Guild of Scenic Artists: After I work out the design, the question of materials and tools to use becomes imperative to solve. As with many projects a Scenic Artist faces, there was a large portion of this project that would be repetitive and need to have a consistent process throughout painting the backdrop. I often go back to when I was taught the basics of scenic painting, and the introduction to many new objects: funky brushes cut by hand; sponges, rollers, stamps, to help solve my problems. I needed to find a tool that would make the marks I needed and as efficient (FAST) as possible.
3 comments:
Scenic painting is a whole other level of artistry. The level of detail in this drop is so beautiful, and the fact that Clausius was able to replicate that result with the same degree of beauty blows my mind. It is simply amazing how innovative artists can be to get the outcome they want. A feather duster is merely a household tool and Clausius transformed it into a paintbrush. I think it is so cool that even when the art store did not have what she needed, she was able to improvise and still get an amazing result. I have painted details on set pieces using household items like a towel or even a mop as a paintbrush, and I think it's cool to see that same and more extensive level of creative tool making exists in the professional industry. The feather duster creates layers of paint that allow depth – being able to see the different colors creates contrast and a third dimension. It's interesting that the technique of using a feather duster is something used often enough to have a name, schlepitchka, and yet a specialized artist's tool does not exist for it. This is a blessing and a curse, because a feather duster is definitely cheaper than any specialized tool, but a feather duster probably will not hold up to the paint for an extended period of time. In the world of theatre, hardware store is just as useful as the art store.
Making your own tools has been something that has been done for hundreds of years, especially in the theatre arts. We tend to be inventors due to the innate nature of what our jobs require us to do. Time and money are always our two biggest forces pushing us to find a cheaper faster way of doing things. This will usually cause several ways to be created that have a similar or identical outcome. For example creating bricks can be done with cut rollers, lining sticks, stencils, stamps, or taped lines. The problem comes when we let the speed and desire to do things cheaply rule over the quality of the finished product. Sure one can only try to use chip brushes for everything but both the time lost to not having a better brush and the loss of quality because you couldn’t get that line quite right, only counteracts anything saved. There is a time and a place to create the tool you need but one must also know when you need to spend the money to just do it with the proper tool form the start.
I found article fascinating because it gave me insight into an aspect of theater that I don’t really know a lot about. Just reading the article, I am impressed by the level of innovation required for each drop, and how Clausius achieved a high level of detail on such a large scale is quite remarkable. I really liked the way Clausius builds the drop in layers, and the way she considers how it looks from far away. I like her descriptions of how she achieved certain effects. For example, I really like the way that she used the feather duster and other tools. I didn’t realize that the tools are such a big part of scenic painting, but it makes sense. Most of the time when painting a surface that big you would use rollers, but obviously you can’t get that kind of detail. Paint brushes take too long so it makes sense.
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