Team Preacher

I want to start by saying that I feel like I'm on the verge. Not on edge, like I'm gonna snap or something. On the verge, like on the precipice of something new. I'm excited. I'm scared. I'm intrigued. I don't know what any of this means, but it is my fact of the moment.

Ana and I have been meeting to play around with costume things and we have a couple toys to show the cohort in class today. We have been exploring building structural fabric. It seemed necessary to do when approaching Victorian and Futuristic clothing. I hope you all like it.

As for this week's assignment, I was set in team preacher. I found this intriguing at first because if there is anyone in this cohort that lacks a relationship with a higher being, it's me. Nevertheless, we approached this assignment by first acknowledging the problematic nature of the word "preacher." My concern was that "preacher" is a mix of "prayer" and "teacher". It implies from the get go a didacticism that I think we always want to avoid in our theatre. The preacher leads by telling his congregation what they are doing is wrong. "Reverend", however, comes from the words "reverence" and "respect". The reverend leads by example, acknowledging his faults along with the rest of the congregation's. He/she leads by example and helps the congregation learn things for themselves. This is what I wanted to explore.

I also wanted to avoid the cultural appropriation of one specific type of reverend. It needn't be Methodist, or baptist, etc. It just needed to be reverent. That's why I incorporate "other" ideologies in the introductory "sermon". I'll stop talking now. Here's what I wrote:

Reverend

Life…is a challenge. This, journey that we are on…is a challenge. Finding our purpose on this big floating rock…is a challenge. A challenge clearly placed before us. There is no easy answer. If you are here for answers, you will not receive them here today.

Life is not about the answers. It’s about the questions. It is about the journey. We are born. We live. We die. Those moments, the moments of becoming and the moments of ending, are infinitesimally small moments of this journey. In the Hindu dualistic schools of Vaishnavism this journey is called lila, or playtime. It is God’s playground where his devotees are welcome to just play. Life is play.

A part of this congregation is facing the final ticks of lila’s stopwatch. The journey for the Usher family is coming to an end. I have seen their home and met with Roderick Usher. The home and the Usher line…are in decay.

To the Buddhists, impermanence is one of their essential doctrines. Under this concept, all existence is in constant flux. The only constant is impermanence. We are never certain about the length of this journey, the time constraints of our lila. The only certainty is uncertainty.

Living without certainty leaves room for innumerable surprises. Joy! Fear! Wonder! Sorrow. Each surprise is neither fully good nor fully bad.

When our playtime, or a loved one’s playtime, is cut short we experience grief in what Elisabeth Kübler-Ross calls stages.

We experience denial: It’s not ending. We have more time.
We experience anger: It can’t end! It’s not fair!
We experience bargaining: What can I do to prolong playtime?
We experience depression: It really is ending. Why bother anymore?
And finally, we find acceptance: It is going to be okay.

Yet, Roderick is stuck in denial. He will not accept impermanence. He will not acknowledge the termination of lila. He is disintegrating and he needs our help.

The word “church” comes from the Greek word ekklesia. It means “assembly” or “called-out ones.” Church is the people, not the building. We are being called out. This church is being called out. And we must respond to the call. We must step up.

Who in this congregation will step up to the plate? Who among us will offer a shoulder for Roderick to lean upon, a reminder of the fun had, assistance with the burden that the Ushers bear?

Costume Inspiration

After class this Thursday I became inspired by my colleagues to explore a new aesthetic.  Not necessarily fully new, but a more fleshed out aesthetic.  The ultra modern aesthetic has been very intriguing to me, especially in regards to the costumes.  However, I feel that the historical context of the Poe narrative and the age of Escher's work require attention to historical clothing.  For my brain they do at least.

My small group looked at the idea of mimicking the television show "Firefly" for this 519 project.  If you're unfamiliar with the show, here's the aesthetic:

More or less, victorian costumes meets sci-fi in this "Firefly" aesthetic.

However, I don't want to mimic exactly what has been done before.  I think steampunk has a lot of what I'm thinking of, but I'm not so much interested in the industrial revolution influence that steampunk emphasizes.  I'm looking at the sterile, the robotic, the clean, the futuristic, and trying to combine that with victorian aesthetic.

I'm working on getting a fashion design program to create costume renderings (because I can't draw to save my life), but in the meantime here are the photos I'm looking at.

Take all of these costume concepts, throw them in a blender, and sew all of the pieces back together and you basically have what I want to explore.

Structure stuff

After reading Freud's article about the uncanny...I worry that we may be starting to stray from our sources. I believe that one of the issues when developing POVV that essentially brought us under was that we never set a limit to what sources could influence the piece. It made the process hectic and inconstant. I don't want that to happen with this project. Our sources were specifically Poe, Escher, and Quantum theory. The branching out into Freud leaves me with a feeling of scrounging around to keep up with newly introduced concepts and a fear the possible unending branching out into disparate concepts. I will continue to keep up, but I want this issue to be addressed.

That said, I think a point to be made is that I don't feel we need to seek to recreate the Uncanny. The concept as I understand it will occur with or without our attempt at creating it. I feel that poe's work, the confusion quantum theory can cause, and Escher's mastery of manipulating perception will do this on its own. Nevertheless, I am drawn to the concepts of eyes and doubles in regards to the uncanny. Below are my notes on possible manifestations of uncanny, things that already exist in our source material that can be approached and explored in order to achieve that effect.

Below also are some notes regarding colleagues' research that I feel can be used in interesting ways to bring life to this CYOA structure.

Makeup

I will be the first person to admit, that I certainly don't know the first thing about coming up with a makeup design for a show.  Especially when so much of a character's makeup and costume is based on...the character.  The best I can think to come up with right now is to bring a bunch of things to the table and try a bunch of shit so that I'll have an arsenal of ideas when it comes time to settle on individual makeup and costumes.

Nevertheless, I met with Ana and we played around with some stuff!

Here's what happened:

Some other inspiration:

Update

I completely forgot to blog last week so here's some stuff from then.

Last week I really accomplished one of my goals of exploring the designer in me instead of just focusing on the performer by becoming the newly appointed Assistant Costume and Makeup Designer!  YAY FOR THAT!

I will actually be meeting on Friday February 15th with Ana to play with makeup.  I'm super excited about that.  I met an aesthetician yesterday who knows Lizz Campbell (http://makeupbylizz.com/index.html) and I may get a chance to meet her.  She's a pretty prestigious makeup artist here in Arizona.

In regards to design ideas, I'd really like to explore sculpting the face with heavy shadow and highlight kind of sticking to what Escher does with light and shading. Somewhat Tim Burton esque, but borderline high goth fashion.I.E. These ladies:

 
 


Aside from all that stuff, last week we talked about some structures.  Here's some thoughts about that conversation:

In regards to the deeper exploration of CYOA and Chautauqua, I think either one is great even though I didn't not find the Chautauqua structure appealing last class.

CYOA:

Exploring the fact that we’re performing around Halloween as a building block for creating the performance is a wonderful idea.  In my Business of Media Industries class, outside events or tie-ins were quintessential components of pitching and selling a performance.  This could, however, limit the future life (if we’re interested in that) of the performance to only being performed at that time, like A Christmas Carol or It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown.

This has the possibility of being very very long…will we be able to guide the audience to a specific ending without destroying their power of choice?  Or is that maybe an interesting thing to explore…

Chautauqua:

I’m afraid of the possible disparity of the acts.  It feels to me like we’d be performing autocours and enquetes rather than an actual performance. 

However, I know that both of these structures have been successful in the past and I would support either decision.  I would prefer CYOA.

Other makeup things:

I'm in love with Dani Fonseca (she did the popular "skeleton" makeup for Lady Gaga) and have been for a few years now.  You can check out some of her work at http://thebodyofart.com/ or by stalking her on Facebook.  I think the kind of work she does would be awesome to explore in the design of this show. 

That's all for now.  Toodles!

'stɹʌkʃjɚ

So, structure.  Yea.  What?  Ok.  Ideas.

Simple question:
In our performance of The Fall of the House of Escher: A Möbius Trip, what falls?

Attempt at a simple answer:


I personally think it would be kickass if whatever "falls," falls over the audience.  I'm kind of floating with the idea of the audience in 3D glass and we learn how to do 3D projections so that the thing that falls can really FALL into them.  I'm speaking vaguely, but I'm thinking a house.  A structure, a building, architecture, that is mapped with a 3D projection falls down along the Z axis towards the audience.  Crazy?  Maybe?  That's my brain.

Wait...what does any of that shiz mean?  Here's an attempt at explaining.
Jeremy reminded me of Robert Lepage's "Image Mill," reductively giant projections mapped on large scale images.  i.e.:

Cool. Projecting on a giant architecture surface. Projection mapping. High Definition projection. Woot. Now think about an iMAX 3D movie experience:

Thought I'd have a video here? Sorry. Doesn't work like that. As this projector is not a 3D projector and nobody in the room happens to be wearing 3D glasses, it won't have the same effect. So ha!

Whaaaaat iiiiiiiffff:

We combine these two concepts. Projection mapping on a large architectural model...WITH a 3D projector. That would open it up for us to project a 3D house onto our set that could fall from the top onto the audience. Legit breaking that fourth wall.

Look at my hands for illustration.


Second Simple Question:


Structure?


I would love to explore mirroring (entanglement of sorts) in our structure. Like, what if the actors were paired up, placed in opposing places on stage at all times and every action causes an equal and opposite reaction on the other actor? i.e. Tyler facing the audience at Downstage Right lifts his right arm and Julie facing upstage at Upstage left lifts her left arm. Something like that that would rely heavily on what we've all learned from kinesthetic response and would illustrate the concept of entanglement wherein the actions of THIS thing affects THIS other thing.

Also, Pepper's Ghost:

Reductive statement about light theory:

White light hits a brown shirt. Shirt absorbs all colors accept for brown. The brown light reflects off the shirt and into the viewer's eyes.

In Pepper's Ghost, the plexiglass grabs that reflection that would normally just go into the viewer's eyes and suspends it in "midair."

Hands again.

Legit...that is mirroring.

Them's is ma thoughts.

Goals reflections:

I have not met with Brunella or Anastacia like I said I would. Bad me.

But I have been sharing ideas and speaking up, yes anding as best I can. So yay for accomplishing two other goals.

Impossible? I-M-Possible.

I'm sort of in love with making the impossible possible.  At least, creating the illusion of it.  Here's a little animation I made that show's you how to draw an "impossible" cube:

I'm enthralled by the idea of warping people's perspectives.  You look at it this way, you see X.  Look at it this way, and you see Kerfuffle.  By developing a better understanding of light and shadow, Escher was able to make us see the impossible.  That idea somehow landed me here:


I don't know how we could incorporate anything as intricate as this shadow cloud into our project, but it's really cool to look at.

Something more useful actually popped up on my Facebook news feed this morning.  An old professor of mine posted a comment about Japanese Body Artist Choo-San.  I googled her.

Guffaw!  What if we incorporated something like this into our makeup design?!  I was stuck looking at the architecture for set ideas, but if we apply the same concepts of light and shadow manipulation along with a little color matching, we could blow minds!

Inspiration!  Everywhere!  I just wanna play!