Contemporary Art Rooted in Tradition

While in the Netherlands I visited the Zuiderzee Museum - an open-air village of fisherman's huts and other buildings from 19th century life in this area before it was cut off by dikes from the North Sea.

It's a charming, buccolic setting with fascinating historic artifacts, but the wonder, the thing that keeps the place from fossilizing, is that around any corner you're likely to run into contemporary art.  The place is a monument to a vanished past... but it's still alive and carrying on a lively conversation with today.

My favorite installation was a clever - brilliant, I think - room of graffiti art.  A little background: graffitti or "street art" is everywhere!  This tidy, perfectly up-kept country has, nevertheless, so much graffiti it astonishes the visitor.  But this graffiti is - as if by tacit agreement - only in certain places, like railway property or highway screen walls, and seldom where it will upset a private property owner.  I even saw a fully graffiti'd car... with its licenseplate and lights and glass carefully masked off to keep it legal and functional.  It's as if the society has decided this is an acceptable outlet for rebellion - within civilized limits.  Graffiti is a quasi-accepted art form.  (Go to any American modern art museum and see all the books on "street art.")  The second piece of background:  in historic Holland it was common to use huge quantities of Delft tile inside houses: at fireplaces and, if you could afford to, even for all the walls of a room.

The art room I liked?

A whole room of spray-paint graffiti Delft tile featuring, as such tiles do, both "art" scenes and scenes of daily life.  Daily life in the Netherlands has changed a bit since the 16th century century is all.

Sadly I haven't found the artist's name yet, though here's a link to an article about these installations.

Revision!  The artist's name is Hugo Kaagman.

Theater Tech Week - Online

I just found a fun website that talks about Tech Week (AKA Hell Week) mostly from a community theater perspective.  Check out The Theater Community.

Image is public domain, courtesy of the Library of Congress

Becky Review

A real review by a, you know, paid reviewer likes Becky's New Car!  The Dallas Morning News says nice things about script, cast and direction, and mentions the set and my name.  (Not "spoiled by that rotten set" either.)  Phew.

A friend, on the way to see the show, asked whether I get nervous at openings.  Normally, no.  I figure my design work is long done.  Opening is the big deal for actors, director, and producers and also, of course, for me... but at that point there is nothing I can fix.  My work is a done deal.  That's the odd part of design compared to acting: rehearsal is only rehearsal, the actor's Work happens in that minute in front of the audience; but the set designer's artistic decisions were (mostly) made weeks or months before and even physical work was completed days ago.

I like that.  And it saves me jitters.  Excitement, yes.  (Dread occasionally.)  Nerves, no.  This not true for all designers, however, my buddy Wade used to pace the lobby during openings.

Not a Review - The Wiz

Went to see the Dallas Theater Center's production of The Wiz.

A lot of fun!  I enjoyed the colors, the costumes, the singing, and especially the terrific dancing by Dallas Black Dance Theatre, who even pulled off "tornado" dancing.  The sets worked well... though they felt very traditionally proscenium style to me... considering that the big deal with this staging is the way audience seating pods move around.  I think they moved around too much - half as often would have been plenty - but it was great to see the seating change radically in this changeable space.  All in all a good production.

Minor quibble: more attention should have been taken in shielding the light booth from neighboring seats; the glow was distracting and it hurt sight-lines too.

Tornado sketch from my version of The Wiz, for WaterTower Theatre's summer kids' camp

Not a Review - Becky's New Car

Well, Becky's New Car opened last night to a full house and an enthusiastic audience.  (Always nice when folks like the show.)  As an added bonus, Charlie and Benita Staadecker, who commissioned this play, were in the audience - they try to make it to every opening.  What a great idea!  To commission a play, then to travel around the country watching it open.  Coolest hobby ever!

Come see what the fuss is about at Circle Theatre, Fort Worth.

Film Fest - My Brilliant Career

I'd heard about this quintessential Australian film for years.  Really good.  Nice to see a young Judy Davis and Sam Neill in these strong roles.

This 1901 story shows the plight of a young woman with ambitions besides "having a baby a year," as our fore-mothers so often did, in Australia or elsewhere, until worn out.  The good old days of hearty pioneer women!  Or, at least, of many children sometimes by several mothers, as each wife was replaced.

Tempting to blame husbands of the time, but really, how much choice did men have?  Men needed household labor!  But sex and even love, family affection, and companionship were also kind of nice things in a hard pioneer life.  Besides, the link between sex and pregnancy was not always understood - at least by women - certainly never discussed; birth control was crude, hard to come by, and considered immoral or irreligious; but human nature was then what it is now... a baby a year was almost inevitable.  As for serial wives?  Once a man had three or six kids what could he do when his wife died except replace her fast! with someone else to change diapers and feed and wash for them all?  And probably produce kid # seven?

Recently, a board of American health experts studying low-cost interventions to improve women's health recommended that birth control be paid for by health insurance.  Wait for that fuss!

Film Fest - Captain America

I enjoyed this movie a lot!  I liked Captain America much more than the lukewarm local review led me to expect.

You just have to go with it, ride along with the story on its own retro terms...  This is an old-fashioned, corn-fed, American hero with the straight-forward goodness and bravery that belongs on the front of a box of Wheaties.  Thank goodness the filmmakers had the good sense to take him seriously - no nudges, winks, or cynicism - and make this adventure an honest period piece.

Captain America is, of course, copyrighted by Marvel Comics.  I believe this is fair-use.

(Minor spoiler)  At the very end, Captain America finds himself in present day Times Square...  Frankly I'm looking forward to seeing him cope with modern America in the up-coming Avengers movie.  Seeing the aw-shucks modest Captain America dealing with the Old-Norse bragging of Thor ought to be fun too.  Now, even if Joss Whedon weren't directing that film, I'd be looking forward to it.

Fun with Colored Pencils

I can't reveal the final design yet (ticket buyers have to have perks, right?) , but I've just finished coloring my elevation drawing for In the Other Room: the Vibrator Play.  Coloring is fun, whatever your age, and I kinda like the way this show is looking.  After a few more minutes of lunch-munching and typing, I'm off to the copy place, then to meet the director... to see what he thinks of this.

I have to put in a good word for ink and colored pencil as rendering media:  ink lines give crisp definition, detail, and copy well, while colored pencil is fast, colorful - bold or subtle as desired - and wonderfully erasable when you goof.  More forgiving than theater-traditional gouche or watercolor!

Here's a different ink/pencil rendering for a kids' Easter show at Casa Manana a few years back - a fast-fast-fast sketch.  Try it yourself.

Like crayons, the bigger the box of colors, the more fun!