Art For Talespinner Children's Theatre
This is my last post for 2012, and I wanted to write about another incredible opportunity that I had this year. I was asked to help out in making three-dimensional artwork for the two shows of 2012 for Talespinner Children's Theatre.
In June, I was called in to help add on details to some of the puppets that were constructed for the show, "The Tale of the Name of the Tree." They needed someone who could handle very detail-oriented and time-consuming work of gluing dried grass from grass skirts as hair on some of the puppets. Detail-oriented and time-intensive; naturally, they thought of me. I worked on a baboon puppet, and giraffe puppet, and a huge lion puppet.
In November, I got the call again from Talespinner's Artistic Director, Alison Garrigan, to work on chandeliers for their adaptation of the opera, "The Magic Flute." I was provided with most of the materials and the umbrella "skeletons" that were going to serve as the base of the chandeliers and told one was for The Queen of the Night, and the other was for Sarastro, who was like The King of the Day. In addition, the umbrella "skeletons" needed to be able to transition between the closed and open positions, as they would be brought out onstage "closed" and then opened and suspended in the closed position. I was given complete creative freedom and confidence, which is everything that an artist like me could wish for. Using the materials I was given, and some of my own, including spray painting one of the umbrella "skeletons" gold, I threw myself into making sparkling chandeliers that would hopefully dazzle the young audiences who would be witness to the magic onstage.
There's something very rewarding for me about creating work that will be seen by children and helping to transport them into another world fueled by their imaginations. I was very happy with how the chandeliers turned out, and they were even mentioned in a review of the show on Cool Cleveland.com as part of the set:
"...clever and visually stunning (old umbrellas with glittering streamers where hung up as chandeliers in the palace)."
Images ©Kevenn T. Smith 2012