Part 408: “Art on the Stage” 1881
Today’s installment begins the last of three articles about scenic art in the 19th century. For the past few weeks I presented information from two vintage articles about the history of scenic art in England, one from 1866 and another from 1871. Leap ahead one decade to 1881 when the theatrical trade of scene painting was presented in the article “Art of the Stage.” It was first published in New York, then later appeared in “The Building News and Engineering Journal” – a fascinating publication in its own right.
“The Building News and Engineering Journal” began as “The Building News” in 1854. It was renamed “The Building News and Architectural Review” by 1860, and then “The Building News and Engineering Journal” in 1863. It ran until 1926, when it merged with “The Architect” to form “The Architect and Building News.”
In 1881, Volume 41 of “The Building News and Engineering Journal” included an article titled, “Art on the Stage.” Other articles from this issue include “Water Supply and Sanitary Matters,” “Practical Notes on Plumbing,” “The Improvement of Artisans’ Dwellings,” “Bristol and Gloucestershire Archeological Society,” “Restoration of St. Alban’s Cathedral Since 1877,” “Calculator of Measurement of Packages and Timber,” “Building a House on a Sand Hill,” and “Ancient Wood and Ironwork in Cambridge.”
Here is the first of three parts.
“Scene Painting is an art by itself. There is no other branch of painting just like it, either in the variety of subjects embraced or in the methods employed. The thorough scenic artist must be equally at home in landscape or marine work, architectural or fresco. He is not permitted to cultivate any particular branch of his art, nor any favorite style. He must be able to produce, at any time, the wild mountainous passes of Switzerland or the flat meadows of Holland; the green lanes of homelike England, or the winding valleys of romantic Spain. In his architectural work he cannot devote himself to the Gothic or the Romanesque, but must be equally master of the Moorish, the Greek, and the Oriental. He may to-day be called upon to paint the Temple of Minerva, and to-morrow the Mosque of Omar; this week the Windsor Hotel, and next week the Palace of Versailles. His art knows no boundaries, and his scope is confined by no limits. The universe must be at his command, and things unseen must live in his imagination. The methods by which he works and many of the materials he employs are altogether different from those employed by the ordinary oil or water-colour painter. They approach more nearly to those of the latter, yet even here certain qualities of the colours used by the scene-painter constitute a sharp dividing line.
In the first place, the ordinary water-colour painter works upon paper. The scene-painter uses canvas. He first makes a pasteboard model of his scene and gives it to the stage carpenter, who builds the frame-work and pastes the canvas upon it. It is then ready for the ‘paint frame.’ This is a huge wooden affair, hung upon ropes, with counterweights attached. It is usually placed against the wall at the back or side of the stage, and has a windlass attached by which it may be hoisted and lowered. The artist works upon a bridge built in front of this frame and at its top when the bottom is touching the stage. By hoisting or lowering the paint frame he is enabled to reach any part of his scene. He is provided with plenty of brushes, ranging from a heavy 2lb. brush such as is used by house-painters, to a small sharp one for drawing fine lines. In addition to these he has several whitewash brushes for laying in flat washes and skies.
His colours are kept in buckets, tin cans, and earthenware vessels. His palette is a long table with partitioned compartments on the top to hold small quantities of colour. Give him now his palette-knife, his rule, plenty of twine and sticks of charcoal, and he is ready to go to work. His first duty is to “prime” his scene. This is done with a plain coat of white. This colour and all others used by him are mixed with “sizing,” which is simply a weak solution of glue. Working with colours mixed in this way is called painting in distemper, and has certain advantages which will be spoken of further on. The priming coat is laid on with a heavy white wash brush, care being taken to drive the colour well into the canvas. Sometimes heavy unbleached muslin is used; but the usual material is duck.
After the canvas is primed and dry, the artist is ready to draw. Most scenic painters do their first drawing in a very sketchy manner. After the charcoal outline is finished, it is gone over carefully with an ink prepared especially for the purpose, and not used in any other branch of art. In architectural drawing this part of the work is necessarily done with the greatest care, as regularity of outline and accuracy of detail are absolutely necessary. A scene-painter’s outline for a landscape, however, looks very much like the off-hand outline productions hastily done by an old hand at sketching from nature. The scene-painter must be a master of perspective; for street scenes and palace corridors are frequently produced by him.
The method of drawing in perspective on a large scale is curious, though substantially the same as that usually employed. The artist selects his “vanishing point,” usually outside of his scene, and attaches to it by a pin a long piece of twine. Beginning at the top of the scene he marks off, in the foreground, the distances between his lines. He then blackens the twine with charcoal, and, laying the loose end on his first mark, draws it tight and snaps it upon the scene, making a line in the same manner as a carpenter does upon a long board. These lines are afterward gone over with ink and ruler. In this way he is able to produce a perfect perspective. Exterior scenes, in which a castle or other large building appears, often have the perspective increased in effect by continuing a wall or rampart down the stage upon a separate piece set exactly in the line of perspective.”
To be continued…
