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| SET DESIGN |
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| My interest in set and production design happened almost by accident. When I went to Vassar College, I felt their studio art program was somewhat lacking (though the Art History courses, at least, were outstanding). I was in one Drawing Intro class for two days, and dropped out knowing I'd hate it with a passion. (You know you'll be in trouble when you think you know more than your instructor, day one.) A Drama major suggested an alternative: set design coursework. And this began a wonderful new path; the instructor, Thaddeuz Gesek, quickly became a good friend and mentor. Though I haven't used what I've learned from him to the extent that I should, his teaching was invaluable. (Sorry to say that he retired from the college two years after I graduated.) And unlike Drawing Intro, I don't think I'll ever know nearly as much as my set design professor. And so, with respect to "Tad", here is a sampling of some of my designs... |
| ABOVE and TOP RIGHT: THE BEAR by Anton Chekov Sample costume & set design for Vassar College, 1993 My very first set design. The intention here was to limit the basic color palette to two contrasting colors (in this case, red and green) for the set and costumes. |
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| LEFT: OTHELLO Desdemona's Chamber by William Shakespeare Concept set design for Vassar College, 1993 The intention here was to be symmetricai and ornate, like moorish and Middle Eastern architecture. The "skull" frame with windows for the eyes and teeth left an eeire, if not very subtle, impression. |
| LEFT: KING LEAR Lear's Palace by William Shakespeare Concept set design for Vassar College, 1995 With King Lear, I was trying to go for minimalism. A reflective opaque backdrop was placed in the background, so the overall color scheme could change with the lights. Black "tarps" were dropped from above, implying a sense of architectural columns in a free space. The center piece, a constructed platform with stairs on one side and a stone-like boulder on the other, could be rotated during a scene to keep the movement going without breaks. |
| RIGHT: JUNK TV Client: Mike Young Productions Concept set design for television show, 2000 This was the interior set design of an apartment featured for a potential TV show, with the lead character living as a couch potato in this weird, askewed dump. The angle perspective was deliberately twisted. |
| ABOVE: ORESTIA, SECOND CYCLE: LIBATION BEARERS by Asyculus Concept design for Vassar College, 1994. RIGHT: LIFE OF GALILEO Galileo's Study by B. Brecht Concept design for Vassar College, 1995. One of my favorite designs, this play entailed two backdrops: one with the sun at center, and the dropout moons and planets slowly moving "around" it (as Galileo asserted), and the "religious" view of the sun spinning around the earth. |