Wednesday, October 13, 2021
How To Create Large-Scale Papier-Mâché Scenery
www.rosco.com: Set against the backdrop of 1920s Appalachia, DARLIN’ CORY is a haunting new musical by Playwright & Novelist Phillip DePoy and Sugarland’s Grammy Award®-winning frontman, Kristian Bush. To create the set for their world premiere of the musical, Atlanta’s Alliance Theatre called upon the skills of Tony Award®-winning Scenic Designer Todd Rosenthal. His design re-created granite mountain passes and Blue-Ridge forests on stage.
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5 comments:
It is so cool to be able to visually see this step by step process. I think the most impressive aspect of this project is just the sheer scale of it all. If it was a challenge to skillfully integrate texture in design project for class, I'm sure this is a whole other feat. I think process photos like these are totally underrated, and underutilized especially in our undergrad education. One thing I didn't get from this article that I would be interested in learning about would be the brainstorming and trial and error stage. It also doesn't appear that anything went wrong, which is really awesome! But I wonder if these artists have done a similar project in the past, or just simply not included any of the road bumps they encountered. The time lapse was also really awesome; I'm always impressed by these and think more of them should exist! We should do time lapses for our shows!
This is so interesting! I have never seen any tree recreations that have been this effective for texture (useful for lighting variation), color, and size. It also seems relatively cost-effective which of course is a huge plus. The backdrop itself is shockingly beautiful and innovative. The abilities that lighting has to create an organic look on a subject is far beyond our abilities of recreation, which is why using this translucent textured material is so brilliant. As someone who has worked with papier-mache, I will say it is not easy or graceful. Once for one of my first projects where I was acting as a scenic artist I made an 8 or 9 foot volcano out of chicken wire and papier mache. What I was able to do was create something textured and organic looking, as well as lightweight. But, I struggled with stability and durability, something that Kat Conley conquered with her use of wood pieces to weigh it down. Very inspirational.
I am very passionate about Papier-Mâché, been a fan since the beginning when my parents took me to a Papier-Mâché art class when I was like seven and I made a pig out of a balloon, changing my life forever. Since then I have made headdresses and various puppets out of Papier-Mâché and I have even helped create sets out of it, though that was grueling. The scale of the Papier-Mâché projects outlined in this article astounded me as we just made two little hills out of it while they were making mountains and entire trees. The look of the finished set was also incredible to behold, and I think the texture really created an awesome atmosphere for the play. It seems to me that Papier-Mâché is underutilized building material for the theater as these people have discovered a way for it to be done at a large scale and the interesting texture would be difficult to reproduce in a different material.
Wow, that really turned out so beautifully. It always awes me how scenic artists create texture and life in their pieces. To papier mache a giant tree is hard enough but the stamina to do multiple? It makes me a little sad to see the time and effort that goes into these pieces and then know they're not the star of the show. There's so many different types of talent displayed on a stage but 9 times out of 10 the one that gets the most praise is the performers. What about a hold for applause for the trees? Papier mache was always a craft I wanted to get into but never had the time. It's interesting to see what incredible things people can make with paper, adhesive, layering, and creativity. I'm sure it also requires a lot of patience. What if a piece you just perfectly crumpled is too wet and slides off onto the floor? I'd be so sad. These artists astound me.
This article is so cool! It gave such a great insight into how scenery is made, especially what materials are chosen. I think this article shows how sometimes simple techniques can be just the right one — nothing fancy, but gives the right effect. I know paper-mache is not an overly complex technique and requires very simple ingredients, but seeing Kat and her crew doing it on such a large scale is so impressive. Apart from paper-mache, they also used a lot of other materials and I’m impressed with their materials choices, as they seem to have helped accomplish the goal (look the same as the design & be lightweight and flyable). Again, this is a good lesson for me, to learn that problem solving skills are much needed in this field. And being familiar with products and materials are extremely helpful in determining what to use to reach the desired effect.
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