SCENERY PAINTING FOR THE AMATEUR MUSICAL THEATRE and PANTOMIME

"Causeway" Dance- page two. Designer:- Brian Willis Scenic Artist:- Brian Willis Performed by:- Dominic Graham School of Dancing at the Riverside Theatre Coleraine in August 2006

The ground row consisted of seven plywood flats overlapping each other. This piece is eleven feet high. The stones are painted blue as the brief was : - "The Causeway bathed in moonlight" So I painted it blue to be enhanced by blue lights. I also picked out the light side of the stones in a fluorescent paint which should glow under Ultra Violet lights. Although I understand this effect was never used - Pity it would have been a nice piece of magic.

The texture of the rock I accomplished by first of all painting the various faces of the 'stones' with a base coat, then I dipped a broken sponge into three different colours and patted it onto the ply in a haphazard manner. In places I used more yellow/orange amongst my three colours to hint at lichen. Once everything was dry I then went over the cracks again with a dark colour so that my "texture" was obliterated at that pont. Note the painted shadows made by the 'rocks' standing in front of each other. In fact in the top right corner theres a shadow of a rock that doesn't exist !

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