Works of theatrical art. The main features of theater as an art form

CLASSIFICATION OF ARTS

Art (creative reflection, reproduction of reality in artistic images.) exists and develops as a system of interrelated types, the diversity of which is due to the versatility of itself (the real world, displayed in the process of artistic creation.

Types of art are historically established forms of creative activity that have the ability to artistically realize life content and differ in the ways of its material embodiment (word in literature, sound in music, plastic and color materials in fine arts, etc.).

In modern art history literature, a certain scheme and system of classification of arts has developed, although there is still no single one and they are all relative. The most common scheme is its division into three groups.

The first includes spatial or plastic arts. For this group of arts, spatial construction in the disclosure of the artistic image is essential - Fine Arts, Decorative and Applied Arts, Architecture, Photography.

The second group includes temporary or dynamic arts. In them, the composition unfolding in time is of key importance - Music, Literature. The third group is represented by spatio-temporal types, which are also called synthetic or spectacular arts - Choreography, Literature, Theatrical art, Cinematography.

The existence of various types of arts is due to the fact that none of them, by its own means, can give an artistic comprehensive picture of the world. Such a picture can only be created by the entire artistic culture of mankind as a whole, consisting of individual types of art.

THEATER

Theater is an art form that artistically masters the world through a dramatic action carried out by a creative team.

The basis of the theater is dramaturgy. Synthetic nature of theatrical art determines its collective nature: the performance combines the creative efforts of a playwright, director, artist, composer, choreographer, actor.

Theatrical performances are divided into genres:

Tragedy;

Comedy;

Musical, etc.

Theatrical art has its roots in ancient times. Its most important elements already existed in primitive rites, in totemic dances, in copying the habits of animals, etc.

Theater is a collective art (Zahava)

The first thing that stops our attention when we think about the specifics of the theater is the essential fact that a work of theatrical art - a performance - is created not by one artist, as in most other arts, but by many participants in the creative process. Playwright, actors, director, make-up artist, decorator, musician, illuminator, costume designer, etc. Everyone contributes their share of creative work to the common cause. Therefore, the true creator in theatrical art is not an individual, but a team - a creative ensemble. The team as a whole is the author of a finished work of theatrical art - a performance. The nature of the theater requires that the entire performance be imbued with creative thought and living feeling. They must be saturated with every word of the play, every movement of the actor, every mise-en-scene created by the director. All these are manifestations of the life of that single, integral, living organism, which, being born through the creative efforts of the entire theatrical team, gets the right to be called a true work of theatrical art - a performance. The creativity of each individual artist involved in the creation of the performance is nothing but an expression of the ideological and creative aspirations of the entire team as a whole. Without a united, ideologically cohesive team, passionate about common creative tasks, there can be no full-fledged performance. Full-fledged theatrical creativity presupposes the presence of a team that has a common worldview, common ideological and artistic aspirations, a creative method common to all its members and subject to the strictest discipline. “Collective creativity,” wrote K. S. Stanislavsky, “on which our art is based, necessarily requires an ensemble, and those who violate it commit a crime not only against their comrades, but also against the very art they serve.” The task of educating an actor in the spirit of collectivism, arising from the very nature of theatrical art, merges with the task of communist education, which presupposes the development of a feeling of devotion to the interests of the collective in every possible way, and the most bitter struggle against all manifestations of bourgeois individualism.

Theater is a synthetic art. Actor - carrier of the specifics of the theater

In the closest connection with the collective principle in theatrical art is another specific feature of the theater: its synthetic nature. Theater is a synthesis of many arts interacting with each other. These include literature, painting, architecture, music, vocal arts, the art of dancing, etc. Among these arts is one that belongs only to the theater. This is the art of the actor. The actor is inseparable from the theater, and the theater is inseparable from the actor. That is why we can say that the actor is the bearer of the specifics of the theatre. The synthesis of the arts in the theater - their organic combination in the performance - is possible only if each of these arts performs a certain theatrical function. When performing this theatrical function, the work of any of the arts acquires a new theatrical quality for it. For theatrical painting is not the same as mere painting, theatrical music is not the same as mere music, and so on. Only acting is theatrical in nature. Of course, the significance of the play for the performance is incommensurable with the value of the scenery. The scenery is called upon to play an auxiliary role, while the play is the ideological and artistic foundation of the future performance. And yet a play is not the same as a poem or a story, even if written in the form of a dialogue. What is the most significant (in the sense that interests us) difference between a play and a poem, scenery from a painting, stage construction from an architectural structure? A poem, a picture have an independent meaning. The poet, the painter address directly to the reader or viewer. The author of a play as a work of literature can also address his reader directly, but only outside the theatre. In the theater, however, the playwright, the director, the decorator, and the musician speak to the audience through the actor or in connection with the actor. Indeed, is the word of the playwright sounding on the stage, which the author has not filled with life, has not made it his own word, is perceived as living? Can the director's instructions formally carried out or the mise-en-scene proposed by the director but not experienced by the actor turn out to be convincing for the viewer? Of course not! It may seem that the situation is different with decoration and music. Imagine that the performance begins, the curtain opens, and although there is not a single actor on the stage, the auditorium applauds the magnificent scenery created by the artist. It turns out that the artist addresses the viewer quite directly, and not at all through the actor. But here the actors come out, a dialogue arises. And you begin to feel that as the action unfolds, a dull irritation gradually builds up inside you against the scenery that you just admired. You feel that it distracts you from the stage action, prevents you from perceiving acting. You begin to understand that there is some kind of internal conflict between the set and the acting: either the actors do not behave the way they should behave in the conditions associated with this set, or the set incorrectly characterizes the scene. One does not agree with the other, there is no synthesis of the arts, without which there is no theater. It often happens that the audience, enthusiastically meeting this or that scenery at the beginning of the act, scolds it when the action is over. This means that the public positively assessed the work of the artist, regardless of this performance, as a work of art of painting, but did not accept it as a theatrical scenery, as an element of the performance. This means that the scenery has not fulfilled its theatrical function. In order to fulfill its theatrical purpose, it must be reflected in the acting, in the behavior of the characters on the stage. If the artist puts up a magnificent backdrop at the back of the stage that perfectly depicts the sea, and the actors behave on stage in the way that people in the room, and not on the seashore, behave, the backdrop will remain dead. Any part of the scenery, any object placed on the stage, but not animated by the attitude of the eraser expressed through the action, remains dead and must be removed from the stage. Any sound that sounded at the will of the director or musician, but not perceived by the actor in any way and not reflected in his stage behavior, must be silenced, because he did not acquire theatrical quality. Theatrical being to everything that is on the stage, the actor informs. Everything that is created in the theater in order to receive the fullness of one's life through the actor is theatrical. Everything that lays claim to independent significance, to self-sufficient being, is anti-theatrical. This is the sign by which we distinguish a play from a poem or a story, a scenery from a painting, a stage construction from an architectural structure.

Theater is a collective art

Theater is a synthetic art. Actor-carrier of the specifics of the theater

Action is the main material of theatrical art

Dramaturgy is the leading component of the theater

The creativity of the actor is the main material of directing art

The spectator is the creative component of the theater ZAKHAVA!!!

THEATRE(from the Greek theatron - places for a spectacle, spectacle), the main kind of spectacular art. The generic concept of the theater is divided into types of theatrical art: drama theater, opera, ballet, pantomime theater, etc. The origin of the term is connected with the ancient Greek antique theater, where the places in the auditorium were called that way (from the Greek verb "teaomai" - I look). However, today the meaning of this term is extremely diverse. It is additionally used in the following cases:

1. A theater is a building specially built or adapted for showing performances (“The theater is already full, the boxes are shining” A.S. Pushkin).

2. An institution, an enterprise engaged in showing performances, as well as the entire team of its employees who provide rental of theatrical performances (Mossovet Theater; tours of the Taganka Theater, etc.).

3. A set of dramatic or stage works structured according to one or another principle (Chekhov's theater, Renaissance theater, Japanese theater, Mark Zakharov's theater, etc.).

4. In an obsolete sense (preserved only in theatrical professional slang) - stage, stage ("Noble poverty is good only at the theater" A.N. Ostrovsky).

5. In a figurative sense - the place of any ongoing events (theater of military operations, anatomical theater).

Theatrical art has specific features that make its works unique, unparalleled in other genres and types of art.

First of all, it is the synthetic nature of the theatre. His works easily include almost all other arts: literature, music, fine arts (painting, sculpture, graphics, etc.), vocals, choreography, etc.; and also use the numerous achievements of a wide variety of sciences and fields of technology. So, for example, the scientific developments of psychology formed the basis of acting and directing creativity, as well as research in the field of semiotics, history, sociology, physiology and medicine (in particular, in teaching stage speech and stage movement). The development of various branches of technology makes it possible to improve and move to a new level of stage machinery; sound and noise economy of the theater; lighting equipment; the emergence of new stage effects (for example, smoke on stage, etc.). To paraphrase the famous saying of Moliere, we can say that the theater "takes its good where it finds it."

Hence - the following specific feature of theatrical art: the collectivity of the creative process. However, things are not so simple here. This is not only about the joint work of the numerous theater staff (from the cast of the performance to representatives of the technical workshops, whose well-coordinated work largely determines the "purity" of the performance). In any work of theatrical art there is another full-fledged and most important co-author - the spectator, whose perception corrects and transforms the performance, placing accents in different ways and sometimes radically changing the general meaning and idea of ​​the performance. A theatrical performance without a spectator is impossible - the very name of the theater is associated with spectator seats. The audience's perception of a performance is a serious creative work, regardless of whether the audience is aware of it or not.

Hence the next feature of theatrical art is its momentary nature: each performance exists only at the moment of its reproduction. This feature is inherent in all types of performing arts. However, there are some peculiarities here.

So, in a circus, when the artistry of the performance participants is required, the technical purity of the trick still becomes a fundamental factor: its violation carries a danger to the life of the circus artist, regardless of the presence or absence of spectators. In principle, active co-authorship with the audience is, perhaps, only one circus artist - a clown. From here came the development of one of the types of theater, theatrical clowning, which develops according to laws close to those of the circus, but still different: general theatrical.

Performing musical and vocal art, with the development of audio recording technology, gained the possibility of fixation and further multiple reproduction, identical to the original. But an adequate video recording of a theatrical performance is impossible in principle: the action often develops simultaneously in different parts of the stage, which gives volume to what is happening and forms a gamut of tones and semitones of the stage atmosphere. With close-ups of shooting, the nuances of the general stage life remain behind the scenes; general plans are too small and cannot convey all the details. It is no coincidence that only directing, author's television or cinematographic versions of theatrical performances made according to cross-cultural laws become creative successes. It's like with a literary translation: the dry fixation of a theatrical performance on film is similar to interlinear: everything seems to be correct, but the magic of art disappears.

Any empty space can be called an empty stage. Man is moving

in space, someone looks at him, and this is already enough for a theatrical

action. However, when we talk about theater, we usually mean something else. Red

curtains, spotlights, blank verse, laughter, darkness - all this is randomly mixed in

our mind and creates a blurry image, which we designate in all cases

in a word. We say that the cinema killed the theatre, meaning the theater that

existed at the time of the advent of cinema, that is, a theater with a box office, foyer, folding

armchairs, footlights, scene changes, intermissions and music, as if the word itself

"theater" by definition means just that and almost nothing else.

I will try to divide this word in four ways and highlight four different ones.

meanings, so I will talk about the Dead Theatre, the Sacred Theatre, the Rough Theatre.

and about the theater as such. Sometimes these four theaters exist in the neighborhood somewhere in

West End in London or near Times Square in New York. Sometimes they are separated by hundreds

miles, and sometimes this division is conditional, since two of them are combined into

one evening or one act. Sometimes, for a single moment, all four theaters -

Sacred, Rough, Inanimate and the theater, as such, merge into one. P.Brook"Empty space"

1. THEATER AND TRUTH Oscar Remez "The Mastery of the Director"

If it is true that "theatricality" and "truth" aremaincomponents of a dramatic performance, just as trueAndthe fact that the struggle of these two principles is the source of developmentexpressivemeans in theatrical art. This fight is easyguessedwhen we survey the theater's past, and muchmore difficultis revealed when considering the living creativeprocessdeveloping before our eyes.

3. CYCLE OF THEATER HISTORY

Comparing the well-known past and the emerging present, one can come to the conclusion about a special pattern of changes in theatrical trends, a special, strictly measured, cyclicality of theatrical eras.

Princess Turandot was replaced by a new criterion of stage truth - the method of physical actions. The new theatrical tradition was continued in the works of M. Kedrov. At the same time and in the same vein, the theaters of A. Popov and A. Lobanov worked. Further, the increasingly strict and consistent stage "vitality" is replaced by the romantic theatricality of N. Okhlopkov. The synthesis of two principles, the pinnacle of the theater of the late 40s - "The Young Guard", a play by N. Okhlopkov, which most fully expressed reality by means of modern artistic language. In the mid-50s - a new wave - the triumph of the method of effective analysis: the works of M. Knebel, the birth of Sovremennik, the performances of G. A. Tovstonogov.

As you can see, each theatrical direction develops as if latently at first, often matures in the depths of the previous (and, as it turns out later, polar) direction, arises unexpectedly, develops in conflict with tradition and passes the path conditioned by dialectics - ascent, fullness expressions, creative crisis. Each period of theatrical history has its own leader. They follow him, they imitate him, they argue with him fiercely, as a rule, from two sides - those who are left behind, and those who are in front.

Of course, the path of ascent to theatrical synthesis is many-complex. The turning points in theatrical art are not necessarily associated with the names of the directors named here. The pedantic division of theater workers into “groups”, “currents”, “camps” is hardly justified either. Let's not forget - during the period of theatrical synthesis of the 20s, none other than K. S. Stanislavsky created performances in which the winning trend expressed itself most fully and vividly - "Hot Heart" (1926) and "The Marriage of Figaro" ( 1927). It was in these works that brilliant theatricality was combined with deep psychological development.

A continuation of this kind of tradition at the Art Theater was such a performance as The Pickwick Club (1934), staged by director V. Ya. Stanitsyn.

One might get the impression that the theater is repeating itself, following one predetermined circle. A concept that is very close to this kind of understanding (with some shift and ambiguity of terminology) was once proposed by J. Gassner in his book “Form and Idea in Modern Theatre”.

However, the concept of a closed cyclical development of the theatererroneous. An objective picture of the development of theatrical history -movement, performed in a spiralessential, What's onevery housein its new turn, the theater puts forward fundamentally newcriteria truth and theatricality that crowning each, from the cycles of development, the synthesis arises each time on a different basis. At the same time, the new theatricality cannot but master (even despite the controversy) the previous experience, and this is the prerequisite inevitable in the future of dynamic equilibrium. Thus, the struggle between theatricality and truth becomes the content of the history of directing expressive means, a source of development of new, modern theatrical forms.

1. Theater as an art form has a synthetic nature. Theatrical performances include expressive possibilities, means of almost all types of art (literary, music, fine art, choreography, etc.). At the same time, none of the art forms will play a leading role. At the present time, the synthesis of the theater is achieved through the use of the developments of modern science and technology (psychology, semiotics, technology).

2. Theater is a collective creative process. It is not only about the joint creativity of the members of the troupe, but it is about the interaction, co-authorship of the viewer. The audience's perception can correct and modify the performance. The performance is not possible without an audience. Audience perception is a serious, creative, intellectual work, even if the viewer himself does not realize it.

3. Theater exists as a momentary performance. Each performance exists only at the moment of its reproduction. Due to this, an understanding of the idea of ​​historicity in the perception of the theater is provided. It is in the theater that the spectator has direct access, involvement in the work. Regardless of what era the actors are playing.

4. A theatrical work is not preserved because of the moment, it exists only in the current moment. Any transfer to film makes it possible only to fix the action. In this case, the magic of art disappears.

5. The theater, like any kind of art, is subject to a certain artistic time, the events on the stage (the birth of a work) take place simultaneously with the act of perception by the viewer. In the theater, the so-called. stage time - during which the performance takes place. At the present time, the performance is 2.5-3 hours, but some productions suggest a duration of 5-10 hours. Sometimes it takes several days.

6. The main carrier of the theatrical idea, action is the actor. The actor's image is created within the framework of the idea laid down by the play, its interpretation by the director, but, despite this, the actor remains an artist who independently embodies living images on stage.

7. Theater as an art form is subject to interpretation. The problem of interpretation arises in relation not so much to the texts of modern dramaturgy as to the texts of the classics. Interpretation in the theater is a variant of a new reading of a well-known work, in which one can trace the philosophical, political, moral position of the author.

In the theater, interpretation makes it possible to correlate the problems of the current day with the historical facts of the past day.

In the analysis of theatrical interpretation, an important role is played by the understanding of the director's attitudes, his worldview, as well as the clarification of some eternal problems relating to the essence of man. The viewer, perceiving a classical work in the theater, enters into a dialogue not so much with the author, but with the director, which allows you to reveal the essence of the conflicts of modern society. But at the same time, the viewer is in dialogue with the era in which the work was created. Directors turn to classical works, interpret them, because. in them the conflict is not resolved, it is eternal. The director is in a state of "interpretative appeal" (W. Eco). Interpretation in the theater is possible, it is possible at the level of a playwright, at the level of a director, actor, spectator, theater critics (Anatoly Smenlyansky, A.V. Protashevich).

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THEATER AS A KIND OF ART

Like any other art form (music, painting, literature), the theater has its own special features. This art is synthetic: a theatrical work (performance) consists of the text of the play, the work of the director, actor, artist and composer. Music plays a decisive role in opera and ballet.

In the last quarter of the XIX century. throughout Europe, but primarily in France, began to be created cabaret theaters , which combined the forms of theater, stage, restaurant singing. The most famous and popular were "The Black Cat" in Paris, "The Eleven Executioners" in Munich, "Damn It All" in Berlin, "Crooked Mirror" in St. Petersburg.

People of art gathered in the premises of the cafe, and this created a special atmosphere. The space for such representations could be the most unusual, but most often the basement was chosen - as something ordinary, but at the same time mysterious, a little forbidden, underground. With cabaret performances (short scenes, parodies or songs), both for the public and for the performers, a special experience was associated - a feeling of unfettered freedom. The sense of mystery was usually enhanced by the fact that such performances were given late, sometimes at night. To this day, in different cities of the world there are real cabarets.

A special kind of theatrical performance - puppet show. In Europe, it appeared in the era of antiquity. Home performances were played in Ancient Greece and Rome. Since that time, the theater, of course, has changed, but the main thing remains - only puppets participate in such performances. However, in recent years, dolls often "share" the stage with actors.

Each nation has its own puppet heroes, in some ways similar, but in some ways different. But they all have one thing in common: on stage they joke, play pranks, ridicule the shortcomings of people. Dolls differ from each other, both in "appearance" and in device. The most common puppets are those that are controlled with the help of threads, puppets, and cane puppets. Puppet theater performances require special equipment and a special stage. At first, it was just a box with holes made from the bottom (or top). In the Middle Ages, performances were held on the square - then a curtain was pulled between two pillars, behind which the puppeteers hid. In the 19th century performances began to be played in specially built rooms.

A special form of puppet theater is the theater of puppets, wooden puppets. Special scenarios were written for the puppet theater. The history of the world puppet theater knows many famous names. The performances were a huge success. Revaz Levanovich Gabriadze (born 1936), a Georgian puppeteer and playwright, offers new solutions in his fantasies.

THE ORIGIN OF THE THEATER.

Theater is a "vanishing" art, difficult to describe. The performance leaves a trace in the memory of the audience and very few material, material traces. That is why the science of the theater - theater science - arose late, at the end of the 19th century. At the same time, two theories of the origin of the theater appeared. According to the first, the art of siena (both western and eastern) developed from rites and magical rituals. There was always a game in such actions, the participants often used masks and special costumes. Man "played" (depicted, for example, a deity) in order to influence the world around him - people, nature, gods. Over time, some rites turned into secular games and began to serve for entertainment; later, the participants in such games separated from the spectators.

Another theory connects the origin of the European theater with the growth of the self-consciousness of the individual. A person has a need to express himself through spectacular art, which has a powerful emotional impact.

"PLAY LIKE ADULT, ONLY BETTER"

The idea that special theaters should be created for children in ALA appeared a long time ago. One of the first "children's" productions was the work of the Moscow Art Theater. In 1908, he staged the play "The Blue Bird" by the Belgian playwright Maurice Maeterlinck, and since then the famous performance has not left the siena of the Gorky Moscow Art Theater. This production determined the path of development of performing arts for children - such a theater must be understandable to the child, but by no means primitive, not one-dimensional.

In Russia, children's theaters began to appear after October 1917. Already in 1918, the First Children's Theater of the Moscow Council was opened in Moscow. She became the organizer and manager, wonderful artists designed the performances, and a well-known choreographer worked here. Natalya Ilyinichna Sats () devoted her entire creative life to theater for children. In the years she was the artistic director of the Moscow Theater for Children (now the Central Children's Theatre). Her last brainchild is the Moscow Children's Musical Theater (bears the name). In February 1922, the Theater of Young Spectators in Leningrad received its first spectators. One of its founders and permanent leader was director Alexander Alexandrovich Bryaniev (). He believed that in the theater it is necessary to unite artists who can think like teachers and teachers who are able to perceive life as artists.

New, purely technical problems have appeared. A special light was needed in the room, it was necessary to give a "picture" of the background, which would be before the eyes of the audience for several hours of action. Frames with canvases were inserted into a real architectural composition - other buildings or interiors were depicted on them, and thus the illusion of a different space was created on the playground. Sometimes a landscape was painted on canvas, as if “breaking through” the wall and breaking out into the world blocked by the architect.

In the Middle Ages, performances began to be played again in the open air. Forms of medieval folk, street theater were preserved in the Renaissance - in the design of the Shakespearean stage. The name of the great English playwright is called the type of construction of theatrical space that existed during the reign of Queen Eli Testaments I Tudor (gg.).

A feature of the Elizabethan scene was its division into three playgrounds. Such a scene (highly protruding into the auditorium) was ready to receive whatever the playwright's fantasy would give birth to. It made it easy to transfer the action of the play from one country to another, to freely move events in time. Sometimes the details of the situation were explained in the text that sounded from the stage. In the plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries, one can not only find detailed remarks, but also learn from the characters themselves what this or that landscape looks like. The heroes of the play "The Tempest" who miraculously escaped from the shipwreck, coming out of the water, say with surprise: "Our clothes, soaked in the sea, nevertheless have not lost either freshness or colors" or: "In my opinion, our dress looks brand new ... " etc.

The theater itself established the conventions and rules by which the two parts of a single theatrical whole were connected - the play and the audience. Everything that got into the playing space, onto the stage, was transformed: a tree in a tub became a forest, an armchair became a royal throne, ordinary clothes became a theatrical costume. In the XVI century. in the city of Vicenza in northeastern Italy, an outstanding architect (real name di Pietro di Padova,) built the Olimpico Theater (15). This building was completed by a follower of Palladio - Vincenzo Scamozzi (). The Olimpico Theater had a ceiling above both the playground and the auditorium. The space of the theater seemed to be slammed shut. Behind the backs of the actors, in the depths of the stage, voluminous architectural scenery was placed. There, in the depths, the actor could not enter - otherwise he would destroy the illusory space. But on the sloping floor of the original "streets" it was possible to put flat painted figures of characters, cut out in the right scale, and before the eyes of the audience, as in ancient times, an endlessly lasting world appeared. And on the ceiling of the hall, the painter depicted the sky, trying to maintain the old connection with the world around the theater.

A lot of what theater architects and artists came up with during the Renaissance has been preserved in the theater to this day. The ramp line (fr. rampe), the boundaries between the spectator and playing space, is still often marked with small lamps. Equipped with special reflectors, they are placed to brightly illuminate the stage and the faces of the actors. Cables (ropes) were pulled on console mounts extended from the wall, and with the help of a special device, the characters flew over the stage. Despite the latest achievements of modern stage technology, the principle of this device is still considered the most reliable. By the end of the XVII century. in theatrical architecture, the stage box finally took shape - the same one that can be found in the theater now. Particular attention was paid to artists until the end of the 19th century. focused on how to keep the viewer feeling that this box contains a huge space. This so-called Italian scene has become the most widespread in the European theater.

Within the Italian box scene, the artist, following the playwright's instructions, built the scenery according to plans: from the foreground (line of the ramp) he gradually "stretched" the image and reduced it to the background - a flat picturesque backdrop. On the wings, lined up on both sides of the stage, on the planes of the hedges, there is an image, for example, of a forest. Tree trunks, painted on the wings, branches intertwined above the scene in the painting of the padugs, form a kind of arches that go down from plan to plan in depth and merge with the forest landscape of the backdrop. This system of scenery, which developed in the Baroque theater (the end of the 16th - the middle of the 18th century), was called just that - kulisnoarochshya. Painters-decorators worked real miracles on the theatrical stage. The theatrical technique, which became more sophisticated over time, made it possible to arrange fires, floods, volcanic eruptions on the stage ... One of the greatest theater artists of the late 18th - early 19th centuries. Pietro di Gottardo Gonzago (17) called theatrical scenery "music for the eyes".

As an independent form of art, theatrical decoration takes shape only by the middle of the 19th century. Dramaturgy began to set new tasks for the theater - not only to designate a scene or a historical era. It is difficult to imagine the events taking place in Gogol's The Government Inspector, or Griboedov's Woe from Wit, or Pushkin's Boris Godunov without specific signs of time, without characteristic details of everyday life and costume. Drama theater was rapidly moving towards creating a life-like environment on the stage.

In the first production of the play "Late Love" in 1873, the artist of the Maly Theater P. Isakov in the room on the stage set up a Dutch stove with smoked tiles near the firebox door, as always happens in real life. This detail caused almost indignation of the audience, accustomed to the "beautiful and sublime". The actors also thanked the artist for the fact that in his interior "you can not play, but you can live." "Truthful Stops" helped them to feel the specific atmosphere of the action.

The birth of the director's theater at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries gave rise to new theatrical experiments, and the scenography of the early 20th century. experienced a period of discovery in its history. Little things, individual items of props helped to solve the same basic theatrical problem of interaction between the playing and spectator spaces. Divided by a line of ramps, the performance and the audience influence each other, the general mood is born thanks to the efforts of the director, artist, actors - and of course the viewer.

During the first half of the XX century. directors and stage designers consistently analyzed all the possibilities of the box scene and experimented with the arena scene. They mastered the volume vertically, diagonally, making its three-dimensionality more and more tangible, extracting the maximum of figurative expressiveness from the stage space.

Like-minded artists united around the directors of different schools and trends, who brought new plastic ideas to the theater. An example is the creative union of Alexander Yakovlevich Tairov (), the chief director of the Moscow Chamber Theater, with the painter Alexandra Alexandrovna Exter () and the architect Alexander Alexandrovich Vesnin ().

Alexandra Exter came to the Chamber Theater from easel painting. In search of new rhythms, she turned the plane of the stage into stairs of different heights, building unusual plastic compositions in Tairov's performances. created for the play "Phaedra" (1922; play by Racine) an installation of inclined platforms, on which characters in colorful costumes and cothurns came out, which came from the ancient theater to the performance of the 20th century.

The actors wore large headdresses, reminiscent of the architectural completion of the temple. In such an outfit it is impossible to move quickly along an inclined plane, gesticulate vigorously, turn your head - in a word, the usual household plasticity was excluded by the artist. The need to physically overcome scenographic difficulties gave the actors unexpected strength for the ultimate emotional and plastic expressiveness.

In the early 20s. 20th century at the State Higher Theater Workshops Vs. Meyerhold studied and worked together with actors, directors and set designers. This was fundamental to his theatre. In Meyerhold's performances, the stage designer built a scenery machine for the worker-actor. All parts of the machine tool, the "tool" of the actor (his body, voice) had to work in perfect harmony.

Theatrical traditions of the past are studied and used by modern stage direction. Nowadays, set designers constantly work with the director, whose role in the preparation of performances continues to grow.

When the viewer comes to the theater today, he is clearly aware of the conventionality of the theatrical action and does not require an absolute life of likeness. The public is waiting for impressions that will awaken feelings, evoke associations with what has been experienced by everyone in their own lives.

There are performances when seats for spectators are placed right on the stage. This is how the director and set designer manage to force the audience to reconsider the usual notions that "the theater shows, and the audience watches." (Similar techniques can also be found in the past.) In the 1998 performance by director Valery Vladimirovich Fokin (born in 1946) and artist Sergei Mikhailovich Barkhin (born in 1938) "Tatyana Repina" (based on a little-known parody play), the action takes place in the church, during the wedding. Spectators can sit on the stage, appearing as guests at a wedding ceremony or birthday. The perception of the audience is sharpened by the fact that it is in a space intended for acting.

Theatrical space today can mean both the Universe and a room in an ordinary apartment. It depends on what tasks the creators of the performance set and solve.

SHAKESPEARE THEATER

Shakespeare's tragedies, comedies and chronicles were staged at the Globe Theater (built in 1599). The name is explained by the external similarity: the auditorium covered the stage from three sides and did not resemble a globe. However, there is another, symbolic meaning of the name: the theater is the world, and all the main plots of human life are presented in the plays. There was a canopy over the sienna of the Globe, and over the heads of the spectators there was an open sky.

Other English theaters were arranged in a similar way. The building was an open courtyard where the public, who bought cheap tickets, walked, stood or sat on boxes and baskets. Seats in the galleries surrounding the courtyard were more expensive - there the spectators were comfortably seated on benches and were sheltered from the weather. Above a simple plank stage, covered with a canopy from the rain, rose a turret, on which a flag was hung on the day of the performance. Theaters in London were built outside the city center, on the other side of the Thames, and if the inhabitants of the city saw the flag in the morning, they knew that there would be a performance today. Sitting in boats, taking with them baskets of provisions and warm capes, people swam across the river and went to the theater, where performances lasted for several hours in a row until it got dark.

The audience was very different - artisans with apprentices and students, soldiers and vagrants, detectives in disguise, tracking down thieves and swindlers, sedate merchants with their wives. In the boxes on the galleries, one could see noble ladies and gentlemen in masks that covered their faces - it was not fitting for them to be among ordinary citizens at a performance of a "public" theater. The mask in those days was as common in everyday life as gloves or a hat. It was worn to protect the face from cold and wind, dust and heat, to hide from immodest glances. In a word, the mask on the face did not surprise anyone.

THEATER COSTUME

The actor always wore a dress that could not be as traditional as casual wear. Not just "comfortable", "warmth", "beautiful" - on the stage it is also "visible", "expressive", "figurative".

Throughout its history, the theater has used the magic of the costume, which, however, exists in real life as well. The rags of a poor man, the rich attire of a courtier, military armor often in advance, before a close acquaintance with a person, determine a lot in our attitude towards him. A costume composition made up of the usual details of clothing, but in a special, "speaking" way, can emphasize certain traits in the character's character, reveal the essence of the events taking place in the play, tell about historical time, etc. Theatrical costume evokes in the viewer their own associations, enriches and deepens the impression of both the performance and the hero. The costume incorporates the symbols of traditional culture. Wearing someone else's clothes means using the appearance of another person. In the plays of Shakespeare or Goldoni, the heroine dresses up in a man's dress - and becomes unrecognizable even to close people, although, apart from the costume, she has not changed anything in her appearance. Aphelia in the fourth act of "Hamlet" appears in a long shirt, with fluffy hair (in contrast to the court dress and hairstyle) - and the viewer does not need words, the heroine's madness is obvious to him. After all, the idea that the destruction of external harmony is a sign of the destruction of internal harmony exists in the culture of any nation.

The symbolism of color (red - love, black - sadness, green - hope) also plays a certain role in everyday clothes. But the theater made the color in the costume one of the ways to express the emotional state of the character. So, Hamlet on the stages of different theaters is always dressed in black. By design, cut, texture, theatrical costume, as a rule, differs from the household one. In life, natural conditions (warm - cold), and the social affiliation of a person (peasant, city dweller), and fashion play an important role. In the theater, much is also determined by the genre of performance, the artistic style of the performance. In ballet, for example, in traditional choreography, there can be no heavy dress. And in a dramatic performance saturated with movement, the costume should not prevent the actor from feeling free in the stage space.

Often theatrical artists, drawing costume sketches, distort, exaggerate the shape of the human body. The costume in a performance on a modern theme, oddly enough, is one of the most difficult problems. It is impossible to bring an actor dressed in a nearby store onto the stage. Only the exact selection of details, well-thought-out color scheme, correspondences or contrasts in the appearance of the characters will help the birth of an artistic image.

AT HOUSE AND AROUND

In the first production of the play "The Cherry Orchard" in 1904, together with theatrical artist Viktor Andreevich Simov (), he wrote on paper a plan of almost the entire estate house, although in the performance the viewer was shown only two rooms. But if the actors imagine the house as a whole, they know from where they entered the room on the siena, where each door leads, where was the "children's room, my dear beautiful room", their sensations are inevitably transmitted to the audience. The viewer has a sense of the reality of the space in which the life of the characters passes before his eyes. When the curtain opens, according to Chekhov's play, there is no one in the siena. Then Dunyasha and Lopakhin enter - and the action begins. At the Moscow Art Theater, the action began immediately: dawn, the first rays of the sun color the white frosty space outside the windows of the room. After darkness and silence, broken only by flashes of fire and the crackling of logs behind the ajar door of the stove, the sienna is flooded with sunlight, and bird singing falls upon it, as it happens in spring at dawn.

ARTIST IN THE THEATER

The concept of an artist's individual creative manner in scenography acquires a special meaning. The theatrical artist collaborates with different theaters and different directors, and in each work he is like an actor in Siena - and not like himself, and always recognizable. The director, in turn, chooses a master who is close to him in style as a co-author.

In the Russian theater of the second half of the XX century. one of the most interesting was the creative union of the director and set designer David Lvovich Borovsky-Brodsky (born in 1934). The best performances by Borovsky at the Taganka Theater are "Hamlet" (a tragedy by W. Shakespeare), "The House on the Embankment" (based on the story) and "The Dawns Here Are Quiet" (based on the story). The artist's fantasy gives rise to complex metaphorical images in them with the help of authentic textures and things. Earth, wood, iron "collide" on the sienna, and this conflict interaction turns into a symbol. The forged blades in Hamlet pierce the boards of the sienna tablet, almost splitting them. Gravediggers throw real earth on siena. A huge knitted curtain moves horizontally, turns around its axis - it becomes an almost animated partner of the heroes of the play. In the play "The Dawns Here Are Quiet" the body of a military truck, in which the girls ride at the beginning of the action, later "carries" on the boards, becoming either trees in the forest, then the walls of the house in the memories of the heroines, then logs thrown across the swamp.

The uniqueness of this artist's thinking was manifested in the performances of the Moscow Art Theater - in the productions of the plays "Echelon" and "Ivanov". Borovsky's solutions are akin to a mathematical formula: hidden in two brackets, it can be expanded into several pages - and again folded into a small line. His images, composed of carefully selected details, give extraordinary scope to the viewer's imagination.

The "Echelon" tells how women, children, old people go to the rear during the Great Patriotic War. In siena stands a structure assembled from railway rails, telegraph poles, and doors of a caravan. The sound of wheels at the junctions of the rails, the poles flickering outside the window, the clanking of the wagon door, the monotonous rhythm of road stories give rise to a complex and expressive image of the performance, with outward simplicity and unpretentiousness.

Leventhal (born in 1938) works a lot in the musical theater, and not only in Russia. Picturesque thinking, an absolute ear for music, a subtle sense of style allow this set designer to be very different in performances - and always recognizable.

With the director Leventhal staged operas. "Music for the eyes" sounds from the sienna in painting, textures, plasticity of stage forms. In order to convey the complex images of Prokofiev's works, the artist uses all the means available to the theater. In the opera The Gambler, the painting literally hangs over the sienna on tulle poles. Stage light fills with air, makes this painting "sound". In the modern theater, the techniques and methods of different types of art interact. The experience of the remarkable Czech artist Josef Svoboda can be called innovative. At the turn of the 1950s and 1960s, using film and television projection (that is, the technology of other arts), he created the famous Laterna Magica - a show in which an actor interacted with a moving projection. But all kinds of tricks on the theater siena are not new. Svoboda brought to the theater the understanding that it is necessary to artistically comprehend any technique used by the stage designer. Simple at first glance, the stage installations of this master conceal the possibility of unexpected transformations, each of which reveals the figurative solution of the performance more deeply.

Svoboda's striving for the diversity of the scenographic language pushes the theatrical technique itself to perfection. Lighting and technical effects in his performances, without becoming an end in itself, make the artist's "words" richer and more expressive. The scenographic techniques and methods of work of a modern theater artist are diverse. Painting, light, authentic textures and things, new audio, video, computer technologies - everything can be used to create an artistic image of the performance.

MAGIC BEHIND.

The third bell sounded. The hall slowly plunges into darkness, the curtain silently opens, and a picture gradually emerges from the darkness before the eyes of the audience: a sunny autumn morning, an old overgrown park, a small wooden arbor on the left, a bench in the center; in the distance, on a hillock, a path leaves, and behind the tree trunks, through their thinned crowns, a forest and a clear blue sky are visible. The hall is silent. The play begins.

This almost real world was invented by the director and the artist. By means of the theater they were able to truthfully and poetically convey the beauty of autumn nature, set the viewer in the right mood. And they were helped by people whom the viewer does not see, but who, along with the actors, the director and the artist, applauds. Theatrical backstage is an amazing world. The spirit of collective creativity always reigns here. Many people of various, sometimes unusual and rare professions take part in the creation of the performance.

First, the production designer, who has been working with the director for a long time on the artistic solution of the performance, brings sketches of scenery to the theater. But sketches are a flat, two-dimensional image, and a scene is three-dimensional space. Therefore, the theater artist can correctly evaluate the results of his work only by completing the layout of the scenery. At this necessary and extremely important stage, the layout designer comes to the aid of the artist. The uniqueness of the profession of a theatrical layout designer lies in the fact that he is an artist, a carpenter, a locksmith, and a draper at the same time. The master works in a certain scale - 1:20. Each theater has a sub-model - a twenty-fold reduced image of the stage. In this "box" and "conjures" the modeler. First, he usually makes the so-called cutting - "figures out" the scenery from plain paper. This is like a draft, from which you can then cleanly, without errors, make a layout out of wood, cardboard, fabric and other materials.

The layout, as well as sketches of scenery, costumes, furniture and props, are submitted to the artistic council of the theater. Leading actors, directors and other authoritative employees discuss and approve the proposed solution for the performance. Among those present at the meeting of the artistic council there is always the head of the post. So in the theater, the head of the artistic production part is abbreviated, that is, a group of artistic and technical workers who are engaged in the design of the performance. The head of the post is a responsible position. He manages the process of making scenery, and monitors their further operation.

At the technical meeting, which is held by the head of the post, a mount inventory is drawn up - a detailed description of each detail of the decoration and the technology for its manufacture.

Use decorations of several types. Rigid, or built, made of wood (boards, bars, plywood) and metal. They must be both strong and lightweight, quickly installed on the stage. Rigid scenery is made collapsible - so that it is convenient to store and transport during the tour. Soft scenery is a rug that is used to cover the floor of the stage, backstage covering the sides of the stage, arches covering the top of the stage, as well as backdrops that create a background. Furniture, lighting fixtures (chandeliers, table lamps, wall and other lamps) and props are also carefully described. The same detailed inventory is made for costumes.

Before starting work in any production, be it a factory or a construction site, you need to determine how much money you need to spend, that is, calculate the estimate. The same is true in the theatre. This document is compiled by the head of the workshops. He takes into account all the upcoming costs and orders materials for the sets and costumes from the supply department.

With the director, the head post coordinates the schedule for supplying scenery to the stage. The director indicates what design details he needs before, and the head of the post calculates the time of work. The scenery drawings are made by the designer. Often the designer, and sometimes the artist himself, has to make templates - drawings or accurate life-size drawings. And finally, in the artistic production workshops of the theater, the production of scenery begins. The carpentry workshop is equipped with machines with which you can saw and process boards, saw out parts with a complex contour from plywood. Here they make decorative walls (frames made of bars covered with fabric), stairs, machine tools (collapsible platforms of different heights on the stage), columns, cornices, doors, windows, reliefs, etc.

Among the workers of this workshop there are cabinet makers - this is the name of the masters in the manufacture of furniture. A turner and a carver help them. If coniferous woods are mainly used for decorations, then furniture is better obtained from birch, oak or beech, and soft linden is good for carved details. Theatrical tables, chairs, sofas are different from ordinary home ones. The design is lightweight, but the details are connected very tightly - after all, in the theater, furniture is much more often transferred from place to place than at home.

If you need especially durable decorations, then frames are prepared from the metalwork shop. Also here they perform mounting metal fittings - "hardware": loops for connecting parts of the scenery, eyelets for hanging, brackets, hooks and much more. In addition to locksmiths, the workshop includes a welder, a tinsmith, a metal turner. Here they can solder a complex-shaped lampshade from wire, make a chandelier, an old goblet or fake swords.

Backdrops, backstage, padugas, tablecloths, furniture covers are sewn in the soft decorations workshop. The workers of this workshop make appliqué decorations on tulle and curtain netting. Here, on long, wide frames, a special mesh of a special weave called "bug" is woven from a thick thread. It holds its shape well and also serves as the basis for applications. A master of a very ancient specialty works in the soft scenery workshop - an upholsterer, a draper. He knows how to upholster and trim an old-style chair with a braid, tighten it with silk fabric and fringe a lampshade. He knows how to tailor and sew sumptuous draperies with scallops, pelmets and tassels "for royal apartments".

It is far from always possible to purchase fabrics of the required color, which is why it is good when workshops have their own equipment for dyeing fabrics - large boilers in which fabrics are dyed, a rinsing bath, wringer rollers and a dryer. By the way, simultaneously with painting, the material for decorations is treated with a special compound - fire-retardant impregnation.

For final processing, the design details are sent to the painting and decoration workshop. The most important stage of work is the painting of soft decorations according to the sketches of the artist. The shop premises are spacious, bright, with high ceilings and galleries. It is most convenient to transfer an image from a sketch to a backdrop in a simple way - "by cells". To do this, the backdrop is first drawn with thin lines on the grid, and on the sketch, in order not to spoil the work of the author, the lines are marked with stretched threads in accordance with the scale. In the arsenal of the artist about the performers - brushes of different sizes. All brushes are with long handles, because masters write standing up. In their work, artists use aniline paints (water-based), glue paints (such as gouache), etc. To paint, for example, clouds with airy, blurred edges, the artist uses an electric paint sprayer. From a close distance, theatrical painting is a continuous heap of color strokes, dots, lines. You can see the work from afar only by climbing the gallery, which is what the masters do from time to time.

Fabric painters work wonders. They turn cheap sacking into brocade: the pile of cotton velvet is smoothed down with starch adhesive on a patterned stencil, painted with "golden" paint - and an old precious fabric is in front of the viewer. Such artificially created textures look much more impressive from the stage than natural ones. The work of the prop shop is also important. Props are products depicting real objects that, for one reason or another, are difficult or impossible to use on stage. The prop artist is a jack of all trades. He takes various materials for his work: wood, plywood, wire, tin, foam plastic, foam rubber, fabric, paper, etc. He knows how to sculpt from clay and sculptural plasticine, saw and plan, work with wire and tin, solder and sew. The purpose of the work is to make such a thing so that it would be difficult to distinguish it from the real one even at close range. The favorite fake material is called papier-mâché. This is a mass that is obtained from a mixture of paper or cardboard with glue, starch, gypsum, etc.

In some theatrical workshops, the ancient craft of making artificial flowers is preserved to this day. Of course, you can take flowers made in a factory way. And if you need to decorate a hat? Then the store won't help. A small elegant bouquet will be made in the theater itself. The sewing workshop deals with theatrical costumes. The work of tailors in this workshop is outwardly similar to work in an ordinary atelier: the same sewing machines, dummies, ironing boards, heavy irons, large tables. But on the mannequins, instead of fashionable modern suits, there is an old camisole with gold buttons, a luxurious long dress with puffy petticoats or an unusual outfit of a fairy-tale character.

The workshop also has a workshop for the manufacture of hats. The milliners of the hatter choose feathers, silk ribbons, braid, lace, bijouterie, artificial flowers, etc. for finishing products. In the shoe workshop, wooden blocks are neatly placed on the shelves along the walls, on which boots, boots and shoes are sewn. There is a special machine for processing heels and soles. But the shoemaker does most of the work by hand, sitting in front of a low table - a workbench - on a low stool.

The most numerous workshop is the machine-decoration department, which is headed by the chief machinist. The stage is equipped with a variety of complex mechanisms (in the old days they were called "machinery"), and the shop manager must know how they work. In his submission - scene workers, or assemblers. The post manager, together with the artist, prepares the layout (a drawing showing the placement of the scenery), and the workers install the design. First of all, they fill the rug on the scene board. After that, they lower the necessary fence lifts and tie soft decorations to them. After that, hard decorations are taken out and attached to the tablet. The electric lighting shop "manages" the equipment with which the stage is illuminated. A variety of spotlights are placed in a ramp, on soffit rises, on portal towers, in lighting boxes; use portable equipment on tripods and projection installations. Also in charge of this workshop is electroprops - chandeliers, table lamps, candlesticks and candelabra (the flame of a candle is imitated by the light of a small light bulb). Before the performance, the illuminators put the spotlights in their places, check the light filters (special heat-resistant films of different colors), connect the electric props. For each performance, a layout plan is drawn up that fixes the location of the equipment. In addition, each performance has its own light score, which records how the light changes in the paintings. The illuminator conducts the performance behind the control panel.

No less important than light is sound design. In a special workshop, under the direction of the director, a soundtrack of the performance is created. In the theater's music library (a collection of records) you can find anything: the sound of the surf, the whistle of a blizzard, and the barking of a dog. Finished recordings are mounted.

The sound engineer's console is usually located in the box in front of the stage. The sound score (a recording similar to the light score) tells the operator those moments during the performance when to turn on and turn off the soundtrack. To make the sound voluminous, the speakers are located on both sides of the stage, and in the depths, and in the auditorium. There is a workshop in the theater where nothing is made - furniture, carpets, large window and door draperies, cornices for them are stored here. Before the performance, the worker puts everything on the stage in its place. In order not to be mistaken, small marks are made on the rug - stamps.

The property department is in charge of small details of the situation and those objects with which the actor works. They are stored in comfortable capacious cabinets, on the doors of which there are labels with the names of performances. Often there is a need to purchase real, not fake things - after all, in each performance there is an "outgoing" prop: food, matches, cigarettes and much more, which is "destroyed" in the course of the action. By the way, "live props" - a dog, a cat or a scarecrow in a cage - is also the concern of the props. Immediately before the performance, the costumes are brought from the store. For this, there are special metal carts with a frame: shoes are folded at the bottom, and suits are hung on a hanger. Master dressers help the artists get dressed.

Before the start of the performance, the actors are worried behind the scenes. There is only one person on the stage now. He hastily, but carefully examines the scenery. I need to check everything one last time. This person is an assistant director. He directs the performance: calls for the beginning, opens and closes the curtain, calls the actors to the stage, notifies the stage services about the upcoming change of scenery. This is how the art of the theater is created and lives by the joint creative work of professionals and enthusiasts in the workshops and behind the scenes.

WHY YOU NEED A DIRECTOR

The audience does not see the director on stage during the action, he can only appear after the performance - to bow along with the actors and greet the audience. For centuries the theater lived without even trying to ask a question. why do you need a director? And in our time, going to see a new performance, people are often interested in who staged the performance.

There has always been a person in the theater who worked with actors, artists, solved a variety of tasks - creative and technical. But for a long time this "character" remained in the shadows, even the definition for it was not immediately found. Only by the beginning of the 19th century in the theatrical environment began to be mentioned someone who was the main one in the preparation of the performance - the creator of the stage world. At the turn of the XVIII-XIX centuries. a new concept appeared on the pages of German theatrical publications - "directing". However, in different countries the new figure of the theatrical process was called differently, and at first the tasks and forms of work depend on the name.

In the Russian language, the concept of "directing" came from the German: regiehen - "to manage". Therefore, the director is the one who manages, manages. In French, the name has a professional connotation: the director is called the "master of mise-en-scène" (fr. metteur enscene). Mise-en-scene (from French mise enscene - "staging on stage") is the location of the actors on the stage at every moment of the performance. The alternation of mise-en-scenes in the order in which the play prescribes gives rise to stage action.

In England, the director was called the one who "produces" the performance - performs the organizational work that precedes the creative one. With the advent of cinema, the creators of a theatrical performance began to be called director - that is, the one who directs the action and is responsible for everything. Sometimes another term is used - director. The origin of this name also has an explanation. The process of working on a performance involves translation, transposition of a literary text into a special stage language. The director reproduces, i.e., stages, the play on the stage with the help of actors, decorator, composer, etc.

The director has many tasks: he must be both the organizer, and the teacher, and the interpreter of the text of the play - a kind of leader, "master" of the performance. Both the people of the theater and the public realized the main role of the director not immediately, but gradually. Throughout the 19th century the very existence of a new profession was questioned - and the authors, and sometimes the actors did not want to obey the director. The creators of the performances often distributed responsibilities. One worked with the actors, the second decided how the stage would be framed, the third explained to the troupe the playwright’s intention, etc. It is no coincidence that in the 19th century such concepts as fine directing arose (producers were engaged in solving the stage space) and verbal directing (transformation of the word written into the spoken word).

Some historians believe that the director has existed since the emergence of the theater, and they are partly right: someone has always been involved in the preparation of the play. There is another opinion: directing arose only with the advent of a special type of dramaturgy, which required a complex construction of stage action, work with an ensemble (French ensemble - literally "together") of actors, and the creation of a stage atmosphere. Such a drama appeared in the last quarter of the 19th century, and it was called that: the new drama. It was then that the interpreters of this drama came to the theater - the directors; they sought to create a special artistic world on the stage. The performance was now understood as something integral, it had to confirm the unity of the director's intention and the acting. The very concept of "intention" was also born at the end of the 19th century.

However, the idea of ​​directing appeared almost a century earlier: the German romantics of the late 18th - first half of the 19th century spoke of a theatrical performance as an independent world created by the artist-creator. The Russian writer and playwright Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol () believed that in the theater someone should "manage" both tragedy and comedy. He called such an "artist's actor" "we are waiting for the choirs" (an obvious analogy with the director!). "Only a true actor-artist can hear the life contained in a play, and make this life visible and alive to all actors; he alone can hear the legal measure of rehearsals - how to produce them, when to stop and how many of them are enough to so that the play could appear in its full perfection before the public, "Gogol argued, very accurately and in detail defining the meaning of directing, staging work. But in the Russian theater then, in the 40s. XIX century, these statements of the writer seemed only unrealizable dreams, utopia. The very idea of ​​the need for directing in Russia came later than other European countries - only at the very end of the 19th century.

The director creates a performance - a special theatrical work: such an idea took root in the minds of theater theorists and practitioners at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries. Although in the musical theater the choreographer (or choreographer) appeared much earlier. 18th century ballet creators and especially in the 19th century, when the romantic ballet conquered the stage, these are clear predecessors of modern directors. Late XIX - early XX century. - the time of the emergence of major directors. Now the success of the performance begins to depend on the director's intention, his understanding of the play. Actors eventually recognize their subordinate role. However, the paradox (more precisely, even the rule that does not provide for exceptions) is that a successful performance, a truly artistic work, can be created only if the actor and director are equal in talent, in ability to understand the text of the play. And a good actor ultimately obeys the will of the director, because the performance is their common creation.

Since the beginning of the XX century. everywhere, with the exception of Italy and the United States of America, where the formation of the theater differed from the pan-European one, directors began to determine the development of stage art. Very quickly, the debate about the need for directing almost ceased, but another controversy arose: about the tasks of directing art. There is no doubt that this is art. One of the founders of the Moscow Art Theater - Vladimir Ivanovich Nemirovich Danchenko () believed: the director must die in the actor, that is, the director must put his idea into the consciousness of the actor, it is through him to express everything that he intends to say himself. For each play, the director is obliged to find a special form of life on the stage, to penetrate deeply into the author's intentions and understand the forms of his thinking. The famous experimenter in the field of theatrical art, Vsevolod Emilievich Meyerhold, argued with this approach. He believed that the director is the "author of the play" and therefore should feel free. The author's text, according to Meyerhold, imposes certain limits on the freedom of the director's intention, but the director cannot and should not be a slave of the text in any case.

Such disputes continue to this day, since with the appearance of the figure of the director in the theatrical process, interpretation, that is, understanding, explanation of the play by the director began to play an important role. To what extent is the director free in the interpretation of a literary text? What is the director of the play primarily interested in: the play or the opportunity to express their ideas by rethinking or even distorting the playwright's intention? Of course, everything depends on the director's individuality, his will, his understanding of the essential problems of being - hence, on his worldview. Of course, there are limits to the freedom of interpretation in directing art, but everyone decides this question for himself. When directing established itself as a stage profession and a special form of theatrical thinking, the question of directing style inevitably arose. What role do the principles of life-likeness play in the work of this or that director when the scene becomes a "cutout of life"? How often and extensively does the director use metaphors? How does he relate to the theatrical tradition? The concept of metaphor in performing arts is rather complicated, somewhat confusing. However, the language of the stage is the language of art; consequently, the director must master the forms of precisely artistic thinking, create his own image of the world.

Directing art, like any other, is primarily imaginative thinking. In the performance, images are made up of acting, rhythm, tempo, and depend on the construction of the stage space. The history of the performing arts of the XX century. knows the impressive director's images of the world, reflecting the peculiarities of the artistic worldview of various masters. The recognized creators of stage metaphors were Craig (), Vsevolod Emilievich Meyerhold, George Strehler (1, Yuri Petrovich Lyubimov (born in 1917), choreographers Maurice Bejart (real name Berger, born in 1927) and Mate Egk, as well as Robert Wilson and Luke Bondy successfully working on the opera stages.The stage metaphor, composed by the director, helps to comprehend the essence of any phenomenon or event.On the stage, metaphors, in contrast to literary ones, are most often spatial, they are created by the stage director of the performance together with the set designer.Sometimes it happens it is difficult to determine who owns this or that spatial solution: the director or the stage designer.However, this does not really matter.The result is important - the impact on the audience, the most vivid expression of the essence of the director's intention.

So, the golden mantle of the pyramid entered the history of theatrical art, which turned the retinue of the king into a dangerous monster. It was specially designed for Gordon Craig's play "Hamlet", staged at the Moscow Art Theater (1911). The heavy knitted curtain in the same "Hamlet" staged by Yuri Lyubimov in 1971 symbolized fate.

As soon as the director gained a dominant position in the theater, the problem of mutual understanding between the participants in the performance became important. Different styles, different creative passions can collide on the stage. The director is called upon to combine all the elements into one whole, taking into account the peculiarities of the characters of the actors and the tastes of the artist, understanding the duality of their role in the preparation of the performance. The actors and the stage designer are at the same time independent and subject to the will of the director. In his work, he must remember the double, or rather, even triple, subordination of the actor. The participant in the stage action must be guided by the text of the play (in any case, pronounce the words written by the playwright), follow the director's instructions and master the space built by the stage designer.

The history of the theater of the XX century. showed that at the request of the director and with the help of actors embodying his idea on the stage, even the genre of the play underlying the performance can be changed. The comedic text, at the will of the director, acquires the features of a tragedy, the tragic plot is treated as satirical, and the dramatic character looks funny. A genuine work of theatrical art is born only in the creative community of all participants in the stage action, but the leading role of the director must certainly be preserved.

LIGHT EFFECTS ON SCEHE

Lighting effects are created not only with the help of electrical appliances in the theater. It is interesting to use some fabrics in combination with light. Especially unusual effects give tulle and black velvet. Tulle has a remarkable property: it becomes invisible if the space is lit from behind, and turns into an opaque "wall" when lit from the front. Look at ordinary homemade tulle curtains. We can perfectly see what is happening on the street if we look through them at the window when the room is dark. But it is worth turning on the light, and the curtains lose their transparency. True, it must be borne in mind that home tulle is usually white, and theatrical tulle is black (white is tinted gray or painted). If several tulle backdrops are placed in front of a picturesque backdrop at some distance from each other and illuminated, then the viewer will have a greater sense of spatial depth: a slight haze will appear, which is especially important in landscape scenery. Black velvet absorbs light rays and thus allows you to create the effect of invisibility. For example, a character will easily "disappear" against a background of black velvet, covered with the same cloth. This technique is especially good in a fairy-tale performance.

NOISES OFF STAGE

And today in some theaters they use devices to imitate sounds, invented many years ago - when people did not have sound recording and sound reproducing devices. Whistles of various designs depict the singing of birds, strikes on a sheet of iron suspended on a frame - peals of thunder, friction on the stretched fabric of a ribbed wooden drum - the sound of the wind ... It's impossible to list everything. Now such devices are used not so often. And working with them is a special art. But the live sound created by these simple devices is incomparable in reliability with the sound coming from the speakers.

MAKE UP CEX

An important detail of the stage appearance of an actor is makeup. It allows the performer to change the appearance, helps to create an image. The actor is looking for a make-up drawing together with a make-up artist. Especially difficult are the so-called portrait make-ups, when the artist must become like a famous person. But makeup can be light, just emphasize facial features, make them more expressive.

The duty of the workers of the make-up shop also includes post-dressing work - the manufacture of wigs and overlays (mustache, beard, sideburns). The pads are glued to the face with special glue, and each actor has his own beard and mustache. To make it convenient to work, the stylist fixes a "hat" on a wooden blank, sewn from tulle in the shape of a head and stitched with a narrow cotton braid for strength and shape.

FROM THE SELECTION OF A PLAY TO THE PREMIERE

In different eras, performances were prepared in different ways. Gradually, the practice of the rehearsal process, common to theaters of all countries, developed. It all starts with the choice of a play. The director reads the text to the actors, then distributes the roles, and then the reading takes place according to the roles. The next stage is "table" rehearsals (from Latin repetitio - "repetition"). At the same time, the director works with the production designer: they discuss the construction of the stage space in which the play will unfold. The decisive word always belongs to the director - the actors follow his instructions.

When the scenery and costumes are prepared, rehearsals from a special (rehearsal) room are transferred to the stage. The participants of the performance, already in make-up and costume, settle in the space of the siena. Usually the performance is prepared for two three, and sometimes five months. It is necessary to coordinate the performance of the actors with the extras, with the noisemakers, to think over the lighting. Editing rehearsals are conducted without actors: they set the scenery, work out the closing and opening of the curtain. Finally, the day of the dress rehearsal arrives (sometimes referred to as the "dad and mum" show). Now the performance can be shown to the public - the day of the premiere is ahead.

IN THE MUSICAL THEATER

When staging an opera performance, there is also a stage of stage rehearsals. At first - in the classroom, under the piano, in enclosures (screens, steps, ramps - inclined platforms, machines - platforms that rise above the floor) with furniture (tables, benches, sofas, armchairs, chairs, etc.), with props, props (samovar, bouquets of flowers, inkwell, paper, a bowl for cooking jam, fans, etc.). Props in Latin means "necessary". Now, after long stage rehearsals to the piano, a new stage of rehearsals with the orchestra will begin. All disputes, clarifications, searches for convenience for singing, audibility of the text, authenticity of behavior end with the main rehearsals, which are called "runs", "general rehearsals". Now they bring costumes from the dressing rooms, "settle in". Before the general rehearsal, there is a "light", "mounting" session.

In a musical theater, all lighting fixtures (spotlights, spotlights) are turned on exactly according to musical phrases, and the illuminators do this. All preparation of lighting can take place on the scenery with or without people. Changing the design of one picture to another is done at the command of the assistant director under the guidance of the machinist of the sienna. The change of scene takes place either with the curtain closed during "sitting intermissions" when the audience is seated. place (this is called "clean break"), or during a long intermission. If you look behind the closed curtain, you can see how quickly all those involved in the rearrangement run out - props, props, lighting, working sienna. Alya so that they would not collide and each, without interfering with each other, did his job, and there are editing rehearsals. In the opera, in addition to the actors, the choir is necessarily involved, which consists of several groups of voices: female - sopranos and altos, male - tenors, baritones, basses. They can perform simultaneously and by voices, i.e., as provided by the composer. The choirmaster prepares the choir for the performance, learns the parts with them. As a result of joint efforts, an opera performance is born, in which the audible is combined with the visible.

theater art suite

Like any other art form (music, painting, literature), the theater has its own special features. This art is synthetic: a theatrical work (performance) consists of the text of the play, the work of the director, actor, artist and composer. Music plays a decisive role in opera and ballet.

Theater is a collective art. The performance is the result of the activity of many people, not only those who appear on the stage, but also those who sew costumes, make props, set the light, meet the audience. No wonder there is a definition of "theatrical workshop workers": a performance is both creativity and production.

The theater offers its own way of knowing the surrounding world and, accordingly, its own set of artistic means. The performance is both a special action played out in the space of the stage, and a special figurative thinking, different from, say, music.

Theater, like no other form of art, has the greatest "capacity". He absorbs the ability of literature to recreate life in a word in its external and internal manifestations, but this word is not narrative, but lively-sounding, directly effective. At the same time, unlike literature, the theater recreates reality not in the mind of the reader, but as objectively existing pictures of life (performance) located in space. And in this respect, the theater is close to painting. But the theatrical action is in constant motion, it develops in time - and this is close to music. Immersion in the world of the viewer's experiences is akin to the state that a music listener experiences, immersed in his own world of subjective perception of sounds.

Of course, theater is by no means a substitute for other art forms. The specificity of the theater is that it carries the “properties” of literature, painting and music through the image of a living acting person. This direct human material for other forms of art is only the starting point of creativity. For the theatre, "nature" serves not only as material, but is also preserved in its immediate vivacity.

The art of the theater has an amazing ability to merge with life. The stage performance, although it takes place on the other side of the ramp, at moments of high tension blurs the line between art and life and is perceived by the audience as reality itself. The attractive power of the theater lies in the fact that "life on the stage" freely asserts itself in the imagination of the viewer.

Such a psychological turn occurs because the theater is not only endowed with the features of reality, but in itself is an artistically created reality. Theatrical reality, creating the impression of reality, has its own special laws. The truth of the theater cannot be measured by the criteria of life's plausibility. The psychological load that the hero of the drama takes upon himself cannot be endured by a person in life, because in the theater there is an extreme compaction of entire cycles of events. The hero of the play often experiences his inner life as a bunch of passions and a high concentration of thoughts. And all this is taken by the audience for granted. “Incredible” according to the norms of objective reality is not at all a sign of unreliable art. In the theater, "truth" and "untruth" have different criteria and are determined by the law of figurative thinking. “Art is experienced as a reality by the fullness of our mental “mechanisms”, but at the same time it is evaluated in its specific quality of a man-made-game “not real”, as children say, illusory doubling of reality.”

The visitor to the theater becomes a theatrical spectator when he perceives this double aspect of the stage action, not only seeing a vitally concrete act in front of him, but also understanding the inner meaning of this act. What is happening on the stage is felt both as the truth of life and as its figurative recreation. At the same time, it is important to note that the viewer, without losing a sense of the real, begins to live in the world of the theater. The relationship between real and theatrical reality is rather complicated. There are three phases in this process:

1. The reality of objectively shown reality, transformed by the playwright's imagination into a dramatic work.

2. A dramatic work, embodied by the theater (director, actors) into stage life - a performance.

3. Stage life, perceived by the audience and become part of their experiences, merged with the life of the audience and, thus, again returned to reality.

The basic law of the theater - the internal complicity of the audience in the events taking place on the stage - involves the excitement of the imagination, independent, internal creativity in each of the spectators. This fascination with the action distinguishes the spectator from the indifferent observer, who is also found in theater halls. The spectator, unlike the actor, the active artist, is a contemplative artist.

The active imagination of the spectators is not at all some special spiritual property of the chosen art lovers. Of course, the developed artistic taste is of great importance, but this is a matter of the development of those emotional principles that are inherent in every person.

Consciousness of artistic reality in the process of perception is the deeper, the more fully the viewer is immersed in the sphere of experience, the more multi-layered art enters the human soul. It is at this junction of two spheres - unconscious experience and conscious perception of art that imagination exists. It is inherent in the human psyche initially, organically, accessible to every person and can be significantly developed in the course of the accumulation of aesthetic experience.

Aesthetic perception is the creativity of the viewer, and it can reach great intensity. The richer the nature of the viewer himself, the more developed his aesthetic sense, the more complete his artistic experience, the more active his imagination and the richer his theatrical impressions.

Aesthetics of perception is largely geared towards the ideal viewer. In reality, the conscious process of educating theatrical culture will probably advance the viewer to gain knowledge about art and master certain skills of perception.

In the synthetic theater of modern times, the traditional correlation of the dominant principles - truth and fiction - appears in a kind of indissoluble unity. This synthesis takes place both as an act of experience (perception of the truth of life) and as an act of aesthetic pleasure (perception of theater poetry). Then the viewer becomes not only a psychological participant in the action, that is, a person who "absorbs" the fate of the hero and spiritually enriches himself, but also a creator who performs a creative action in his imagination, simultaneously with what is happening on the stage. This last moment is extremely important, and in the aesthetic education of the audience it occupies a central place.

Of course, each viewer can have their own idea of ​​the ideal performance. But in all cases it is based on a certain "program" of requirements for art. This kind of “knowledge” presupposes a certain maturity of the audience culture.

Spectator culture to a large extent depends on the nature of the art that is offered to the viewer. The more difficult the task set before him - aesthetic, ethical, philosophical, the more intensified the thought, the sharper the experience, the subtler the manifestation of the viewer's taste. For what we call the culture of the reader, listener, viewer is directly related to the development of the very personality of a person, depends on his spiritual growth and affects his further spiritual growth.

The significance of the task that the theater poses to the viewer in psychological terms lies in the fact that the artistic image, given in all its complexity and inconsistency, is perceived by the viewer at first as a real, objectively existing character, and then, as you get used to the image and reflect on it. actions, reveals (as if independently) its inner essence, its generalizing meaning.

In terms of aesthetics, the complexity of the task lies in the fact that the viewer perceives the stage imagery not only according to the criteria of truth, but also knows how (learned) to decipher its poetic metaphorical meaning.

So, the specificity of theatrical art is a living person, as a directly experiencing hero and as a directly creating artist-artist, and the most important law of the theater is a direct impact on the viewer.

The “theater effect”, its clarity is determined not only by the dignity of the creativity itself, but also by the dignity, the aesthetic culture of the auditorium. However, the awakening of the artist in the viewer occurs only if the viewer is able to fully perceive the content inherent in the performance, if he is able to expand his aesthetic range and learn to see the new in art, if, remaining true to his favorite artistic style, he does not turn out to be deaf and to other creative directions, if he is able to see a new reading of a classic work and is able to separate the director's intention from its implementation by the actors ... There are many more such "if" ones. Consequently, in order for the spectator to become involved in creativity, so that the artist awakens in him, at the present stage of development of our theater, a general increase in the artistic culture of the spectator is necessary.

The theatrical performance is based on a text, such as a play for a dramatic performance. Even in those stage productions where the word as such is absent, the text is necessary; in particular, ballet, and sometimes pantomime has a script - a libretto. The process of working on a performance consists in transferring the dramatic text to the stage - this is a kind of "translation" from one language to another. As a result, the literary word becomes the stage word.

The first thing the viewer sees after the curtain opens (or rises) is the stage space in which the scenery is placed. They indicate the place of action, historical time, reflect the national flavor. With the help of spatial constructions, even the mood of the characters can be conveyed (for example, in an episode of the hero’s suffering, immerse the scene in darkness or tighten its backdrop with black). During the action, with the help of a special technique, the scenery is changed: the day is turned into night, winter into summer, the street into a room. This technique has evolved along with the scientific thought of mankind. Lifting mechanisms, shields and hatches, which in ancient times were operated manually, are now electronically raised and lowered. Candles and gas lamps are replaced by electric lamps; lasers are often used.

Even in antiquity, two types of stage and auditorium were formed: the box stage and the amphitheater stage. The box stage provides for tiers and stalls, and the audience surrounds the amphitheater stage from three sides. Now in the world both types are used. Modern technology allows you to change the theater space - to arrange a platform in the middle of the auditorium, seat the viewer on the stage, and play the performance in the hall. Great importance has always been attached to the theater building. Theaters were usually built in the central square of the city; architects wanted the buildings to be beautiful, to attract attention. Coming to the theater, the spectator renounces everyday life, as if rising above reality. Therefore, it is no coincidence that a staircase decorated with mirrors often leads to the hall.

Music helps to enhance the emotional impact of a dramatic performance. Sometimes it sounds not only during the action, but also during the intermission - to maintain the interest of the public. The main person in the play is the actor. The viewer sees a person in front of him, mysteriously turned into an artistic image - a kind of work of art. Of course, a work of art is not the performer himself, but his role. She is the creation of an actor, created by voice, nerves and something imperceptible - spirit, soul. In order for the action on the stage to be perceived as a whole, it is necessary to organize it thoughtfully and consistently. These duties in the modern theater are performed by the director. Of course, a lot depends on the talent of the actors in the performance, but nevertheless they are subject to the will of the leader - the director. People, like many centuries ago, come to the theater. From the stage, the text of the plays is heard, transformed by the forces and feelings of the performers. Artists conduct their own dialogue - and not only verbal. This is a conversation of gestures, postures, looks and facial expressions. The decorator's fantasy with the help of color, light, architectural structures on the site makes the space of the stage "speak". And everything together is enclosed in a strict framework of the director's intention, which gives the heterogeneous elements completeness and integrity.

The spectator consciously (and sometimes unconsciously, as if against his will) evaluates the acting and directing, the compliance of the theater space solution with the general plan. But the main thing is that he, the viewer, joins the art, unlike others, created here and now. Comprehending the meaning of the performance, he comprehends the meaning of life.