DANC 285
Lighting Design for Performance
Last Offered Spring 2022
Division I
Cross-listed THEA 285
This course is not offered in the current catalog

The artistic, intellectual, and practical roles of a designer vary widely, from the spectacle of Broadway to the do-it-yourself ingenuity of downtown theater to the conceptual frame of the art gallery space. This course explores the art and techniques of lighting design for performance. This course will cover the conceptual methodology for development of a design based in textual analysis and research. We will discuss light as an ephemeral substance and the visual content upon which we incorporate it into the theatrical world. Students will delve into how we use lighting to help to tell a story, influence the audience, and create a world unseen to many. By the end of the course, students will be able to answer the question of ‘how do color, form, texture, and motion impact our emotions in everyday life and onstage?’ We will explore the various tools that are used to implement such a design including the use of movement, color, intensity, and texture as compositional and storytelling tools; and the translation of concept into technical drawings and paperwork used to make an artist’s design into a reality. The class format will be a combination of lectures, discussions, and studio work.