State of the Craft Artisan Address: Shakespeare in Utah! (plus Off-Topic photos)
I've just finished up a cross-country drive from North Carolina to Utah!
The PlayMakers Repertory Company season has come to a close (reopening in the fall) and we professional production artisans on staff at traditional seasonal theatres often travel to work at one of the many summer theatre or opera companies during the break.
Last year, i worked as a crafts artisan in the costume department of the Utah Shakespearean Festival, and really enjoyed the experience. If you haven't been reading this blog since August of 2006, you can read all about the company (with some cool pictures, too!) here, in a post i made last year, and by clicking the "utah" tag in the sidebar to the left, find several posts pertaining to last season. That post linked in the previous sentence shows some of the facilities as well, including a few images of the crafts building (though i'm planning on doing a "Virtual Tour" of the whole crafts facility in an upcoming post).
This year, i've returned with a bit of an "upgrade"--I'm now the assistant manager of the Costume Crafts department, and also Lead Crafts Artisan for the world premiere of the new musical Lend Me a Tenor (based on the stage play by Ken Ludwig). My posts for the next couple months will focus on topics pertaining to the production of the shows this season, from a crafts perspective--we've got lots of armor, hats, crowns, and leather goods so it should be some fun stuff.
In addition, I hope at least a few of my fellow staff will agree to help me launch a new feature i've been tossing around for a while: artisan interviews! We've got a very talented milliner from the St. Louis Repertory on staff, a visiting artist who was the road manager for a Cirque du Soleil production, an amazing moldmaker/caster who's a propmaster at Milwaukee Repertory as our Crafts manager, and a whole crew of great artisans (including two of my graduate students from UNC-Chapel Hill). Hopefully a couple of them will agree to interviews about their careers and fields of specialty, because i'd love to have this blog feature more than "ME ME ME" and my projects and my students' projects and my opinions on shows and craftwork (because, while i do like myself quite a bit and am proud of my work, the egocentric nature of blogging is something that makes me vaguely uncomfortable on some level).
So, that's where i'm at and what's coming up here on La Bricoleuse. Upcoming posts will definitely involve some Elizabethan stuff and some fin de siecle stuff, among other, well, stuff!
And, they're totally off-topic, but here are some photos from the road I'd like to share:
Tamarack, West Virginia
bridge in the rain
St Louis! Not even halfway there yet...
snow in Colorado
near the Goblin Forest in Utah
The PlayMakers Repertory Company season has come to a close (reopening in the fall) and we professional production artisans on staff at traditional seasonal theatres often travel to work at one of the many summer theatre or opera companies during the break.
Last year, i worked as a crafts artisan in the costume department of the Utah Shakespearean Festival, and really enjoyed the experience. If you haven't been reading this blog since August of 2006, you can read all about the company (with some cool pictures, too!) here, in a post i made last year, and by clicking the "utah" tag in the sidebar to the left, find several posts pertaining to last season. That post linked in the previous sentence shows some of the facilities as well, including a few images of the crafts building (though i'm planning on doing a "Virtual Tour" of the whole crafts facility in an upcoming post).
This year, i've returned with a bit of an "upgrade"--I'm now the assistant manager of the Costume Crafts department, and also Lead Crafts Artisan for the world premiere of the new musical Lend Me a Tenor (based on the stage play by Ken Ludwig). My posts for the next couple months will focus on topics pertaining to the production of the shows this season, from a crafts perspective--we've got lots of armor, hats, crowns, and leather goods so it should be some fun stuff.
In addition, I hope at least a few of my fellow staff will agree to help me launch a new feature i've been tossing around for a while: artisan interviews! We've got a very talented milliner from the St. Louis Repertory on staff, a visiting artist who was the road manager for a Cirque du Soleil production, an amazing moldmaker/caster who's a propmaster at Milwaukee Repertory as our Crafts manager, and a whole crew of great artisans (including two of my graduate students from UNC-Chapel Hill). Hopefully a couple of them will agree to interviews about their careers and fields of specialty, because i'd love to have this blog feature more than "ME ME ME" and my projects and my students' projects and my opinions on shows and craftwork (because, while i do like myself quite a bit and am proud of my work, the egocentric nature of blogging is something that makes me vaguely uncomfortable on some level).
So, that's where i'm at and what's coming up here on La Bricoleuse. Upcoming posts will definitely involve some Elizabethan stuff and some fin de siecle stuff, among other, well, stuff!
And, they're totally off-topic, but here are some photos from the road I'd like to share:
Tamarack, West Virginia
bridge in the rain
St Louis! Not even halfway there yet...
snow in Colorado
near the Goblin Forest in Utah