Posts Tagged ‘body’

From the Archives: Lighting the Body in Space (Part 1)

Friday, March 26th, 2010

Note: This post first appeared in October 2006. I thought it was a nice compliment to my post last Monday

Something I have not spoken of in this forum, at least not much, is the relationship of light to the performer. Concept, space, time and story are all here, but what of the performer? First, before anything, we are lighting the performer. Be they dancer, singer, actor or DJ. The performer and their body.

But what is that body? In dance it is Body as kinetic sculpture. In theatre it is Body as language made form. In opera it is Body in the world. On the dance floor it is Body as extended psychic presence. How do we see these bodies? What are they and what do they mean? Do we see them differently?

Body. Literally it is a physical composition of living cells. It is organic matter. And it reacts to light in a particular and unique way because of that nature. One of the primary qualities of light that can assist us in doing this is color. Through the use and manipulation of color one can make the body appear dead or alive. Real or artificial. The control of and transformation of the skin tone of the performer is a vital and necessary aspect of the lighting designers job.

cabaret_pasties

In 1986, John Gleason wrote a series of articles for Lighting Dimensions magazine titled “What is the Color of White Light?” In it he explored the myriad variety and variation that commonly comes under the title ‘white light.’ This light refers to both the cold dead green of fluorescent lighting and the vital red warmth of a candle. White light is not a single thing, rather it is a variously aspected dynamic transformative entity.

Transforming skin tone as I mentioned above does not necessitate heavy use of chromatic color, although that too can be effective. Rather the very subtle alteration from a slight green to a slight red can radically alter our entire perception of a body in space. The line between life and death is thin and mutable.

wheel1

Angle too is a key element of this revelation of the body. The low side lighting so common in dance helps to bring out the sculptural nature of the human form. The angle of the light determines, by necessity, the angle of the shadows. Thus one is designing not only the light, but also the shadows on a performers body.

But then this performer exits within some context. They exist in some physical location, but also in a psychological space as well. So the surrounding environment must be lit to show them and their relationship to that context. As each and every element is added to the equation the frame of reference changes and the balance shifts. It is a constant negotiation. An ever shifting lens that must keep a narrow depth of field on the performer. The focus must always be clear. Sometimes that is difficult and sometimes impossible, but it must always be the first intent.

Medea with Chorus

How a body is revealed determines how we interpret their words and actions. Do we trust them or not? Are we looking for comedy or tragedy? Is it ok that we are confused? What is the nature of their soul?

Light does not and can not answer these questions. Light can be a lens through which these questions are asked. Light can make an action seem natural or forced, it can cause our initial impression to be one of trust or mistrust, confusion or clarity. The focus of the composition can in many ways determine the focus of the performance. Light can not hide a bad performance, but it can make a good performance great.

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Its not where you’re from its where you pay rent

Thursday, November 16th, 2006

In response to my last post I got a comment from Josh arguing that essentially what I wanted has always been the case. That the theatre must be viewed as a context that places the human form in contextual relation to an environment that is at once an expression of the contemporary worldview and a map of the future.

His argument is that The Globe is just such a space. That the theatre itself is a map of the Elizabethan worldview. I in no way dispute this fact. In part because he knows a hell of a lot more on the subject than I do, but it does not answer my question. My concern is what is that thing for a modern contemporary audience. As I state in reply to his comment:

My question is, what is the contemporary equivalent of the Globe. My hunch is that it is reclaimed decaying or abandoned spaces. But that might also just be my own aesthetic. But there is something directly relevent to transforming an otherwise decaying space into something new. It happened with the Medea I did in San Juan, the Seven Deadly Sins in Oakland, and about every warehouse party I have lit. There is something so profoundly NOW about these experiences, something I can not put my finger on but I know exists.

That is the context I am talking about. Like I said “Perhaps a blank stage with worklight is the most contemporary thing we can do.” But what and where is that stage? That is the critical question.

The belief that the living theatre today is found in dead and decaying spaces is more than a hunch. The more I think about it the more I come to realize that the moments of “Immediate Theatre” that I have experienced have all been events in these kinds of spaces. Not necessarily something decaying, but a space that is transformed into a living vital thing. This might be a theatre piece in a former Spanish fortress turned museum piece or it might be an all night dance event in an Episcopal Church but either way it takes a space that has become calcified and gives it new energy.

rust

This kind of renewal is something that too much theatre ignores. Within certain aesthetic criteria, Queen Coziah might not be the ‘best’ piece of theatre. This is not something I believe, but I could see someone making this case. The play is quite engaging for its intended audience. And there is an amazing kind of energy one gets from the priests performing in the rhythm section, or the woman cleansing the space with sage before the performance. The death of God only holds any weight when one was once a believer. This is why Cioran is such a powerful writer. This is also why the arguments of so many atheists sound hollow. They can quote Neitzsche backwards and forwards yet never feel the pain of losing faith.

There is an amazing power to be found in spaces that have died. Spaces whose original purpose has fallen to decay and only the outward structures remain. These spaces contain so many possibilities. They contain the ability to hold more beauty than their original intended purpose could ever hope to hold. Like the Rewind Concert at the Angel Orensanz Foundation. Here it occurred in a double fashion, a space transformed and an artform transformed. The classical music concert mixed like a DJ set inside a former Synagog.

receeding skyline

It is certainly likely that the issue is not about found spaces per se but rather the kind of intent thinking that often occurs when engaging in these spaces. Especially for ‘theatre people’ working in a space that is not a theatre is a huge leap on its own. That leap causes one to go back to the original and fundamental questions about what we are doing and why we are doing it. All shows should work this way, but they do not. The trick is to find out how to keep the spirit of the novice alive when doing Ibsen in a Proscenium space with realistic scenery. What is basic and essential here? Why is it on a stage? Why should we care about what is going? All variations on the age old question ‘What does it mean?’

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Posted in theatre, theory | 3 Comments »

That’s why I need you to leave, I’m busy trying to discover a new style

Wednesday, November 15th, 2006

I have tried quite a number of blogging adventures over the years. Perhaps on the order of six different blogs. Several have been creative writing, a few have been(or started out as) wholly anonymous endeavors. This current iteration is interesting, but I am finding I have trouble engaging with my work in the manner that I do on this site. Ultimately I am trying to work out various aesthetic issues on the different projects I am working on. Of course there is some degree of simply reporting on what I do. But mostly this has been for me to explore, look at and work through issues that I find myself facing in my work.

All art has a tendency to get trapped in styles. While I find that current modes of theatrical production do make for some wonderful engaging and quite beautiful work from time to time, too often it falls short of the mark. Some of the problem is technological. Theatre does not yet have adequate technology to reflect the technologically advanced world we live in. This often comes down to using video or talking on cell phones, which tends to be a reductionist approach, but that is a separate post. Too often the use of technology is something other than the text. The production is a play with technology, rather than a work infused with technology.

A Picture Share!

I have seen glimmers and outbreaks of the possibilities of technology but nothing conclusive. I am hesitant to say that Theatre is a mode of artistic creation that falls short of fully engaging the contemporary world, but it is a possibility that one must entertain. This is nothing to do with theatre being ‘dead’ or ‘deadly’ or ‘dying.’ This is a fact that our modes of discourse are so radically different than they were not even twenty years ago that the theatre has not fully absorbed this. The changes are not such that they necessitate putting cellphones and laptops on stage. This can work but it is not necessary.

More than anything we are witnessing a transformation in our ways of seeing. The basic core mode of utilizing vision for information gathering has transformed. We are moving away from discursive language to a language of symbols. Rather than letters and words and sentences being our sole means of gathering information, we now have pictures, emoticons and so on. In a way we are getting much closer to a language that resembles mediaeval times where bible stories were told in stained glass windows rather than through reading of books. Diamond Age imagines a future world where language has become almost totally imagistic, at least for a certain class of society. This is very close to our contemporary world and something worth exploring.

Too often I see plays where the only concern is solely the placing on bodies in space. This is an important if not primary element of play making. But in an increasingly visual and symbolic world, it seems reductive and lazy to ignore the larger visual stage picture. The body must exist within a larger context in order to make sense. A complex of symbolic networks must be erected around and through the body for it to fully exist on the stage.

Some of why I am strongly attracted to Opera and Dance as mediums is that choreographers and Opera directors tend to have a stronger sense of visual symbolism. Some of the issue might lie in the literality of language. Words lend themselves to a kind of specificity that might overlook other modes of discourse. In the end words on their own can not encompass the entirety of the situation, so they are spoken by a living human being whose body interacts with the words. This body must needs exist in some context. To ignore the importance of that context leaves out a necessary element to contemporary theatre making.

A Picture Share!

How this relates to the current form of my blogging endeavors I am not quite sure. The two may be parallel issues not necessarily related. Perhaps they are the same thing. I wonder at times if in the end I am simply a conceptual lighting designer, that the plays I do are elucidations of what I write here. After all, if I say “imagine a sunrise” I have perhaps created a stronger image in the mind than any combination of lights could create. Light is at once filled with meaning and meaningless. It is everything and nothing. Everywhere and nowhere. The true identity and the blogger persona are simultaneously true and diametrically opposed. Wave and particle.

Perhaps a blank stage with worklight is the most contemporary thing we can do.

Perhaps the future is broken.

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Posted in theatre, theory | 7 Comments »

Lighting the Body in Space (Part 3)

Sunday, October 15th, 2006

The human form might be a constant consideration when lighting a performance, but the context in which it is found is always different. One must negotiate between two nonnegotiable situations, the body and the surrounding context. What the body looks like is determined by that context. What the body can look like is always limited by practical things like walls and windows and fabrics that stop or allow various levels of light into a space.

composition

Scenic designers, in many ways are lighting designers, though often this aspect of their work is not recognized(even by them!). If there is a solid wall, for example, to one or both sides of the performance space, low angled sidelight will not be allowed on the body and other solutions in the lighting must be found. Sometimes the visual flow of the scenery determines the angles and directions the light moves, not because of some physical barrier, but out of a sense of harmony and balance. Or discord and conflict.

backdiagonal

In the final analysis it is a human body standing in some space. The aesthetic of modern dance arose from a minimalism by economics yet has evolved into a minimalism by design. What was at first seen as a clever way to save money on fancy scenery and props has turned into an ingenious means of communicating time and space and the relationship of the human form thereto.

frontdiagonal

One of the basic principles of modern dance is the neutral space. A “black box” that can be transformed through lighting into vast landscapes of the human psyche. Lights are arranged in many different angles and directions with myriad colors such that through the use of a single light plot any number of styles and locations can by presented. Infinite interpretations of the human form are allowed.

backlight

At NYU I worked as the resident lighting designer for the Dance Department for my last two years. Over the course of the school year the department presents around 15 dance concerts with 8-12 dances per concert. The lighting is split between the two resident designers and a handful of guest designers. Leaving each resident designer with approximately 50 dances per year to light.

Lighting 50 dances in a 30 week time span affords one quite an opportunity to experiment with lighting the human form. The aesthetic of the dance department falls solidly within the contemporary modern/post-modern styles and the lighting set up is based on that as well. There is lighting devoted entirely towards lighting the skin and costumes, and there is lighting devoted to the temporal architecture of the stage and lighting that falls somewhere in between.

frontlight

Lighting the body in space means navigating between the body as pure form, as Object and the body as psychological construct, as Subject. These two aspects are not mutually exclusive. In fact, this dual nature of the human form is integral to the performative body on stage. At the level of formal composition the speaking body must stand apart from the background. At the psychological level, the Subject must be detached to a greater or lesser degree from its environment.

A balance must be found in every lighting situation between the Body as Subject and thus separate from its environment and Body as Object and aspect of environment. Textually these differing aspects of Self flow in and through the dynamic character. So too can and must the lighting address these various currents of Self. In all theatrical idioms, but especially in minimalist and symbolist styles the fragile and shifting nature of the Self is brought to full view through lighting.

compositionwithcolor

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Lighting the Body in Space (Part 2)

Friday, October 13th, 2006

Live performance, no matter what the medium, has one unique quality that runs through it. No matter the scale, be it a 3000 seat opera house or a 30 seat black box, the unit of measurement is that of the human form. The body. The average height of a human being is between five and six feet. Quite often the proscenium opening will be over five times that size. That space is filled with scenery and people, yet in the theatre we are often supposed to see one or two people at a time selectively. How does this occur?

composition

Staging is a key factor. One person in a group might be difficult to notice apart from that group. Yet if sixty people are looking at one person, we see the one person. The focus becomes clear.

Similarly setting and costume can help. If a room is green and the sixty people are dressed in blue and one is dressed in orange, we will pay attention to the one in orange. Again the focus becomes clear.

But often we do not want such gross generalizations of focus. Perhaps everyone in the crowd is talking to one another, including the one we want focus on. Perhaps even our body of interest is wearing blue. What then?

sidelight

Through subtle transformations of lighting we can guide the focus to the appropriate speaking body. Various visual cues can be given to help us see what we should be looking at. Color can be a useful tool, as can the angle of the light and the revelation of the sculptural form of the body. When one looks out over a great distance, objects that are close to us appear clear and in great detail. When they get further and further away they flatten out and begin to take on a blue/purple cast.

toplight

In the theatre we can use these principles of nature to guide our decision making. We can apply them literally to make various “naturalistic” effects. But more interestingly they can be applied dramatically to lend a sense of tension and urgency to a scene. Perhaps a scene deals with the conflict between two characters in different psychological spaces. What nature takes as two aspects of the same thing can be deconstructed and recombined to create a sense of visual tension that matches the psychological tension on stage.

lowside

We have a tendency to equate bright clear illumination with the truth. Or with a particular kind of truth. And shadow, consequently with with lies and deceit. Yet the body hides its existential truth in the artificiality of full shadowless illumination. The Theatrical Body is Language made form. That language needs its pauses and punctuation, its shadows, as much as it needs its nouns and adjectives, its highlights.

uplight

While yesterday I spoke about different performative forms having different notions of the body, in truth it is more a matter of balance. Richard Foreman‘s Theatre utilizes the Body as Kinetic Sculpture as much as Body as Manifested Language. William Forsythe‘s Ballet utilizes Body as Manifested Language as much as Body as Kinetic Sculpture. In the end the final composition of the text(aural, linguistic and kinetic) helps determine the final composition of the design. It gives us clues towards negotiating the various currents of visual storytelling, dramatic tension and focus.

compositionwithcolor

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Lighting the Body in Space (Part 1)

Thursday, October 12th, 2006

Something I have not spoken of in this forum, at least not much, is the relationship of light to the performer. Concept, space, time and story are all here, but what of the performer? First, before anything, we are lighting the performer. Be they dancer, singer, actor or DJ. The performer and their body.

But what is that body? In dance it is Body as kinetic sculpture. In theatre it is Body as language made form. In opera it is Body in the world. On the dance floor it is Body as extended psychic presence. How do we see these bodies? What are they and what do they mean? Do we see them differently?

Body. Literally it is a physical composition of living cells. It is organic matter. And it reacts to light in a particular and unique way because of that nature. One of the primary qualities of light that can assist us in doing this is color. Through the use and manipulation of color one can make the body appear dead or alive. Real or artificial. The control of and transformation of the skin tone of the performer is a vital and necessary aspect of the lighting designers job.

cabaret_pasties

In 1986, John Gleason wrote a series of articles for Lighting Dimensions magazine titled “What is the Color of White Light?” In it he explored the myriad variety and variation that commonly comes under the title ‘white light.’ This light refers to both the cold dead green of fluorescent lighting and the vital red warmth of a candle. White light is not a single thing, rather it is a variously aspected dynamic transformative entity.

Transforming skin tone as I mentioned above does not necessitate heavy use of chromatic color, although that too can be effective. Rather the very subtle alteration from a slight green to a slight red can radically alter our entire perception of a body in space. The line between life and death is thin and mutable.

wheel1

Angle too is a key element of this revelation of the body. The low side lighting so common in dance helps to bring out the sculptural nature of the human form. The angle of the light determines, by necessity, the angle of the shadows. Thus one is designing not only the light, but also the shadows on a performers body.

But then this performer exits within some context. They exist in some physical location, but also in a psychological space as well. So the surrounding environment must be lit to show them and their relationship to that context. As each and every element is added to the equation the frame of reference changes and the balance shifts. It is a constant negotiation. An ever shifting lens that must keep a narrow depth of field on the performer. The focus must always be clear. Sometimes that is difficult and sometimes impossible, but it must always be the first intent.

Medea with Chorus

How a body is revealed determines how we interpret their words and actions. Do we trust them or not? Are we looking for comedy or tragedy? Is it ok that we are confused? What is the nature of their soul?

Light does not and can not answer these questions. Light can be a lens through which these questions are asked. Light can make an action seem natural or forced, it can cause our initial impression to be one of trust or mistrust, confusion or clarity. The focus of the composition can in many ways determine the focus of the performance. Light can not hide a bad performance, but it can make a good performance great.

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Posted in design, theory | 7 Comments »

Quality Control

Friday, April 7th, 2006

Tech for my latest show has been going well. Long days and frustrations due to an EXTREMELY limited facility. But it is all progressing nicely. 24 dimmers for a play with 34 scenes and about half that many locations. Blah blah blah the difficult life of a lighting designer.

We have abstracted the world in an interesting way. Creating a space that operates like an Elizabethan stage but with a very modern sensibility. The scenes move rather smoothly given the high potential for disaster with the rapid transformations that are needed.

With my projects I like to give myself limitations. Light, like music, is a time dependent medium. It is not an individual look that is important so much as it is the changes and transformations that occur between the looks. I like to focus the lighting around a central idea of transformation. In my last play, I based the transformative quality on color. We had five acts and by the end of the third act we had seen just about every color you would ever need. And all that was left, the one thing we had not seen all night, was raw uncolored light. By contrasting with the lushness of the rest of the evening the clear lights became a striking statement of color. As a result the sense of color in the final act was heightened by a return to the original vocabulary.

These limitations give a kind of freedom to the work and at the same time a clear focus. While Haiku Geisha was about color and Medea was about angle, Cupid and Psyche is about the quality of light.

Quality of light is something that is often ignored, or at least simplified, in theatre. The use of ‘theatrical lights’ for most plays reduces the working vocabulary of the designer down to variations on hard directional light. The other day I got into quite a discussion about language and vision. I made the point that language determines reality. While the literal example I used to illustrate the point turned out to be false, the idea behind I believe is still valid and worth exploring.

Language determines reality.

Richard Foreman, as a lighting designer, truly understands the value of transforming the quality of light in a space. He will shift from focused theatrical lights, to industrial floodlights, to television softlights to regular bulbs you might find in a desk lamp. The interest is in finding light that transforms the quality of the performance space.

Photography, specifically Black and White photography, tends to understand the variations of the quality of light better than theatrical lighting. This I feel is in large part due to photography being focused on capturing, and thus expressing, a specific quality of light. Whereas theatrical lighting can become a kind of intellectual game. A conceptual project as much as an aesthetic exploration.

There has been much talk recently about a body centered theatre. A theatre that treats the human form as the yardstick for beauty and story telling. A theatre that finds or creates for itself an aural, kinesthetic and visual vocabulary capable of expressing its varied needs.

This kind of a theatre must be able to respond to the shifting qualities of movement and emotion in the performers through a transformation of the space they are in. An individual is always in a kind of dialogue with their environment. Dim the lights in a restaurant and the conversations change. The same form will look completely different when enveloped by the soft diffuse and directionless light of an overcast day than it does when sharply limned in the low angles of a brilliantly setting sun. The tender wash of morning light touches the body differently than a cold bright noon.

How something is said can be as important as what is said. Form is content and content form. Language, Aural, kinesthetic or visual, determines reality.

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Posted in Uncategorized | 4 Comments »

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