What Is Scenography

"Pamela Howard’s ground-breaking What is Scenography? was the first book to set out the bold new approaches to designing and directing for theatre which had dazzled audiences in Europe during the previous decades. It did us all a service by enriching the scope of how we understand the aesthetics of the stage. The lavish new materials (drawings, colour photos, new production analysis) included in this second edition make it even more essential for anyone interested in new developments in theatre." - David Bradby "To write, design, organize, manage, sculpt, educate, paint, research and above all, to passionately live the life of the performance is what Pamela has done throughout her whole career and, in one way or another, it is reflected here in this book: the universality of stage design, its elements and its soul." - Ramon Ivars "Gives an excellent sense of scenography and a window on a life in the theatre - which is fascinating. ...A superb book." - Professor Arnold Aronson, Columbia University, USA "Pamela Howard is the precise definition of what a scenographer of today should be: a multiple artist. Her vast experience with space, her rare and acute power of reflection, her workshops worldwide, her masterful control of drawing and painting and her ability to interconnect scenography with other artistic expressions qualify her to discuss with great authority what "space for staging" should be in the coming decades of this millennium." - Jose Carlos Serroni Pamela Howard's What is Scenography? has become a classic text in contemporary theatre design and performance practice. In this second edition, the author expands on her holistic analysis of scenography as comprising space, text, research, art, performers, directors and spectators, to examine the changing nature of scenography in the twenty-first century. The book includes: case studies and anecdotes from Howard's own celebrated career illustrations of her own recent work, in full colour throughout an updated 'world view' of scenography, with definitions from the world's most famous and influential scenographers A direct and personal response to the question of how to define scenography by one of the world's leading practitioners, What is Scenography? continues to shape the work of visual theatremakers throughout the world.

Pamela Howard's What is Scenography? has become a classic text in contemporary theatre design and performance practice. In this second edition, the author expands on her holistic analysis of scenography as comprising space, text, research, art, performers, directors and spectators, to examine the changing nature of scenography in the twenty-first century. The book includes: case studies and anecdotes from Howard's own celebrated career illustrations of her own recent work, including black and white illustrations throughout and an eight page colour section an updated 'world view' of scenography, with definitions from the world's most famous and influential scenographers A direct and personal response to the question of how to define scenography by one of the world's leading practitioners, What is Scenography? continues to shape the work of visual theatremakers throughout the world.

The third edition of Pamela Howard’s What is Scenography? expands on the author’s holistic analysis of scenography as comprising space, text, research, art, performers, directors and spectators, to examine the changing nature of scenography in the twenty-first century. The book includes new investigations of recent production projects from Howard’s celebrated career, including Carmen and Charlotte: A Tri-Coloured Play with Music, full-colour illustrations of her recent work and updated commentary from a wide spectrum of contemporary theatre makers. This book is suitable for students in Scenography and Theatre Design courses, along with theatre professionals.

Scenography – the manipulation and orchestration of the performance environment – is an increasingly popular and key area in performance studies. This book introduces the reader to the purpose, identity and scope of scenography and its theories and concepts. Settings and structures, light, projected images, sound, costumes and props are considered in relation to performing bodies, text, space and the role of the audience. Concentrating on scenographic developments in the twentieth century, the Introduction examines how these continue to evolve in the twenty-first century. Scenographic principles are clearly explained through practical examples and their theoretical context. Although acknowledging the many different ways in which design shapes the creation of scenography, the book is not exclusively concerned with the role of the theatre designer. In order to map out the wider territory and potential of scenography, the theories of pioneering scenographers are discussed alongside the work of directors, writers and visual artists.

Focused on the contemporary Anglophone adoption from the 1960s onwards, Beyond Scenography explores the porous state of contemporary theatre-making to argue a critical distinction between scenography (as a crafting of place orientation) and scenographics (that which orientate acts of worlding, of staging). With sections on installation art and gardening as well as marketing and placemaking, this book is an argument for what scenography does: how assemblages of scenographic traits orientate, situate, and shape staged events. Established stage orthodoxies are revisited - including the symbiosis of stage and scene and the aesthetic ideology of 'the scenic' - to propose how scenographics are formative to all staged events. Consequently, one of the conclusions of this book is that there is no theatre practice without scenography, no stages without scenographics. Beyond Scenography offers a manifesto for a renewed theory of scenographic practice.

For literary scholars, plays are texts; for scenographers, plays are performances. Yet clearly a drama is both text and performance. Dramatic Spaces examines period-specific stage spaces in order to assess how design shaped the thematic and experiential dimensions of plays. This book highlights the stakes of the debate about spatiality and the role of the spectator in the auditorium – if audience members are co-creators of the drama, how do they contribute? The book investigates: Roman comedy and Shakespearean dramas in which the stage-space itself constituted the primary scenographic element and actors’ bodies shaped the playing space more than did sets or props the use of paid applauders in nineteenth-century Parisian theaters and how this practice reconfigured theatrical space transactions between stage designers and spectators, including work by László Moholy-Nagy, William Ritman, and Eiko Ishioka Dramatic Spaces aims to do for stage design what reader-response criticism has done for the literary text, with specific case studies on Coriolanus, The Comedy of Errors, Romeo and Juliet, Tales of Hoffman, M. Butterfly and Tiny Alice exploring the audience’s contribution to the construction of meaning.

This ground-breaking book is the first to bring an ecological focus to theatre and performance design, both in scholarship and in practice. Ecoscenography weaves environmental philosophies and practices across genres and fields to provide a captivating vision for the future of sustainable theatre production. The book forefronts leading designers that are driving this emerging field into the mainstream through their relational and reciprocal engagement with place, audiences, materials, and processes. Beyond its radical philosophy and framework, Ecoscenography makes a compelling case for pursuing an ecological ethic in theatre and performance design, not only as a moral imperative, but for the extraordinary possibilities that it offers for more-than-human engagement. Based on her personal insights as a leading ecological researcher and practitioner, Beer offers a rich resource for scholars, students and practitioners alike, opening up new processes and aesthetics of theatrical design that enhance the environmental and social advocacy of the field.

Theatre and Performance Design: A Reader in Scenography is an essential resource for those interested in the visual composition of performance and related scenographic practices. Theatre and performance studies, cultural theory, fine art, philosophy and the social sciences are brought together in one volume to examine the principle forces that inform understanding of theatre and performance design. The volume is organised thematically in five sections: looking, the experience of seeing space and place the designer: the scenographic bodies in space making meaning This major collection of key writings provides a much needed critical and contextual framework for the analysis of theatre and performance design. By locating this study within the broader field of scenography – the term increasingly used to describe a more integrated reading of performance – this unique anthology recognises the role played by all the elements of production in the creation of meaning. Contributors include Josef Svoboda, Richard Foreman, Roland Barthes, Oscar Schlemmer, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Richard Schechner, Jonathan Crary, Elizabeth Wilson, Henri Lefebvre, Adolph Appia and Herbert Blau.