT Centre Serbia and Montenegro, and from 2002 to 2004 in the Museum of Applied Arts in Belgrade. From 1997 to present, she has been curator of YUSTAT’s Biennial of Stage Design, the most extensive exhibition dedicated to design and technology in performing arts in South Eastern Europe. Irena is member of ULUPUDS’, (Serbian national association of designers) section for Arts History, Theory and Criticism, member of OISTAT PCC commission since 1997 and is currently its Vice-Chair. She has designed around 20 museum and gallery exhibitions /including main exhibitions of the Biennial of Stage Design, is a contributor to a number of professional publications in Serbia and OISTAT PCC network of publications and has translated from English a number of academic reference books in the fields of architecture, scenography, cultural and media studies. |
