MA/MFA Scenography

ABOUT MA SCENOGRAPHY

Some of the major innovations in performance practices over the past hundred years have been drawn from scenographic developments. This MA/MFA approaches scenography from multiple practical and theoretical perspectives to create new opportunities for performance design experimentation and authorship.

This is a dynamic course for highly motivated artists and practitioners looking to extend their practice and for those wishing to develop design-led processes for and within performance. Students will engage with scenography through immersion in the process of relating bodies with space, sound, light and objects.

Students will discover, discuss and engage with past and present approaches to performance design informed by a variety of disciplines, for example, video, puppetry, architecture, choreography, sound and scientific enquiry. Existing skills and practice will
be challenged, extended and refined as students investigate speculatively the creative use/misuse of tools and media. Concerned with the body, movement, spatiality and temporality, the course includes a particular attention to, and interrogation
of, the scenographer’s subjective and physical approach to design processes.

There is a mix of collaborative and independent work, exploring the interplay of conceptual and practical thinking. This includes undertaking experimental and laboratory-based case studies, as well as studying the histories and theories of perception, representation and aesthetics within historical and philosophical frameworks.

Drawing on the expertise of current staff and visiting fellow researchers and practitioners, students explore a range of methods in the design studio/rehearsal room and the lecture theatre and have the opportunity to present their work through performance and exhibition. Students work within Central’s existing studio system alongside other courses and, through negotiated learning agreements, in professional contexts.

ASSESSMENT

This is by practical conceptions and realisations, written assignments and research presentations.

Visit the MA/MFA Scenography page on the Royal Central School of Speech & Drama website for more details!