Sam Kipling

Sam is from Charley in Lancashire and has graduated in 2008 in Theatre Design from Birmingham City University (BCU). She has collected work experience during a work placement in prop-making for the Rep's 2006 Christmas Production of Raymond Brigg's The Snowman. She designed and constructed the set and make up for Scenodance 2007 -a collaboration with Wolverhampton University and was in charge of set construction and dressing for a film project on the director Sam Peckinpah for which she collaborated with BCU Film students. She was chosen to work as a costume designer on the Birmingham Royal Ballet's Dynamic Dance Project 2007. She designed and made installations for the 2007 Download Festival at which she also appeared as live artist. Sam is especially interested and skilled in prop making, prosthetic make-up, puppet development, set construction and dressing. In the future she hopes to utilise her skills working in television and film production. Sam is particularly inspired by animatronic puppetry replacing the industry's over dependence on CGI. 

Laura Philips

Laura graduated this July from Nottingham Trent University (NTU) with a First Class Honours Degree in Theatre Design. 

Recently one of Laura's designs won a performance on the Cottesloe stage at the National Theatre, London.  The work was entered as part of the New Connections 2008 Competition and the design was for a new piece of writing by Nicolas Wright. It was performed by by the Nottingham Television Workshop. In addition Laura recently designed set and costume for a new piece of writing entitled My Friend for Rama Young Actors. The piece was staged at Nottingham's Lace Market Theatre. 

Last summer Laura did an internship in Brooklyn, New York, with theatre company Drama of Works. She assisted and directed alongside Grechen Van Lente for a piece entitled Curiouser and Curiouser, as part of the Alice in Wonderland Puppet Festival. Whilst in the USA Laura also assisted director and designer Peter Barbieri Jr.'s for Guys and Dolls and The Elephant Man. 

Whilst at university Laura puppetered in two NTU collaborative productions (The Icarus Project and Dead Moon). Laura also carried out a placement with props master Fiona Viccars.

In 2005 and 2006 Laura spent her summers working as a Camp Counselor in Conneticut, USA. During these periods as welling responsible for the 24-7 wellbeing of 30plus teenage girls, she also taught Israel orphans the sport of Cricket and designed and co-directed the camp's drama productions. Last summer Laura attended the Prague Quadrennial and following spent several weeks travelling through Europe. This summer (on Idomeneo's opening night) she leaves for a trip to Israel where she hopes to discover her roots...  

Alison Garner

Alison is a theatre practitioner and visual artist based in the East Midlands. She graduated in Theatre Design from Nottingham Trent University with a first class degree in 2007. Much of Alison's work to date has centred on human experience of the places they inhabit and how this resonates through space and object. She has worked with companies as Punchdrunk, Leicester Theatre Trust and Metro-Boulot-Dodo.

In 2006 Alison set up Left Luggage Theatre with fellow Trent students and the company is currently graduate residents of the Puppet Centre Trust, Battersea Arts Centre supported by the Centre for Excellence in Training for Theatre at Central School of Speech & Drama. Left Luggage Theatre specialise in site-responsive theatre in which the audience are immersed in an environment incorporating soundscape, scenography, puppetry, performance and projection.

As a visual artist working in performance her work often takes a narrative form through sharing and creating stories that can be discovered and experienced again by the audience. Alison's most recent work has been a site-specific installation commission in Leicester based on the work of Victorian explorer and naturalist Henry Walter Bates. This multi-sensory installation incorporated tactile sculpture, text, Braille, soundscape and artefacts to envelop the viewer in the imagination of the self-taught scientist and the exiting period where we were on the brink of mind blowing discoveries.

Alison was excited to be involved in the large scale site-specific production of Idomeneo and be part of a collaborative design process. "Seeking to increase access and participation in visual and narrative art is fundamental to my own practice and I wish to develop my work in a way that centres on how we process, interact with and leave our mark in the world around us. I feel Birmingham Opera Company's work fulfills these aims and it has been a great opportunity to work with them."

Some links to Alison's and Left Luggage's websites and works:

http://www.alisongarner.co.uk

http://www.myspace.com/alisongarner

http://www.leftluggagetheatre.co.uk

http://www.myspace.com/leftluggaetheatre

Harry Trow

Harry is a 21-year old local to Birmingham. He is the only undergraduate in the Design Brains Trust and has just finished his first year in Theatre Design at Nottingham Trent University.

Harry has long been interested in the arts, theatre and opera. He first got involved with Birmingham Opera Company when he was 15 and took part in the production of Fidelio as a chorus member. Since then he has worked as a steward on several of the company's productions, the last being Mozart's Don Giovanni - He had it coming.

Harry's love for the arts was further sparked when he participated in the Bosnia Tryptich 2005. Coordinated by the Borderland Foundation this project assembled artists and young people from Mostar, Bosnia-Herzogovina, Sejny in Poland and the West Midlands in Mostar to take part in a busy schedule of workshops in tehatre, song, dance, ceramics, writing, photography, film and sound focusing on local traditions and histories around Mostar's famous old bridge, Stari Most.

As part of his first year at University, Harry has done two speculative designs: Shakespeare's Pericles for Nottingham Playhouse and Tiny Dynamite by Abi Morgan for Lakeside Theatre.

Funerals, Canals and a Motto

Well a whole lot has changed since last week. For a start I have learnt how to do a blog! For the last week we have been preparing for the Pre show. To represent the mourning of the death of Idomeneo we discussed the ideas of launching a funeral pyre onto the canal. This presented several problems 1. tour boats frequently sail past so it cant be too big 2. it cant be on fire for obvious reasons 3.the area by the canal is covered with trees! This has lead to several days of tree surgery but the wharf area is now clear for the pre show.

The most interesting thing we dicovered about funeral rituals is the ritual of a resurrection ceremony for those who have been presumed dead and have had funerals without a body then the person has returned from being lost, not dead. This is exactly what happens in our story so it would be interesting to incorporate into the action somehow.

We have just started marking out a large Auschwitz inspired motto in the holding area which reads 'Worship the Gods, Obey King Idomeneo.' This will eventually stretch 15m across the wall but as we only have one ladder and one person that can reach the top of the wall it's slow going but I'm sure it will be very effective when it's finished.

Lynsey Jackson

Lynsey graduated in 2008 in Theatre Design from Birmingham City University (BCU) and just been awarded the Sir Barry Vincent Jackson Scholarship. Over the course of the last years Linsey collaborated in an impressive number of projects. For the Birmingham School of Acting Lynsey worked as set painter and prop maker for designer David Crisp on Of Mice and Men, Head-Rot Holiday and The Flies. Lynsey was also selected to work with Aonghus Hoole and Jenny Murphy from the Birmingham Royal Ballet to design costumes for All for a Kiss and Much A Dance About Nothing for the Stravinsky inspired show Dynamic Dance.

Lynsey represented her university nationally and internationally as a student collaborator for the Prague Quadriennal Theatre Design Exhibition. She worked as a living exhibit with other students to create an installation in one day based on the theme of 'taking flight'. 

Working with contemporary dancers from Wolverhampton University Lynsey was a set designer/dresser and created teh costume for the character Natella for Brecht's play The Caucasian Chalk Circle.

Lynsey choreographed, cio-wrote, dircetd and performed and tap-danced in a short film about film director Busby Berkley. At BCU she was co-writer, puppet maker and puppeteer for the lead role of Mrs Noah in a new version of Noah's Ark.

At the Download Festival 2007 Lynsey helped construct a live art installation of the festival logo from cans. She also sculpted and decorated the head of a 6-meter tall figure at the festival's entrance.

Most recently Lynsey was design-intern for the Olivier-award winning designer Rob Howell on his new version of of the musical Our House. Impressed by her work Rob agreed to mentor Lynsey for her own design for the show and continues to support her. In fact Lynsey will be attending the rehearsals for Rob's most recent show Her Naked Skin.

This is the first opera Lynsey has worked on and she looks forward to designing and building for such an unusual space.

In her spare time Lynsey performs with her local musical theatre society at the Lowry and Manchester Opera House. She has also appeared in professional panto  at Stockport Plaza with the Jean Geddes School of Dance.

Liz Johnson

Liz is based in the The Midlands and completed her degree in Theatre Design at the Birmingham Institute for Art and Design, where her experience covered many aspects of performance and event. She is both a set and costume designer and has particular experience in prop making and sourcing for both theatre and film.

She has been a design assistant, scenic painter and prop maker for the Birmingham School of Acting Winter Season 2006 at the Crecent Theatre, Birmingham, which included Of Mice and Men (Dir. Dominic Colenso), The Flies (Dir. Rebecca Atkinso-Lord) and Head-Rot Holiday (Dir. Abigail Anderson), and she also took part in the collaborative design of a short film based on the life of Walt Disney, for which she also sourced costumes and made props. She was a contributor towards the collaborative design of a contemporary dance performance of Bertolt Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle at the Patrick Centre in the Birmingham Hippodrome, for which she also took part in the construction and paint-effects team for a submarine themed water-misting machine, which was commissioned by Live Nation for the Download Festival 2007.

Liz has a particular interest in site-specific work, which influenced her decision to design, for her final major project, a theatre event that incorporated the performance of two Oscar Wilde plays at a stately home in Staffordshire. 

She enjoys taking part in both the design process and practical work involved in staging a performance, and she hopes to spend more time working in various types of theatre and branching into film and television. 

Ev Beard

A very versatile, multi-talented artist, Ev has been providing art/crafts activities to schools, colleges and community groups for over 15 years. He has designed the activities to develop awareness of the traditions and artistic values of the sometimes forgotten cultures e.g. Aboriginal painting. Completely self-taught, he is an ac

complished portrait/wildlife artist working with virtually all paint mediums, including glass paints and sculpts in clay. His wildlife work has been endorsed by the late Molly Badham - founder of Twycross Zoo and he donates part of the proceeds from the sales of his work to wildlife conservation.

In 2002 he founded Studio Select - a registered charity, to which he is the Project Manager/Trustee, to assist disadvantaged artists and provide art in the community. This includes working with a drama group - Theatre d' Europe that uses drama and games to teach French in schools, producing their backdrops and props. Ev is also involved in the admin and production areas of a drama group - Radio Rep that produces story Cd's and radio plays for hospital radio. Radio Rep has developed the project working in allegiance with Vale FM using school pupils and drama students in the productions. 

Through Studio Select, he develops opportunities for artists by promoting their talent to various organisations: schools, colleges, community groups etc. 

For example S. S. Mary & John J & I School in Erdington, Birmingham, has used Ev's artists extensively to paint murals, backdrops for school plays and display material - all involving the pupils.

Ev has a Small Business Certificate with which he uses his experience to assist, advise and motiv

ate to set up their own businesses, direct them to develop their simply set an exhibition. His involvement with the Birmingham Opera Company is to further develop his experience in set design - to both assist other artists within his organisation and broaden his own skills. Plus if required, to utilise his various skills towards the set design.  

The Brains of Birmingham Opera Design Brains Trust

Over the course of the next few days we'd like to introduce some of the lovely people that make up Birmingham Opera Design Brains Trust.  

Bouncy Hills

The huge cat litter hills from the model are now being put into the factory but are obviously not made from cat litter this time. To save money the hills are going to be made up of a combination of shipping containers, hay, decking and soil, apparently soil is expensive. I made a contour map based on our hills of cat litter in the model and then proceeded to figure out how many shipping containers could fit underneath it, tweaking the hills to make them slightly larger or smaller in certain areas.

The shipping containers started coming in and over the next few days the "big strong boys" as Sam calls them have started building them up with hay and soil. Us Design Brains climbed one the finished hills yesterday and found that the top was very bouncy if you jump on it, we're guessing that's the roof of the shipping container underneath us. We've been told it's safe but if you come to the show i wouldn't recommend using it a bouncy castle.

Once all the hills are made there will be a final layer of soil added on top which will be a more precise colour, texture and grain, To get the effect of the land we want that fits in with the opera.

The Cow Shed

Graham decided it would be nice to have one of the acts outside in the 'cow shed' on the side of the factory. This idea went down pretty well with everyone, pretty quickly act 2 emerged as a perfect choice to be set outside. So we got to work on making an extra part of the model for the outside.

The idea of having act 2 outside has just this weekend been scrapped because it was unworkable due to the noise and light levels. But these are some of the things that might have happened. The Idea was to use the intermezzo like an interval. Different ideas came and went like a carnival party with chinese dragons or for a while it was a beer festival. It's a shame the outside couldn't really be used because some really exciting stuff was being talked about for going on out there, things like cars blowing up or a huge mural of Idomeneo bleeding.

Model Box

In the design studio Stuart and I (Harry) were busy making a 1:50 scale model of the inside of the factory. So after a trip to the art shop for materials we got to work. Stuart took photos of the space and printed them out at 1:50 scale so that we could get more of the feel of the building into the model, which i thought was a great idea that i will probably use in some of my designs in the future. I'd never made a model this big before and I would usually be working at 1:25 scale which for me really gave a sense of the sheer size of the space.

Stuart also introduced me to a computer program called SketchUp he uses sometimes for things like this, In this program you can create a 3d model of a space and fairly quickly add pretty much anything you want to it whether it's bits of buildings, railway tracks, a car , table, curtain, river...... the list goes on. It's definitely something i will use for my own designs in the future.

We used the model to try out and develop some of the set ideas. One of the thoughts Stuart was having was to create great big hills inside the space, To keep it cheap we used cat litter, the model resembled a huge cat litter tray afterwards.

Later the model and the initial ideas were shown to Graham Vick (the director) who on the whole seemed to like it. Throughout the talk some parts of the set were slightly altered, parts were taken out completely or used in a different way and other ideas were added. I was on hand to quickly make up models for the things that Stuart and Graham were coming up with. It was really useful for me to listen in on that conversation and see how a director and designer interact and work together and especially the power struggle between them.

As the ideas developed so did the model even the people got replaced by even more detailed plastic people.

First view of the factory

This is how the factory looked when we first saw it . There was a lot of rubbish scattered around, oily floors, leaks in the roof and skylights in the ceiling. The process of making the space ready to then have a set put in began. Apart from the very obvious of cleaning up and blocking leaks, the skylights were blacked out and then made to look like they had always been like that. This was so that we could have complete control over the lighting of the show.

Carpet Fever

Well a new week and its all go and there are plenty of changes about! We walked in on Friday to find that Act 2 had changed and then we come in today and the model box has changed and there's new exciting little pieces that have been added and other bits that have sadly been removed (I apologise if this sounds as if I am talking in riddles but for those of you who will read this and then come and see the performance I don't want to give to much away and spoil the suprise for you!)

The title of this blog relates to the fact that we have for the most part of the last few days been sewing together rugs, carpets, throw, blankets and other large pieces of fabric that were purchased from various charity shops around Birmingham (we are proud to do our bit for the dieased/orphaned/unfortunates/cats!). Again I won't spoil the surprise as to how these will come into play with the design but I have to say that we are suffering from carpet fever which is an unfortunate side effect of being sat for long periods of time sewing all the pieces we've bought together. It is a madness and I think it may be incurable. If you think you may be suffering these are some of the symptoms ;

• talking absolute rubbish
• inability to drop a knife
• rolling rather than walking

Admittedly (and obviously modestly) these giant blankets we are making look brilliant!

We spent the rest of our time burning things - amazing fun for the pyromaniacs amoungst us!!

Other fantastic things are beginning to form in the space thanks to the team of big strong boys and all their machinery all apart from the slight mishap with the wall....but nevermind....things are being formed, the groundwork is going down and its growing and all starting to come together and it beginning to look like the model box. Its amazingly exciting as prior to this I don't think any of us have really seen anything we've worked on come together like this and to such a big scale.

But the best bit is that the most exciting stuff is yet to come!!!

Sam

Attack of the MegaBlog

So... this is the first post from the collaborative group of graduate designers, local artists and students who are helping to develop the production.  And to be honest, we seem a little stuck for what to say, so forgive us if we ramble, and these are our thoughts so far.  

The project itself is a massive undertaking in an abandoned warehouse, which will be transformed into the setting for a new and immersive version of Mozart's 'Idomeneo'. Our role within the development of the production is exploring, with the designer, the themes of the opera and investigating ways to make interesting visuals which reveal the back story, contributing ideas towards the design and overall experience of the performance.

We began by talking about the importance of the back story to the production, the trojan war and the belief systems of the greek people, hearing the initial ideas of the director and listening to parts of the opera sung professionally. We discussed the turning point in the opera at which the old gives way to the new, about Mozart being part of the Enlightenment, and the new ways of thinking this engendered, and how this was represented in the opera.  We had an 'interesting' bonding session with the chorus (being designers, rather than performers, bonding activities can be a little uncomfortable although necessary) Stuart tried, unsuccessfully, to rescue us and show us the space in which the opera will be performed.  at this stage, the space itself was full of junk, rubble, it was leaking, the floor was covered in oil and the smell... well, it was different.  The acoustics also needed a bit of a tweak, and at that point in time it was really rather an overwhelming space, especially in terms of the amount of work that apparently was needed.  Graham (the director) spoke about removing the audience from their comfort zone, so as to remove the elitist connotations of opera, and make everyone equally uncertain of what could happen. And that was just the first day!

Day two, a week later, we met again, and things seemed to have been developed quite a lot. the design concept for the performance had pretty much been established, and how the space would be used  in relation to the movement of audience and performers was set.  there was a lot more talking and discussion f ideas, some of us had been told to research specific ares and themes, and these were talked through- like a 'thinktank'.  We thought about not only design, but how these things could be applied in the staging of the performance, and how they would affect the audience on various levels.

(Franky - this is day two on the job for me, so all of the above is new to me as well!  still pretty much overwhelmed with the whole thing, mostly because this is basically exactly the type of thing I hope to do as a designer myself.  now I know what I'm letting myself in for.  I seem to be continuously nervous about making a good impression, and therefore I'm probably not... 

the design of the opera itself is very intriguing and different to anything i've seen before, but that's the beauty of site-specific work - it's always so different depending on the space used.  there are so many elements to the design that it's really very interesting to see how it all ties in - from a Utopian socialist-ish society, to almost pagan, definitely polytheistic animal sacrifices.)

Until next time, Richard needs his computer back!  

Liz, Sam, Franky, Harry, Oli

We've started

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