A biography written by Richard C. Beacham with essays by Adolpe Appia. Published in 1994 by Harwood Academic Publishers.
page 14 (Beacham)
His own unpublished accounts of his method are extremely revealing, for they demonstrate how his work was based directly and solely on the works themselves - on their own integrity and expressiveness - and not on any pre-existent notions whatsoever about how they ought to be presented in the theater. This was in itself a revolutionary approach, for uniquely, Appia undertook not to provide the external historical or fictive locales - mere illustrations and background for the stones - but, rather, to determine the setting dictated by the music through the drama, generated from within the work itself.
page 21/22 (Beacham)
Although gradually evolving, the designer-director which Appia called for was still a relatively new concept in theater, and Appia went further than any before him in providing a thorough and concrete description of the principles governing this largely untested idea.
The first of these was the recognition that the mise an scene was already immanent in the score. It was the original music-drama itself that contained not only the tempo and duration of the words, not only the necessary rhythms, gestures and movements, but by extension the setting as well. which the designer-director must think of as music projected and visualised in space. He must trust the music and willingly submit his own talents and efforts to giving it theatrical form.
The second principle was that the performer was the intermediary between the music and its physical setting. Like the designer, he must abnegate his own personality and use all his gifts and training in the service of the score, which alone determined his activity in performance. It was particularly important that the performer understand that his task was to realise the role rather than interpret it, to function as the sensitive medium through which the music achieved its expression in space. Appia placed the actor at the very center of his revolutionary scenic theory; the scenic elements were not to be thought of as setting or background for the drama, but rather as an extension of the actor himself, as he in turn was given significance and motivated by the musical score. Since the Renaissance the actor and the setting had incompatibly shared the same stage. Now the actor could resume his ancient function: through his living presence to provide simultaneously that crucial point at which the poet's words become flesh in a work of theatrical art, and the common ground where human reality and the fictive realms of the imagination meet.
page 24 (Appia)
The human body does not seek to produce an illusion of reality - it is itself reality! What it requires from the setting is simply enhancement of this reality; and of course this in turn entirely alters the purpose of the setting: in the one case it is the realistic depiction of objects that is sought, in the other, the greatest possible degree of reality for the human body ... Scenic illusion is the living presence of the actor.
page 46 (Appia: Texts on the Reform of Theatrical Production)
But how can music be conveyed into the painting, lighting, and the arrangement of backdrops and flats? ...
In a staging of spoken drama, the presence of the actor is absolutely essential for any communication, and therefore he assumes a disproportionate importance … But for the author of a word-tone drama, the actor is not the only nor even the most important interpreter of his intention. He is instead only one medium, neither more nor less important than others, available to the poet ... [The actor] becomes part of an organic unity and must submit to the rules governing the harmony of his organic entity ... his facial expressions and gestures are dictated by the music. Moreover, we observe that these are no longer isolated on the stage, because the actor has become the intermediary between the music and the inanimate part of the stage production ...
But, one will ask how can the actor's gestures and movements on their own determine the arrangement of the setting?...
The inanimate elements of the production (which comprise everything except the actors) can be reduces to three; lighting, the physical arrangement of the setting on the stage, and scene painting. How are these related to each other?
Painted scenery has to be set, up in order to be effectively lit; this spatial arrangement therefore serves as an intermediary between painting and lighting. The lighting is required to make the painted setting visible, otherwise its spatial arrangement is entirely random; nor can lighting ignore the painting in favor of the spatial layout, since its whole purpose is to illuminate the painted canvases and thereby justify their placements in terms of the settings they are meant to represent ... Lighting and painting on flats are two elements which, far from complementing each other through mutual subordination, in fact are entirely incompatible. The layout of painted flats to represent the setting requires that lighting be entirely at its service in order to make visible the painting; a relationship which is entirely distinct from the active role of lighting and in total conflict with it. Because it is three-dimensional, the spatial arrangement allows light to exercise a small part of its active function, but only at the expense of the two-dimensional painted flats. When we bring the actor onto the stage, the importance of the painting is at once entirely subordinated to the lighting and the spatial layout, since the living form of the actor can have no contact and consequently no direct relationship with what is depicted on the canvas.
Of the three elements of production, painting is unquestionably the one controlled by the narrowest conventions. It cannot on its own display any living or expressive reality, and to the extent that the other elements of the setting play an active role in the production, its power of representation diminishes; that is, to the extent that lighting and the spatial arrangement are integrated with the actor. Lighting and spatial arrangement are therefore more expressive than painting, and lighting, apart from its obvious role of basic illumination, is the most expressive. This is because it is subject to few conventions, is unobtrusive, and is able therefore to communicate external life in its most expressive form ...
page 55 (Appia: Texts on the Reform of Theatrical Production)
Everyone has noted that a stage setting works simultaneously in three ways as we view it: 1) the ground level of the setting, that portion sitting on the floor of the stage or upon platforms which raise its level; 2) the central, vertical section; 3) the borders and backcloths that close off the height and depth of the stage and mask the lights.
[...]
Unfortunately the area used by the actor is not at the center of the setting ... he is forced to conduct his dramatic activity in that part of the setting where scenic illusion is at a minimum. The physical reality of this or that flat or drop is exposed by the entrance of the actor ... Obviously, the better the flat is painted with regard to the illusion, the less the actor ... will blend with it, since none of his moves will fit in with the place and objects depicted on the scenery … The actor therefore is directly subservient to the inanimate setting. The place for the action is realised in one manner, the action itself in another; the two modes come into contact, but are utterly disparate. The inanimate setting is like a coloured engraving, and the actor merely the caption at the bottom of the page ...
page 57 (Appia: Texts on the Reform of Theatrical Production)
When a scene painter undertakes to transform a particular picture into a stage setting, he instinctively tries to reduce to the point of absurdity all the solid forms in favour of artificial ones. For him, the only real difference between the picture in its frame and the same picture on stage is that the latter has to provide a place for those inconvenient things called actors ... His problem is to supply this necessary place while disrupting the picture as little as possible; the designer does this by breaking his picture into bits to be displayed in the space facing the audience; the actor will then attempt to maneuver amongst these slices of painting, while performing the basic requirements of his role satisfactorily. The backdrop therefore is the only part of the setting that does not entail a miserable compromise, since only it can display a complete painting to the audience without doing violence to the actual space which ultimately forms the setting ... the rest of the set as a whole is nothing but an arrangement - often undoubtedly an ingenious one - of bits of painted canvas each partly overlapping the other ...
page 69 (Appia)
We can take for example, the second act of Siegfried. How are we to represent a forest on the stage?... In order to create our setting, we need not visualise a forest, but we must represent in great detail the entire range of events that occur in this forest ... [The stage director] will think of the forest as a particular atmosphere encompassing the actors, an atmosphere which can only be achieved in relation to the living and moving beings on whom therefore, he must concentrate ... the production thereby become the compostion of a picture in time ... we shall no longer attempt to give the illusion of a forest but instead the illusion of a man in the atmosphere of a forest.
page 73/74 (Beacham)
Help came the following year, 1906, when Appia first encountered Emile Jaques-Dalcroze and the system of rhythmic exercises which he devised and taught, eurhythmics. Dalcroze had developed his theories and the exercises contingent upon them over several years whilst working as an instructor in music at Geneva, where he taught harmony. He discovered in his pupils difficulties 'which result from insufficient coordination between the mental picture of a movement and its performance by the body. Gradually he composed first 'gesture songs’ which used physical movement to accompany short pieces of music, and later an entire set of exercises designed to create simultaneously greater muscular and nervous coordination and a keener sensitivity to musical rhythm and tempo. To do this, it was necessary to enhance not only his pupils' perception of musical nuance, but their awareness of the responsive movement of the body in space as well.
In effect, he taught his pupils to translate musical composition directly into space through the reactive medium of their own bodies. Bodily movement and mental perception had to be integrated and harmonised to respond to music and the exercises trained students until this occurred almost automatically.
page 79 (Beacham)
In the spring of 1909 Appia created about twenty designs which he termed 'Rhythmic Spaces' and submitted them to Dalcroze who received them with great excitement. Appia perceived that the way to bring these settings to life was by contrasting them with the human body. Their rigidity, sharp lines and angles, and immobility, when confronted by the softness, subtlety and movement of the body, would, by opposition, take on a kind of borrowed life. The spectator himself could imaginatively sense the designs' physical quality as the body of the performer moved amongst them; and, moreover, because of the qualities of architectural harmony and proportion with which Appia imbued them, though lacking any element of time or movement themselves, as the eye surveyed them they could nevertheless visually provide a strong sense of rhythm.
These designs, moreover, suggested far more than merely a series of settings for eurhythmic exercises: they could help clarify the relationship between music, time, space and movement and, ultimately, revolutionise stage performance and design. Appia and Dalcroze worked together with growing conviction to develop spaces which successfully embodied this relationship.
page 82/83 (Beacham)
Appia had for some time envisaged a building which would help abolish what, increasingly, he considered to be the unacceptable distinction between spectator and performer. For this to take place, he needed an entirely new theatrical architecture, and at Hellerau he achieved it for the first time. As the central and largest room in the Institute, he designed a great open hall, fifty metres in length, sixteen metres wide, and twelve metres high, which would enclose both performers and audience without any barrier or obstacle between them. The orchestra and its light were also hidden from view. Thus he abolished the proscenium arch and raised stage, using a completely open performance area for the first time since the Renaissance. This critical step had been anticipated by his earlier theory, and it was constantly reinforced and substantiated by everything he did or wrote afterwards. For Appia it was not merely a practical step, but a deeply philosophical and social gesture as well, since it implied a wholly different attitude towards the function of art and the way in which men respond to it. Indeed, it predicated a new definition of art itself. Henceforth, everything which Appia wrote was based upon a fundamental and irreversible change in attitude. Art was not to be contemplated passively, but engaged in actively. Theatre was not an illusion which one observed, but a real event which one experienced. The attitude and habit of being an 'eternal spectator' were to be transformed by every available artistic means of expression into a new and dynamic perception of art as immanent with in the life and experience of everyone.
page 115 (Appia: Ideas on a Reform of Our Mise en Scène)
Our current stage setting is entirely the slave of painting (scenic painting), which pretends to produce for us an illusion of reality. But this illusion is itself an illusion, because the presence of the actor contradicts it. In fact, the principle of illusion produced by paintings on vertical flats, and the illusion produced by the three-dimensional and living body of the actor are entirely contradictory. Developing the effects of these two illusions in isolation as is done on our stages, cannot achieve an integrated and artistic production.
Let us examine current staging practice in the light of these two approaches.
It is impossible to locate real trees, real houses, and the like on our stages, nor would it be very desirable. We suppose that all we can do is to imitate reality as faithfully as possible. But the creation of three-dimensional objects is difficult, often impossible, and in any case, quite expensive. One might suppose that this would force us to reduce the number of objects to be shown; our stage directors think otherwise: they believe the stage must present everything that seems appropriate and consequently, anything that can’t be created in solid form must be painted …
The essential principle of painting, however, is to reduce everything to a flat surface; how then can it fill a space - the stage - which has three dimensions? Without resolving this problem, they cut up the paintings and spread them around on the floor of the stage. The lowest section of the setting is not painted; if the scene depicts a landscape, for example, the upper section will be a green canopy, to the right and left will be trees, upstage an horizon and sky, and the floor, bare boards...
Therefor the floor is not actually part of the picture; yet this is the very place where the actor moves! Our directors have forgotten the actor; Hamlet without Hamlet, again! Will they not sacrifice a bit of the dead painting in favour of the living and moving body? Never! They would rather renounce the theatre!...
page 119 (Appia: Theatrical Experiences and Personal Investigations)
DaIcroze invited me in the spring of 1909 to view a production he had carefully organised using his own music, costumes, coloured light, etc, I left the performance feeling depressed, and ... seizing paper and pencils I designed feverishly, each day, two or three space designs intended for rhythmic movement. When I had about twenty I submitted them to Dalcroze with a note explaining that his pupils were constantly moving on a flat surface ... My designs caused great enthusiasm … This is how the style of space appropriate for the rhythmic movement of the body was first formulated ...
I shall call this corporeal space, which becomes living space, once the body animates it ... Whereas, earlier in the case of Wagner, I had based my design on the performer, now lacking a score, I thought I could begin with space itself, but I failed miserably. FinalIy I understood! If I lacked a score, I at least had the living body ... This conclusion liberated me … Wherever the pencil touched the paper it evoked the naked body, the naked limbs. The active role of light developed naturally from a spatial arrangement which demanded it, and everything thereby took on the appearance of expectancy: the nature of the space made the presence of the body indispensable ...
page 133 (Appia: Concerning the Costumes for Eurhythmics)
… with the inauguration of the Institute in Dresden, the black tights in one piece were adopted, which provided the minimum of clothes, both for men and women; black was chosen to avoid any expression of the usual diversity of individual taste and on the contrary, to give this simple costume the impersonal I might say, austere quality necessary for the exercise.'
A woman wrote recently to Jaques-Dalcroze on this subject: 'The short period when one is free of all those distracting clothes, when one can move one's limbs to the heart's desire, unhindered by the black tights, when one becomes aware of strength and space, of line and movement according to the laws of Nature, this period gives me a feeling of being at one with the Universe, of expressing life not in accord with human laws, but with divine commandment.'
[...]
The study of bodily rhythm makes one acutely sensitive to the dimensions of Space: The study of Space will therefore form part of the Institute's curriculum. Space must include simple and flat surfaces, as well as obstacles designed to make the body aware of its balance and subtlety - the infinite possibilities of its expressive power - such as different kinds of stairs, platforms, ramps, wall, pillars, etc. But with so active a role, in order to manifest itself clearly to the body, Space requires the appropriate light, and the body, engaging with that light, in order to receive and make the most of its potential, requires all the resources of three-dimensional space.
page 216 (Appia: Living Art or Dead Nature)
Since the importance - and therefore the expression - of such spaces dependent upon the moving presence of the actor, simple sketches or models will give one the strong impression of being incomplete, and awaken desire in the visitor for the presence of the living body which alone has motivated them ... So the settings should include their natural complement, which is movement.
It therefore follows that a comprehensive theatre exhibition should show on the one hand the spaces designed for movement, and on the other, the movement that inspired and shaped those spaces. One without the other is incomplete. But movement and space juxtaposed are not yet theatre ...
The visitor, surprised by the display of lifeless spaces, feels the beneficial need for them to be filled, and this sense of emptiness is the beginning of wisdom! He needs to be forced to experience this. Then, once the movement of the performers lends life to these spaces, and when they fuse before the visitor's eyes into a living synthesis, his doubt and former prejudice will be dispelled ...
In my book The Work of Living Art, I examined the type of structure required for space if it is to be employed for the form and movement of the living person, and I concluded that space does not share the life of the body by assuming its form, but, on the contrary, by opposing it. To accomplish this spatial composition employs only a few lines. These are the horizontal, the vertical, the oblique, and various combinations, such as a staircase that provides the body with a type of support that no other combination can rival. This simplicity allows the material to be handled easily. There will be modules of different sizes constructed carefully to allow them to be combined and joined to make staircases, platforms and ramps, supported, if required, by pillars located evenly at right angles; perpendicular curtains, screens, etc.; a quite elaborate set of components based on right angled forms in opposition to the rounded shape of the body, and the curved lines of its movements. Such modules can be shifted manually by an intelligent and properly trained stage-hand. I should add. that the demonstration will be all the more effective if colour and costume are kept plain so that space and movement can be emphasised on their own without the distractions of essentially minor elements. The modules are covered in canvas; the costumes are simple, either black tights which leave the neck arms legs and feet bare ... or a short tunic over the tights. During these demonstrations light comes entirely from above in order to reveal clearly the forms of the body in motion and the three-dimensional nature of the setting. No footlights, ever! …. These solid pieces should be shifted in full view of the spectator; no curtain is required, since we seek to demonstrate, not conceal …
Halls created for such synthesis will be a place for experimental investigation; the art of staging will never cease being empirical … The exhibition of such experiments will certainly encourage [playwrights] to take part and from there a productive understanding with the audience is only a step away! The theatre exhibition will have become a living organism.
page 275 (Appia: The Work of Living Art)
For the sake of simplicity we have thus far always referred simply to 'the body'; we have placed it in isolation in an undefined space. Obviously it is the idea of the living body that we have therefore deemed to be the essential element. It is clear that in attempting to practice living art, one finds oneself in the midst of bodies - including one's own - and that if this art is created by the body, the artist in possession of the idea of the living body implicitly possesses all these bodies. Consequently he works, as it were, with the life that he creates - with the life of living beings whose collaboration is essential if he is not to create mere marionettes. The idea of collaboration therefore, is implicit in the idea of living art ... Living art is social; it is in its very essence, the social art ... This is simply repeating that living art will be the result of a discipline - a collective discipline which, although it may not affect all bodies, will at least affect all minds, by awakening a bodily sensibility. And just as the idea of the body - the ideal body, if I may so define it - has proved that its reality is aesthetically possible and desirable, so the idea of a bodily sensibility will be able to guide and orient those who have not yet actually experienced plastic movement ... In living art ... the forces employed by those engaged in bodily exercises will be automatically transfused into the responsive organisms of others, thereby producing a bodily awareness that they would themselves be hard-pressed to achieve on their own ...
page 287 (Appia)
... my structure will be architectural only in its function; its monumental quality will thus remain minimal both now and in the future. This is desirable. The people must receive the strong, unforgettable impression that they, their living bodies, are creating and defining the space. The living body must feel able freely to modify at will the actual space and its limits. The crux of the issue thus consists in fully preserving an ideal flexibility in a building, which, nevertheless, must awaken a sense of strength and permanence. I am confident the solution is possible.
page 289 (Appia: The Art of the Living Theatre)
Once an author has completed his play, what element does he deem essential for its enactment? The actors, of course. Without actors there can be no action, thus no performance, thus no play - except on our bookshelves ... In space which is 'without form and void' the actor represents three-dimensionality; he is plastic and therefore occupies a fragment of space upon which he imposes his form. But the actor is not a statue; he is plastic, but also alive, and he expresses his life through movement; he possesses space not just through his mass, but also by his movement within it. His body, isolated in limitless space, measures that space through gestures and movements ... remove him, and space once more becomes undefined and
elusive. In this sense his body creates space.
