Haven’t blogged in ages don’t why really I do have stuff to say just not really had an opportunity to say it. So I guess this can be a bit of a catch up.
Last week a few of us went to see Bright Black at the Tron. It was really good to watch stylistically and there were some moments that were really moving. The design was quite quirky and it fitted in well with the mood of the play. It was quite a depressing show but all of us really were impressed by it.
On Thursday night I went to the Tramway with Gemma to see The Beggars Opera. Fuckin amazing! Really enjoyed it. The set was interesting and the costumes where stunning. It was a great surprise to go to a show like that and really enjoy. After my last modern opera experience which was fanastic design wise but dramatically slow this was really enjoyable.
Last night I went to the Theatre Royal to watch The Steamie. I know this play from the TV version and so I was quite looking forward to seeing it. It was an ok show but I was a bit disappointed with it. The set and lighting was quite disappointing because it just didn’t feel like it was set in a Glasgow steamie. It was so white and bright and I think the design was meant to incorporate some of the characters dreams of escaping Glasgow and living a Hollywood dream. However it felt wrong that the steamie was an airy shining place with a marble pillars against the walls etc. I don’t know but I just felt the set and the lights didn’t express any of the nostalgia or the sadness of the play. The tv version showed a bleak pretty grim place where the woman made the best of it and had a laugh despite the drudgery of their lives which could be symbolic of their situation in general. I didn’t get that feeling from this production however. That said the audience were killing themselves laughing and the Magrit character was still really funny too.
Going to see The Seagull on Friday night. I know nothing about the plot but I’ve heard good things in the Herald and off students. Looking forward to it.

Also this week I’ve been busy working on Maw Broon. It’s been such a good experience for me designing for this show. It’s given me the chance to get some proper theatre experience and understand more the different roles in theatre and other peoples jobs. That’s a really valuable thing and something that I’ve always felt I’m pretty unsure about. It’s also been great to see how a play comes about all the way through the production process. Seeing something that I had designed actually being built was weird. I was quite calm throughout the experience and never really felt nervous or under pressure while doing the design. For me the main thing that got me nervous was talking about my design in front of people I didn’t know at all and feeling like I’ve not got enough experience to be there but nobody ever made me feel like that whatsoever. It was good to feel that people had confidence that you were capable. Maggie and Robin in particular were great to work with and gave us all so much encouragement.
Anyway sitting in the train station now and it’s Saturday. Ended up not going to the Seagull as I was not feeling in the mood to try and concentrate for that length of time so I’m going to go tonight and sit in on it.
Now I’ve got to focus on Pericles and getting my white card model ready. I think I’m going to use the Ath instead of the Chandler because it think it’s probably the best place. I wanted a space where the actors and the set were close to the audience and I think that can still be achieved in the Ath if I design it properly but at the same time it will allow for the set to ascend above the sinful and corrupt word below.
At the moment I need to refine my idea’s and decide what I can actually achieve with the limited budget available. I don’t want to give up on the creative process and stop thinking about what would be good and I think I’m going to draw up a re-design for the Ath as I would like to have it and then at the same time refine that idea. This is tricky because I’m always concerned that I’m going to go to far and then the design would be left soul-less but it’s also a cool challenge to try and create a design that says everything you want it to simply.

I've not been keeping much of a blog the last couple of days mainly because I've had to much on my mind over whats happened to sit down and write without ranting. Anyway the situation is just now that it's going to be less demoralising working on design work at home so I guess it's the lesser of two evils.

I've taken a bit of a change of direction with my concept for Pericles. I had a concept which I had was planning submitting at the presentation but I had a bit of a turnaround in idea last week which has taken the original idea but taken it forward a bit and I think the thing makes more sense in my head now.

Still working on Maw Broon as well. It's been good fun and doing this is something realy positive to focus on and take the mind of everything else thats going on.

Got a busy week ahead of me this week. As well as production meetings we're also heading up to Perth to the workshop where the set is being constructed and on Tuesday and Thursday nights I'm going to the theatre as well. On top of that I also have my concept meeting on Wednesday and working in the hospital as well. I'm just glad I'll be working on opera 1 when the broons finishes because I think I'm going to miss it all.

Well got up early today and tried to sort out some of the hassles regarding an old couch which were the catalyst for my dark mood yesterday. Managed to come up with a solution for that problem which left me free to head into uni for the meeting regarding the space which we had been given as a design space. I didn’t say much in the meeting really because from experiences before coming to the academy I tend to open my mouth, look like a dick, and everything goes ahead regardless. I have had a bit of time to reflect on the idea this afternoon, as the design space around me was being dissembled and I have two main strands of thought on what is happening. Firstly I can see the need for the production students to have space to work in and to a certain extent can see the value in having the different departments of one production together. Although I’m not sure that is best design wise really. However I do get it. If everything works out perfectly I think the plan could get by, in chaos certainly but still get by. However that idea to me would be best put into practice in the new build where there is adequate resources for the students. I think if this was the best plans for the students the idea for putting the designers on level should never have been allowed to come to fruition in the first place just to take it back off us. From a second year design student point of view I’m gutted. I’ll still get by but I think this is going to be detrimental to our studies and lead to second year being denied the opportunity to build on the improvements we made at the end of last year. I think we should be entitled to our own desk as a minimum. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to have expected that, especially as we were always assured we would have adequate space even if that meant bringing in porta-kabins. However that is the way it’s going to be unless the students can find a way to bring about some kind of improvement. Can’t see it happening although it’s never good to give up or in. At the end of the day things have improved for the production students which is good but things have gotten worse for designers and now there is no space dedicated to design. In an institution where “the quality of the student experience is paramount” something has went wrong.

Don't have much to say today. Got up feeling like shit and the day continued like that. Got a meeting tomorrow about bringing the production students into the design space. After going mad at first now I just feel deflated and realise most likely we won't have an option other to go along with it. I don't think it's a good thing though. From a design point of view I think it will have a damaging effect on morale because if there's even more lack of space and the place becomes more chaotic people will start being forced to work from home and miss out on working in a creative environment. Having a proper design space was one thing that I was excited about this year and I think a lot of the other designers were as well. What can you do?

Had quite a good day yesterday. I went up to Glasgow Cathedral yesterday to try and get some inspiration for my design for Pericles. I love old Cathedrals. They are just stunning. It's so cool how they managed to build things like that without the technology we now have and they built something then that surpasses what we build today. It's still breathtaking after hundreds of years. Design wise I want to bring Cathedral architecture into my design. I want to bring in the sense of light and dark there is in cathedrals. You have these massive dark spaces with dark stone and then the light pours through the windows and makes these shapes appear on the stone floors. The problem I'm going to have though is budget. I don't want to focus entirley on that just now because I want to let my ideas go where they want to but it's always at the back of my mind what is financially possible. That's the challenge but that's what's good for us suppose.

I also went to Mr Mackay's Travel Club yesterday. Normally I enjoy it but this week it kind of freaked me out. I don't think I'm really that comfortable thinking about and going into all that personal shit with a group of people I don't know very well and I definitely don't to share or show my weaknesses to them. I was quite glad that I had to leave early or might have had an emotion and I thought I'd stopped suffering from them a while back. In seriousness though I think what we did is good for us but I don't know if it's good for me in a group situation. I'll stick with it just now though and see how I get on.

Last night a went to a poetry reading by Jackie Kay who is the writer for Maw Broon and Liz Lochhead was reading too. Thing is I, if I'm honest, I'm inclined to disregard something like that as a wee bit pretentious and for the "cultured set" but I think that's me just being a fanny because I really enjoyed it. Liz Lochead's work struck a chord with me. She had written this monologue that was performed in the Arches toilets. It was about this transexual that meets a lassie from her school days in M&S while shopping for a new bra. The way she spoke and read was just compeltely real. It was funny and I was pissing myself but at the end I had this tremendous respect for the character in the monologue. The other thing was that it was Scottish. It wasn't like tartan shortbread tin, romantic Scottish. I could picture this character have an idea where she came from what her background was etc and that's something that was quite new. I mean I love Scottish comedy that you can laugh at and you understand because it's Scots humour but this was different from that and more real and I got a lot out of it.

Sat in on the Maw Broon rehearsal this morning then went with Holly along Dumbarton Road through all the second hand furniture shops. We saw one sofa that looked like it could belong to Maw Broon and I was pretty sure no one could actually like it for real. However as I waited to get a price for it an old woman went and bought it! It was hideous. So was she! Anyway that was the end of that. Eventually I managed to find a nice cosy looking one for £20 on Gumtree. We're going to have to go out to Drymen to collect it though. Hopefully we'll pick it up on Tuesday.

Aside from Maw Broon I was also working on Pericles. Spent some time down in the Chandler thinking how I could use the space. It's very different from the Ath and quite an interesting space. I think space is going to be quite important in this play due to the fact it's about a journey. It's quite exciting to think about using a different space from a conventional theatre like the Ath and I like the way the audience are a part of it instead instead of looking into it. I find the idea of the space changing into different guises with the audience in it and them not realising it's going to happen until it does quite interesting also. Another I've noticed while working on this project is how much more I'm thinking about the possibilites provided by lighting. At the beginning of last year I don't think lighting would have sprung to mind when I was coming up with idea's and concepts. It's rewarding to look back and see how your knowledge has broaded since first year. You don't realise your learning all the time until you look back and think to the way you felt on starting the course this time last year. At the beginning of first year the production people had so much knowledge of the technical terms and of how theatre worked and us set designers just didn't know much about that at all. I was concerned was going to be swiftly ejected from the course after introduction to TPA.

Anyway tomorrow is going to be quite a busy day, as will saturday during the day and most likely sunday as well. I've always preferred being busy to being bored but it's good to be kept busy doing something that I enjoy and get so much out of. Normally I'm glad to go into work to do something and to chat to my colleagues, have a laugh etc but it's a different experience to find working something that I really enjoy doing.

Had a day of highs and lows. Starting off with the lows I got up to hear the post coming through the letter box. I went down hoping my student loan award might have come but not expecting it whatsoever. Surprise, surprise however I seen a letter that said on Her Magestys service. I was delighted because I've been skint recently. However Her Magestys service leaves a lot to be desired and to put it more bluntly Her service is fuckin shite! They've completely messed up my application and offered me the lowest possible loan that goes to people under 25 with loaded parents. So I freaked thought oh my god I'm going to have to leave which if the situation isn't resolved is a real possibility however there must be some mistake as they are paying my fees so i just need to chill out and try and contact them. It did upset me though and I was stressed out before going into the The Arches for the first Maw Broon rehearsals. So I got into town on time, met Grant and headed down to The Arches and then Robin asked me if I had the model box. Now this was my first time attending a rehearsal since I was a kid and my first time as a designer. So I felt a bit hopeless and bolted back up to the design room and picked up the model box and geared myself up for doing a presentation on the model that I wasn't aware I'd have to do. However I knew what I had to say and felt quite confident so I got up and prepared to talk. Terri was nice enough to say she thought the model was shit hot to which Tom replied aye the model is shit hot and the box isn't bad either. Anyway the whole place cracked up and I just hit a complete reddy! As Maw Broon was say I was black affronted. Anyway after that I was just like fuck it and I guess it broke the ice so I got on with it. After that we had a read through of the script between Terri and Suzanne. It was brilliant. I was so impressed with how they really brought the script and the characters to life. I was actually pissin myself laughing at one point and then getting goose bumps the next what with Tom's brilliant soundtrack. It was so good and I can't wait to see the finished production. After that we had a production meeting and now basically Holly, Grant and I will be sourcing a hefty amount of the props over the next few days. I'm also getting on with Pericles. It's great to come back to such a busy start and apart from this loan worry everything is going well.