The impossible

Once upon a time, Brian Grace-Duff was in a play writing class taught by P. Seth Bauer. Seth challenged them to write a scene in their current work that was impossible. Impossible to stage, or impossible to create, just..impossible. And Brian wrote that (in paraphrase) the character Til entered the scene and slowly turned to coal. He tried to move, but slowly broke apart until he was only a pile of coal on the floor. And then he started burning. Donnie walked over and pissed on his brother to put it out. Brian has since cut the scene from his play and perhaps it really doesn't have a place in that script (although I maintain that it wasn't that far removed from the story and perhaps the rest of the story just needed to be as impossible as that scene to match, rather than vice versa). My designer brain was immediately set in motion on hearing both the words "impossible" and well, coal. See, I grew up in coal country, or more specifically in an area formerly defined by coal and that has never really recovered. I know about anthracite and bituminous coal. I've held that magical rock in my hands - the strange structure of it, truly black diamond as it is known. I have seen the oily shimmer that plays hide and seek across its surfaces. The way fire burns deep inside it. I said I wanted to design that moment. That I could see it. In earlier "drafts" of the scene, the character was dressed in a shiny black version of his costume, his action slowly hardening and eventually breaking down until he collapsed on the floor. I hadn't really solved the fire/pissing problem. But the slightly unsatisfied smirks of theater friends suggested to me that I hadn't gone quite far enough. So I keep thinking about it, keep dreaming about it, keep imagining it.

There are a lot of technical things that trouble me - what material do I use for this coal? It needs to have that shimmer and shine. It needs to compact to almost nothing yet expand into a rocky form. How do I cover this person? How does he fall apart? Today I took the first step, trying to figure it out on paper. I'm thinking some sort of strings, perhaps chiffon imitating smoke that would pull this mystery material out from various places of the Til costume, up from under his jeans, out from the waist, through his sleeves, and over his head. But for the effect to work the way I have drawn it, I believe the "strings" need to be on the outside, visible, which doesn't entirely jive with the way the scene has been set. I may also be interpreting the words incredibly literally, as I am wont to do, but until I get myself totally stuck, I want to believe that there is a way to really do this, magically, in a theater, not on a screen. My first drawings are below. Til, as he usually is - ripped jeans, worn in flannel shirt all sloppy, barefoot after the killer party. Drawing two is trying to imagine where the "coal" can come from and how it could move to cover him and all the strings. I realize that I will just need to get some clothing, a dress form (or person) and maybe some trash bags and start making magic because, let me tell you, this thinking it out on paper thing is really not working for me! But I took a step, and forward motion is important. It leads to momentum.

Til - after the party

Til - turning into Coal

2 more sketches

I had seen these images on Pinterest before and they were clearly costumes in my head. As I was jsut playing with sketching today, I added them to the done pile, at least in draft form.

Photographer: Trey Ratcliff

Photographer: Vitek Ludvik

Play Time Again

Life interrupted, as it is wont to do. All good things, so I am not complaining. So, onto today's play time. One of the design suggestions I received was the idea of using the language of another form of design to create in my form of design. In more specific terms, to use the language of Lighting Design to create costume designs.
Vocabulary:
Composition, Visibility, Modeling, Information, Mood, Focus, Intensity, Color, Direction, Distribution, Texture, and Movement.

I've been pondering the idea of costumes with direction. Wondering what that could be. I had some ideas, but they weren't really inspiring me, so today I decided to sketch them out, see what happened when I could really see them. It led to an interesting place.

Dress pinned to a wall, Up dress, 2 Down Dresses

More Up dresses, 2 Left ensembles

Sideways Ensembles

Using other ensemble members to create shape/direction

Attaching stretchy fabric costumes to pins on a 

 

wall with a performer inside. Creates Shapes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What if it were strings rather than solid pieces of fabric?

I like a lot of these ideas and images. I think the down dresses are very evocative. I think the up dresses with string are really dynamic. I think the bodies attached to walls making shapes could be really interesting, if a little disconcerting for the performers. Do the shapes change? Do they tell stories and interact?

Jellyfish and Feet

Recently I discovered an interesting blog: http://www.thisiscolossal.com/ It is full over really interesting daring challenging inspiring work that crosses art boundaries of visual, theatrical, etc. art. I love it. Everyday is something new and different to charge my neurons. Sure, a lot of it may be things I can't use directly, but it reminds me that "art" can be so much more than I ever thought. And that my ideas can be a part of that world. So that is always exciting.

Today there was a post about photographer Alexander Semenov who takes these amazing underwater shots. The post was specifically about starfish, but it linked to older posts about the same artist and I came across his jellyfish pictures. Jellyfish are one of those morbid fascination things for me. These beautiful flowing colorful creatures that can sting and lacerate you into oblivion. I want to just watch them move in the water; their movement is so different and ...alien I guess. But I know they are sooo sooo dangerous. But they don't creep me out in the same way spiders and bugs do, and I feel safe watching them in an aquarium. (Well most of the time. Until I start to get really paranoid about gallons of water and the pressure on the glass...then I have to leave really quickly.)

I pinned several images to Pinterest just for reference, but there was one I was just itching to play with and, as the past few days have really handcuffed me, I knew I HAD to let myself do something artsy today or I was going to be cranky beyond all crankiness!

Jellyfish by Alexander Semenov

 And my drawings. I really just tried to let myself play with the shape and how it might react on different places on the body.

 

In other news, I taught my students how to draw feet and shoes today in my Fundamentals of Design Class. I honestly did not know if I could do it. I hadn't the faintest idea how to go about it. But I found some tutorials online that seemed to match the way I draw feet/shoes and made handouts for the class. Then I took off my shoes and started explaining the geometry of the foot while they started drawing. Then I started doing a demo of the drawing myself on my own sketchpad, upside down. (I drew in front of people! Something I am terrified of doing! And I did it, without THINKING about it!) Several of the students went off into their own corners with their feet/handouts and worked on their own, while I had others right in front of me watching my every move. I helped the front group out and then checked in with the corner people, made suggestions and corrections, then we moved onto feet profiles. In less than an hour, I saw such an incredible improvement in all of their drawings. It was so inspiring! I know when I learned some simple foot geometry and a few tricks on shoe drawing, it improved my renderings so much and in a very short time. The class has requested Hands next. Deep breath. Hands are trickier than feet, we don't usually just cover them with shoes! But I am encouraged by the Feet/shoes experience and inspired to try again!

What jumps make your horse skittish?

Whenever I get stuck as an artist, person, maker of things, whatever, I always turn back to The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. I can't recommend this book enough, for any kind of artist, like even if you are an artist of Bank Statements. This book is for anyone and everyone. Julia taught me that an artist can be successful and be healthy, have money and a family. That an artist can be groundbreaking and safe. She helps me believe in myself and to get me to work again instead of dreaming. So, with months ahead of me and no work to fill them, I turned back to The Way. I decided this time to start in the middle because I ALWAYS start at the beginning, and I have read those pages hundreds of times, written and rewritten those exercises. And while they are useful, I wanted something new and different and challenging. So I jumped in around week 6 or 7 (depending on which way I flipped the pages, because I ACTUALLY started at week 7, but it referenced something in week 6 so I went back a little before going forward again) I am doing it a little more informally than usual - not doing the 3 pages of prescribed journaling, but still trying to stick to a weeks worth of exercises before moving to the next week. Trying to listen to my internal monologue - Hmm, I see you are resisting doing that exercise, well that must mean we NEED to do it. So there!
      Last night I was reading and a paragraph jumped out at me. It was a chapter about breaking through creative blocks and getting started on work. Julia says we need to call procrastination Fear and we need to acknowledge that fear to start using it. Ok, that matches up with a lot of things I have learned in therapy - my anxiety has something to tell me, and I need to listen. But all I can see is the fear.
        Julia says, "Think of your talent as a young and skittish horse. This horse is very talented but it is also young, nervous, and inexperienced. It will make mistakes, be frightened by obstacles it hasn't seen before. Your job, as the creative jockey, is the keep your horse moving forward to coax it to finish the course. First of all, take a look at what jumps make your horse so skittish. You may find that certain obstacles or far more scary than others. Remember that in a horse race, there are other horses in the field. One trick a seasoned jockey uses is to place a green horse in the slipstream of an older, steadier and more seasoned horse."
      And suddenly I could feel my heart beating in my chest, because I know what scares me the most about some of the new work I want to do - I have to go into a rehearsal room, and I have to lead it. Something I have never, EVER done. Sure, I have lead classrooms, but I was putting people through motions I have done countless times. I am going to have to walk into a rehearsal room, own that room and guide people through things I am not even sure I am capable of. While I can run, I do not think of myself in terms of my body in motion. I think of myself as almost a wind up mechanical doll - all angles and awkward whirring and clunking around. These two things combined: my fear of leading a rehearsal room and my awkward association with body movement terrify me and make me afraid to take the leap that seems like it should come next.
      A little voice said so clearly then, Hello!? You have many director friends (Julia would have me note that as well - she calls them shadow artists, artists who do an art form that is NEAR another art form, but have lots of associations with others, such as me being a costume designer but hanging out with Playwrights and Directors - you know, people who INITIATE work) and I bet those director friends would welcome you into their rehearsal rooms, maybe even let you assistant direct (I don't really know what that even means, and it is such a terrifying idea to me I deleted it 3 times before actually typing it!). Ok. Deep breath. Ok. That seems like a good plan. Even a doable plan. However, I am in Altoona right now and I don't want to wait for months until I am back in Philly to start doing work. So I need to find other things, more In Altoona Doable things. BUT, this was a breakthrough and an important one. So Philly directors/friends, be looking for my call in May. Because I am coming to you!

Faces

Was perusing Facebook last night and came across a shared post. Apparently an artist friend was doing a face exercise and wanted others to join in. I hopped over to his site, grabbed the template and drew some faces. I played a little with making some more realistic and others more loosey goosey, the way I draw when I just want to get an idea of something down. (The way I started drawing in fashion school.) This morning I traced some over and played some more with the markers. I didn't get to do as much exploration as I wanted because while Eilir was content playing with play doh while I washed dishes, it was not possible for me to be in the same room as her and NOT share the markers. At least in her opinion. So I had to quick dash off a few strokes of color before hiding the box.

Marked up

So all day today, I pretended that I wasn't going to color my drawings with markers. I made all kinds of excuses: I like the originals and I don't want to mess them up, the markers could be terrible, the new drawings are going to be even farther removed from the original line sketches. "Umm, what does any of this matter," my artist self seemed to say. Copy the originals so you don't "mess" them up. Who cares if they are "more removed"? We are just playing!!! So, before I allowed myself to wallow in Netflix, I had to color the sketches with markers. What is interesting is that they look much better in photo form than they do up close in person.