High School AP Portfolio 2017

2D Design

For my concentration, I am using my knowledge of the backstage process to inspire my ideas. My theme is; the magic of backstage, a perspective seen by few. I emphasize the angles and elements that the audience never sees during the performance. In my concentration, I purposefully exclude people, because this unique perspective behind the scenes is important to understanding the atmosphere of backstage.

I chose to reuse materials from past school performances because many of them are discarded after the show closes.The base material for my pieces is cut from two 4' by 8' canvases that were used as a backdrop for a recent school play. While working on the pieces in my concentration, I began with trying to do more literal interpretations of the reference pictures that I had taken. While developing my ideas, I began realizing that I found better results when I took less control of the outcome, discovering that by utilizing many layers and different media I could better relate the feelings that I had to each memory. Many of my pieces exhibit the absolute chaos that can be found behind the scenes before the production even opens. I also highlight elements that are extremely important to the production but are never seen by the audience, including lighting, construction and various reused items, such as costumes and building materials. In other pieces I chose to show individual details including the audience and the fly reel.