Thinking in 3D: Scale Models for the Olivier Theatre Eleanor Margolies
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Thinking In 3D: Scale Models For The Olivier Theatre Eleanor Margolies Contents Thinking In 3D: Scale Models 2 For The Olivier Theatre Eleanor Margolies The Plough and the Stars (1977) 8 by Sean O’Casey, directed by Bill Bryden. Set designed by Geoffrey Scott. The Life of Galileo (1980) 9 directed by John Dexter. Set and costumes designed by Jocelyn Herbert. The Shaughraun (1988) 11 by Dion Boucicault, directed by Howard Davies. Set designed by William Dudley. The Comedy of Errors (2011) 14 directed by Dominic Cooke. Set and costumes designed by Bunny Christie. Antigone (2012) 15 Sophocles, in a 1986 translation by Don Taylor, directed by Polly Findlay. Set and costumes designed by Soutra Gilmour. Exit The King (2018) 16 by Eugène Ionesco, in a new version by and directed by Patrick Marber. Set and Costume designed by Anthony Ward. Antony and Cleopatra (2018) 19 directed by Simon Godwin. Set designed by Hildegard Bechtler. Epilogue 20 Notes 21 1 Thinking In 3D: Scale Models For The Olivier Theatre Eleanor Margolies The scale models used in theatre design have indications of intention, since they will be a paradoxical status: set models are made combined with experiments in the rehearsal with incredible artistry and accuracy, but room with space and objects at life size. In a they pass through many hands, often getting large theatre or opera house (and especially dented or spattered with paint along the way, in theatres where, as in the National Theatre, and rarely survive beyond the lifetime of the several shows alternate over a period of time production. The ‘Playing with Scale’ exhibition in a repertory system), design decisions often arrests the usual process of discarding the need to be confrmed well ahead of rehearsals. model in order to understand more about how models are used by designers and how they Most set models are made at a scale of 1:25 enable collaboration with many other people. (or in the United States 1:24). That means a It is impossible to give a complete account door two metres tall is represented on the of this process, since it varies enormously model by a door 8cm tall. This gives a good depending on the designer, the production balance between level of detail and portability. and the context. The exhibition includes Sketch models are often half that size, at a the work of seven designers responding to scale of 1:50, making it easier to carry scenic a very distinctive space, the Olivier Theatre ideas to meetings. Life size mock ups are at the National Theatre, as well as a brief sometimes needed in rehearsal; in the discussion of the role of models in the design German practice of holding a Bauprobe of the theatre itself. The set models on (construction rehearsal), scenic ideas are display have been acquired by the National built at full scale on the stage, using stock Theatre Archive, or saved by the designers fats or unfnished timber and cardboard, themselves. The archive of Jocelyn Herbert to enable discussion by the whole team of (held in the National Theatre Archive) has been the possibilities and allow for immediate a vital starting point, since it includes model adjustments in dimensions and angles. pieces from dozens of productions, along with copious sketches, correspondence and A fnal model of a set can be a beautiful diaries discussing the evolution of the designs. object – but its usefulness goes far beyond The following short essays describe three wonder at the skilful creation of a miniature productions from the frst ten years of the world. Architect Christoph Grafe describes National Theatre, then leap over 20 or so seventeenth-century Dutch dolls’ houses in years to more recent productions. a way that resonates with the experience of looking at set models for theatre: This sense Models of very different types are made as of privilege, of looking in from the outside part of the process of theatre design. Some and being secretly involved is probably the will be improvised from a sheet of paper and source of the intense pleasure that models a coffee cup during an initial meeting with the of interiors induce, both in their creators director; others will require weeks of work from and their viewers. The viewer is witness and teams of model-makers. Some are ‘sketches accomplice, actor and knowing spectator. in three dimensions’ for experimenting with The model is an incomplete scenario: it materials, spatial relationships and sculptural is up to the viewer’s imagination to fll the forms. Others serve as ‘specifcations in characters and the rooms with a narrative, three dimensions’, defning a space which and the invitation is compelling.1 will eventually be brought into existence by engineers, set-builders and scenic artists. In a devising process, models can be looser 2 Jocelyn Herbert sets up the model for her design for John Osborne’s play Inadmissable Evidence, directed by Lindsay Anderson at the Teatr Współczesny, Warsaw in 1966. Jocelyn Herbert Archive JH/9/27 But while the theatre model can also be For the designer, building a model combines regarded as ‘an incomplete scenario’ that speculative exploration of materials and three- invites performance, a realistic interior is only dimensional space with practical questions one kind of possible world. Theatre design about how objects will be constructed and has always brought into existence worlds far (if necessary) move. Lizzie Clachan describes beyond the domestic interior: landscapes, models as a ‘problem-solving tool’: ‘If it’s hard cityscapes, dreamscapes, atmospheres. to make something stand up in the model, it’s The making of a ‘world’ may involve subtle going to be the same problem in real scale.’ interventions into an existing space – perhaps Having built a physical model, she can ‘look drawing attention to what’s already there makers in the eye and know that I haven’t rather than making new physical objects. tried to defy physics’. Production manager Rachel Hann describes scenographic work as Anna Anderson makes a similar point about involving ‘acts of orientation that complicate, the usefulness of a model when planning reveal or score processes of worlding’.2 And scene changes: ‘It’s great to work with a set models, unlike dolls’ houses, are always physical representation of the set because in a conversation with a previously existing objects can’t just “disappear” – particularly space. As Soutra Gilmour says of her work: in the Olivier. It’s much better than just talking ‘it is always site-specifc, whether I am in a about ideas.’ The period of model-making found space, West End proscenium theatre in the studio can allow for a time of reverie or the Olivier. It’s a dialogue with the place’.3 in which new ideas emerge. It often involves Building a model is a way of thinking in three dialogue with collaborators such as design dimensions, looking closely at a space and assistants and model-makers, who bring speculating about its possibilities. their own artistic sensibility to the work as 3 well as interpreting designers’ indications The model in the theatre about the feel of a production, its look, colour and texture. As discussed later in the essay design process about Exit the King, there is also a signifcant dialogue with materials. After a performance ends, set models are usually scattered, destroyed or discarded. All model-making involves selection and Writing about architectural models, Karen distillation of ideas. As David Neat puts it, Moon warns that their inherent fragility means a scale model is ‘a flter and a focus for the that the models that do survive will only ever designer’.4 The design process for theatre be part of the story: ‘The larger the model, thus involves ‘zooming out’ to a distance at the more diffcult it is to keep; the smaller, the which the whole performance space can be more easily lost; the more refned, the more held in mind, and then zooming in to defne liable it is to damage; the more crudely made, the smallest physical details for construction. the more likely to be discarded’6. Sketch In this way, the set model also bears a relation or working models for the theatre are rarely to the models used in science to represent preserved and few designers have storage relationships that cannot be perceived by space to keep complete fnal models in the human eye – the familiar ‘ball and stick’ their studios. For theatre designer Johannes models of molecular structures or the Schütz the model is inherently transitional: Renaissance models of the universe that ‘A model is like a manuscript or like a polemic feature in The Life of Galileo. As architect – it is supposed to achieve something. Then Asif Khan writes, 'Thinking across scales it is replaced by something else, the right is a remarkable facility of the human mind. thing, and the model is no longer important’.7 We can conceive of galaxies and atoms in Some models survive. Figures, furniture the same sentence’.5 Physical models have and complicated architectural elements always played a signifcant role in the exercise like staircases are often kept by designers. of this facility to ‘think across scales’ because They form a ‘props store’ in miniature that models allows us to grasp something. Not designers can draw on when working on a solely by holding them in our hand, but new design, trying out the idea of a chair or a precisely because we can hold them. Even table in a space, perhaps in discussion with when looking without touching, the body the director, without having to spend hours is engaged by the three dimensional.