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Team USA goes for gold in Prague Quadrennial
Melissa
Mitchell, Arts Editor
217-333-5491; melissa@illinois.edu
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Released
5/3/2007
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — The
next Olympic games won’t take place
until 2008, but a team at the University of Illinois has been going
the distance to ensure that the U.S. is well represented in another
major international event and competition held every four years.
Under the direction of Thomas V. Korder, technical director at the
U. of I.’s Krannert Center
for the Performing Arts, several students
and faculty and staff members from the center and the department of theater’s Division of Design, Technology and Management have
been working long hours for the past year and a half coordinating,
designing and building the USA exhibits that will be entered in the
2007 Prague Quadrennial, June 14-24.
Korder described the event as “the only exhibition of its kind
and magnitude in the world that showcases the best examples of current
practices in performing arts production design, technology and theater
architecture.”
“It is widely viewed as ‘the Olympics of performing arts design,’ ” he
said.
And while Olympic competitors have their sights set on one goal – bringing
home the gold – Korder and crew are similarly focused on a shiny,
gilded object. The U.S. team is hoping to win the coveted “Golden
Triga,” a horsedrawn sleigh-shaped award, and the Quadrennial’s
highest honor.
Exhibitors’ entries are presented in three distinct categories:
the national section highlights the work of professional theater companies
from throughout each country, the architecture and technology section
focuses on innovations in architectural design, and “Scenofest” features
the best work created by students.
This year, the multifaceted event, which has been held in the Czech
capital every four years since 1967, will feature work created by theater
professionals and students in 60 nations, including first-time exhibitors
Belorussia, Bosnia, Cameroon, Georgia, Herzegovina, Ireland, Malaysia
and Singapore. In addition to displays by participating nations, the
event provides a networking opportunity for theater professionals from
every continent, and includes lectures, panel discussions, installations
and performances.
While much of the activity is focused on the exhibits displayed in
Prague’s Industrial Palace, a historic exhibition hall built
in 1891, Korder said performing arts activities are planned at venues
throughout the city during the 10-day event.
The USA exhibit is sponsored by the United States Institute of Theater
Technology, a non-profit membership association of design, production
and technology professionals in the performing arts and entertainment
industry.
In his role as vice commissioner and exhibits project manager for the
U.S. entries, Korder has been responsible for coordinating and facilitating
the entire project. That has included carrying out the wishes of a
curatorial committee, comprising representatives of performing-arts
professionals from throughout the United States. Korder participated
in the committee discussions, but said the curators were largely responsible
for selecting which productions would be represented in the USA exhibits.
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“I’m the person to make sure the physical exhibits were realized
and put together,” he said.
“It’s the same with my job here, or what we did with ‘End
of Cinematics,’ he said, referring to Mikel Rouse’s multimedia
production that premiered at Krannert Center, then traveled to other venues
and is among the productions featured in the USA national exhibition. “The
set designers have their dream. … They tell me what their dream
is, and I try to figure out how to make it happen. In a good relationship
you have input and they welcome your input.”
At the beginning of the process, he said, “I get sketches, and
a lot of what I do is cost estimating, engineering … figuring
out how it’s going to be built, how I can support spans, that
kind of thing. Then I do construction drafting and manage the construction
process.”
The latter, Korder said, includes a great deal of coordination – for
example, making sure people charged with designing the lighting and
painting sets do their part to meet the production deadline.
In the case of the Quadrennial exhibits, there have been more than
a few extra coordination challenges. For starters, more than 140 entries – which
included production photos, video displays, renderings, scenic models,
costumes, puppets, designer statements and bios – were contributed
by professional theater designers from dozens of producing organizations
nationwide. Designers represented include Ming Cho Lee, John Conklin,
Carrie Robins, Julie Taymor and Nic Ularu; producers range from the
Metropolitan Opera and Juilliard School to the Builders Association,
Steppenwolf Theater Company and the Utah Shakespearean Festival.
Besides the sheer volume of materials needing to be presented, all three
USA entries had to be built in off-campus rental space over several
months, torn down, packed up, and loaded into a shipping container. Then it
needs to be unpacked and rebuilt in Prague in four days.
“It’s really very much like touring a show,” said Korder,
who will travel to Prague with the rest of the production team in June
to reassemble the exhibits and staff them during the event.
And like good scouts, they have to be prepared for anything on the other
end.
“For instance, when we took ‘Cinematics’ to California, we
knew there would be stores there, but you don’t have time to go out to
the hardware store necessarily, so you plan to take anything you will need
with you. You take a full set of tools. And anything you use in the exhibit,
you make sure you have extras … light bulbs, plugs, bolts, paint. You
have to think, ‘If that breaks or gets torn, or whatever, do I have a
way to fix it?’”
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If anything does
go wrong, most of Korder’s supporting cast – which
included U. of I. theater professors R. Eric Stone and F. Randy deCelle – will
be there to pitch in.
Stone is the associate designer for the national exhibition, and also
assisted with the architecture and student exhibits. His many contributions
to the project included “taking the co-designers’ ideas
and making them a reality in terms of drafting and models, serving
as the liaison between the exhibition designers, the curators and sometimes
directly with the designers whose work is being displayed.” He
also served as on-site curator, examining all the original artwork
as it was received, and making repairs, when needed. He also designed
most of the graphics for the exhibit.
As the digital media and technology coordinator for the project, deCelle – who
is chair of scenic technology in the theater department – said
he was responsible for determining the best, most efficient methodologies
used in the multimedia presentations in the national and student exhibits.
“The types of systems involved are video and audio playback, and interactive
kiosks used to present the wealth of information cataloged for the exhibit,” deCelle
said. “The design and editing of the video, audio and software
was done by one of our students, Jason Lindahl.”
“We have a whole separate digital portion of the exhibit,” Korder
said, “because America is so big … there are so many designers,
so many shows that could be in it. One of the ways we’ve expanded
the number of people included is by having computer stations so people
can come up, sit down and look through this bigger catalog of work.”
Other U. of I. students who contributed to the overall project and
will be traveling to Prague are Daniel Jacobs, Reuben Lucas, Cathi
Romero-Molay, Tiffany Scribner, Matthew Stratton, Jennifer Zimmerman,
Nicole Bromley and Christopher Woller. Their travel is being supported
by USITT, Krannert Center and Bernhard Works, the center’s original
technical director.
Additional assistance with the project was provided by Verda Beth Martell,
professor of theater and Krannert Center’s assistant technical
director; and U. of I. undergraduates Allyson Schroeder, Justin Parks
and Scott Wolfson.
After the USA exhibit is displayed in Prague, Korder said plans call
for displaying it at a couple of theater conferences in the United
States as well as at the Mesa Arts Center, in Arizona. Work exhibited
in the Quadrennial also will be documented for the first time this
year in a catalog and DVD.
