Midsummer Night's Dream
Jan-Feb 2023
Maynardville
Open-Air Theatre
Scenographer (Set & Props)
This production of Shakespeare's "Midsummer Night's Dream" - directed by Geoffrey Hyland - took place at Maynardville's Open Air Amphitheatre, nestled amidst large trees, open to the magic of Cape Town summer evenings. The production presented a unique design challenge of creating a set and props that could withstand outdoor conditions. I successfully built and sourced all elements of the set and props according to the director's vision.
WIDDERSHYNS
Nov 2022
University of Cape Town
Scenographer, Director
Devised by the creative team and Performed by Meritxell Cilliers
Widdershyns’ (adj):
“Moving in a direction opposite to the usual, anti-clockwise or left hand ways, contrary to the apparent course of the sun.”
This piece was created in collaboration with my creative team (physical theatre artist Meritxell Cilliers and scenographers Grace Lorenzo & Cameron Moodie). Using eight large fans to create a wind vortex inside of a theatre, the piece explored the animism of everyday materials and their relationship to the human. Travelling through oneiric vignettes, we explored the vitality and animateness of materials; as well as the character of wondrous encounters which arise and then recede — charging the real with an afterglow of enchantment.
A Double Bill:
The Seagull
/Stupi F*cking Bird
May - July 2022
Assistant Designer - Set & Props
Directed by Chris Weare, this production saw a period piece in the first act and a contemporary piece in the second act. I worked as assistant set designer to Craig Leo, and was responsible for set design, painting, prop-making as well as sourcing props and designing costumes.
Clouds Like Waves
February 2022
Theatre Arts
Assistant Lighting Designer + Props
My work in Megan Furniss' Clouds Like Waves involved assistant lighting design and prop-making, which included making sun and cloud puppets as pictured.
The Shell Singer
December 2021
Theatre Arts
Lighting Designer & Operator
This production was my debut as sole lighting designer. I worked closely with writer/director Marianne Le Roux for this one-woman-show; with an emphasis on living light, which shifted in luminosity almost imperceptibly as the piece went on.
The Way of Mystery
November 2021
University of Cape Town
Scenographer, Performer, Director
This piece was an exploration of scenographic praxis from the perspective of the magician-scenographer, considering how space, time and atmosphere intersect to conjure surreal journeys which aim to evoke a sense of wonder and shift experiences of worlding for participants. The work presented a triptych inspired by three essential ‘flavours’ of the mysterious to explore how magical experiences, objects or characters might leak into the ordinary, and how notions of atmosphere and journey score this encounter. It took place over two floors of a building on campus, consisting of three installations on the lower-level which audiences would explore and interact with, thereupon arriving at the top level, where they would encounter a silent magic sequence performed by myself, before returning down the stairs to find the installations had disappeared. This piece was conceptualised and created in collaboration with theatre-maker Meritxell Cilliers.
College of Magic:
IMAGINE!
June 2021
Artscape Theatre
Designer
Designer for College of Magic's 2021 Production of Imagine!Worked with director to ideate and conceptualise the design of the production.
Mängata (Moon Road)
March 2021
University of Cape Town
Concept, Scenographer, Performer, Director
This piece represents a preliminary enquiry into the phenomenology of ‘crossing’ and the ways in which scenographics act on a body in journey, to effect a shift in worlding orientations.
The piece offers a decolonial deconstruction of a Cabinet of Curiosity or ‘Wonder Room’, in order to think through what it means to sever objects from their ecological and relational contexts, what it means to journey somewhere ‘else’, and to evoke a reexamination of our own relationship with wonder.
Ways of Dying
Nov 2020
Baxter Theatre
Assistant Set & Lighting Designer + Props
In December 2020, I was assistant set designer and lighting designer for director Lara Foot's production of Zake's Mda's magical realist novel, Ways of Dying, at the Baxter Theatre. I was the only person to work across two design departments simultaneously, and was well liked by the team. My responsibilities involved conceptualising, designing and building props and set pieces for the production. I helped with the concept design and set design, as well as with lighting and prop-making (which included baking and painting edible swiss-rolls for each performance!).
My Visual Journal for the process can be seen below. It includes sketches done in charcoal, as well as images of some of the props I made.
Scale Model Maquettes & Props
On The Open Road
Aug - Dec 2020
University of Cape Town
As part of my Honours degree, I completed a full scenographic design treatment and 1:25 scale model for Steve Tesich's play, 'On the Open Road', which was subsequently selected to be shown at the School of Scenography exhibition in London. The project involved extensive design research, sketching and model building.
The design is based on brutalism & hostile architecture, focusing on what might remain in a post apocalyptic world. The intersected building pieces as well as an enlarged cinder block or brick - the main scenographic elements - score a sense of the monolithic.
The ‘road’ transforms into an urban haze looming over the characters, & the scattered arrangement of pieces aims to evoke a sense of distance, like objects arising on the wide surrealist plain - speaking to the very human process of grappling for meaning along the road of existence.
The Visual Journal for the piece can be seen below.
Act 1, Scene 1: Outskirts of some city, a time of civil war, a place of civil war.
The silver shard with curling licks of metal cuts diagonally through the stage; a cracked and ashen wasteland. On stage right the character of Angel stands amid deteriorating graffitied walls, on an upturned trashcan. A streetlamp flickers above him, secured to which is the noose that lies around his neck.
Al, on stage left, arrives with a shopping trolley – the outline of a high city building appears in the distance.