Abstract the Arts of Design – Es Devlin Scenic Design

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At the start of the episode, Es commented that her practice over the years has been to follow the path of inquiry and then find collaborators who are willing to share their paths with her. What does this mean to you?

  • For Es, the way she works inspires others and makes them want to follow what she does. Es had prioritized her path of inquiry then finding people who are interested in her path. To me, it shows how actually knowing and understanding fully about your idea is the most important thing. It’s not just about how creative/innovative you are, but about how well you get the specific details of your path/work. Only by being aware of what you are making, the others will be able to follow your idea.

During the episode, Es stated 5 ingredients of stage design… (and perhaps photography). What are the ingredients?

  • Ingredient 1: Space
  • Ingredient 2: Light
  • Ingredient 3: Darkness
  • Ingredient 4: Scale
  • Ingredient 5: Time

Pick ONE ingredient and describe or explain what it means according to Es.

Scale

  • According to Es, scale is positioning humans bigger or smaller in relation to the object in the scene. A scaling scene helps you to obtain a better view of what the final product will be. For example, a scaled scene setup that you make prior to the actual set will help better to identify places of improvement. At this stage, things are easier to fix because it’s a small setup, so scaling makes work efficient in stage design.

For “Watch The Throne” tour featuring Kanye West and Jay-Z, Es questioned what the word Throne meant to the artists. For them, Throne was being on top and then having to fight to stay on top — in other words, the Throne meant the tension between power and vulnerability. Can you describe how she created a design that communicated the ‘tension between power and vulnerability”?

  • A big block was set up during the “Watch The Throne” tour of Kanye West and Jay-Z. The tall height of the block and the artists performing on top of it showed the tension between power and vulnerability. In one way, the tall block could signify power because the artist was on top of everyone, and he could control everything. However, at the same time, it could signify the vulnerability of the artist because he was the only one on top, so he could get attacked/shot at any time. The ironic contrast used with the single block further highlighted “power and vulnerability”.

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