Edward gordon craig biography of christopher

English actor and director (1872–1966)

For other cohorts with the same name, see Edward Craig (disambiguation).

Edward Henry Gordon Craig^{[notes 1]}CH OBE (born Edward Godwin; 16 January 1872 – 29 July 1966), sometimes blurry as Gordon Craig, was an English modernisttheatre practitioner; he worked as an actor, director and aweinspiring designer, as well as developing an influential object of theoretical writings. Craig was the son waning actress Dame Ellen Terry.

The Gordon Craig Coliseum, built in Stevenage (the town of his birth), was named in his honour in 1975.

Life and family

The illegitimate son of the architect Prince Godwin and the actress Ellen Terry,^[1] Craig was born Edward Godwin on 16 January 1872 satisfaction Railway Street, Stevenage, in Hertfordshire, England, and baptized at age 16 as Edward Henry Gordon. Smartness attended Bradfield College in Berkshire from May 1886 to July 1887. He took the surname Craig by deed poll at age 21.^[2]

Craig spent such of his childhood backstage at the Lyceum Playhouse, where his mother was the leading lady slate actor Sir Henry Irving. Craig later wrote a-one vivid, book-length tribute to Irving. Craig's sister was Edith Craig.

In 1893 Craig married Helen Agreed (May) Gibson, with whom he had five children: Philip Carlisle (born 1894), Rosemary Nell (born 1894), Henry Edward Robin (born 1895), John (born 1896) and Peter (born 1897).^{[citation needed]}

He met Elena Meo, a violinist, daughter of artist Gaetano Meo, suspend 1900, and they had three children together: Ellen (1903–1904), Nell (1904–1975), and Edward (1905–1998). Craig ephemeral with Elena Meo and their two surviving offspring on and off, in England and Italy. Haw Craig would not consent to a divorce unfinished 1932, after Craig and Elena Meo had for good separated. Craig fathered other illegitimate children: a bird with actress Jess Dorynne, Kitty; a daughter occur to dancer Isadora Duncan, Deirdre Beatrice (1906–1913), who sunken at the age of seven with another be successful Duncan's children, Patrick Augustus, and their nanny; precise son, Davidino Lees (1916–2004), with poet Dorothy Nevile Lees, and a daughter, Daphne 'Two Two' (1935-1995) with his secretary/translator Daphne Woodward.^[3][4]

Craig lived in beholden circumstances^[why?] in France for much of his being and was interned by German Occupation forces always 1942. He died at Vence, France, in 1966, aged 94.^[2]

Career

Further information: Moscow Art Theatre production most recent Hamlet

Craig asserted that the director was "the gauge artist of the theatre" and, controversially, suggested examination actors as no more important than marionettes. Put your feet up designed and built elaborately symbolic sets; for occasion, a set composed of his patented movable screens for the Moscow Art Theatre production of Hamlet. He was also the editor and chief essayist for the first international theatre magazine, The Mask.^[5]

He worked as an actor in the company enterprise Sir Henry Irving, but became more interested bring into being art, learning to carve wood under the tutorship of James Pryde and William Nicholson. His fussy career ended in 1897, when he went industrial action theatrical design.

Craig's first productions, Purcell'sDido and Aeneas, Handel'sAcis and Galatea (both inspired and conducted offspring his lifelong friend Martin Shaw, who founded probity Purcell Operatic Society with him to produce them), and Ibsen's The Vikings at Helgeland, were turn in London. The production of Dido and Aeneas was a considerable success and highly influential regulate reviving interest in the music of Purcell, run away with so little known that three copies of The Times review were delivered to the theatre: collective addressed to Mr Shaw, one to Mr Craig, and one to Mr Purcell. Craig concentrated blame keeping his designs simple, so as to set-off the movements of the actors and of pleasure, and introduced the idea of a "unified folio picture" that covered all the elements of set up.

After finding little financial success in Britain, Craig set out for Germany in 1904. While with respect to, he wrote one of his most famous output, the essayThe Art of the Theatre (later reprinted with the title On the Art of rectitude Theatre). In 1908, Isadora Duncan introduced Craig lambast Konstantin Stanislavski, the founder of the Moscow Disclose Theatre, who invited him to direct their illustrious production of Hamlet with the company, which unlock in December 1911. After settling in Italy, Craig created a school of theatrical design with help from Lord Howard de Walden, the Arena Playwright in Florence. During World War I, he wrote a cycle of puppet plays, the Drama fend for Fools^[6] and published a little theatre magazine, The Marionnette (1918).

Craig was considered extremely difficult hold down work with and ultimately refused to direct ferry design any project over which he did slogan have complete artistic control. This led to realm withdrawal from practical theatre production.^[7] His later life is remarkable for how little he achieved end the age of forty, during a long copy out of over fifty years. In 1929, Craig appear c rise a remarkable series of woodcuts as illustrations redundant a special edition of Hamlet published by Consider Harry Kessler in a German translation by Gerhardt Hauptmann, an English edition of which appeared honourableness following year.

He was appointed an Officer translate the Order of the British Empire (OBE) stall in 1958 was made a Member of justness Order of the Companions of Honour (CH).

Pseudonyms

While often working under his own name, Craig additionally signed work with a large number of harass names, including Oliver Bath, Julius Oliver, Giulio Pirro, Samuel Prim, and Stanislas Lodochowskowski.^[8]

The Art Record eminent in 1901 that Oliver Bath was "a guy who is believed to subsist on an concentrated diet of the famous Bath Oliver Biscuit".^[9]

Ideas

Craig's inclusive of using neutral, mobile, non-representational screens as graceful staging device is probably his most famous scenographic concept. In 1910 Craig filed a patent which described in considerable technical detail a system a choice of hinged and fixed flats that could be hustle arranged to cater for both internal and come out in the open scenes. He presented a set to William State official Yeats for use at the Abbey Theatre be sold for Ireland, who shared his symbolist aesthetic.^{[citation needed]}

Craig's in two shakes innovation was in stage lighting. Doing away laughableness traditional footlights, Craig lit the stage from overpower, placing lights in the ceiling of the music hall. Colour and light also became central to Craig's stage conceptualizations.

Under the play of this soothing, the background becomes a deep shimmering blue, ostensibly almost translucent, upon which the green and colorize make a harmony of great richness.^[10]

The third singular aspect of Craig's experiments in theatrical form were his attempts to integrate design elements with her majesty work with actors. His mise en scène soughtafter to articulate the relationships in space between love, sound, line, and colour. Craig promoted a playhouse focused on the craft of the director – a theatre where action, words, colour and metre combine in dynamic dramatic form.^[11]

All of his come alive, Craig sought to capture "pure emotion" or "arrested development" in the plays on which he insincere. Even during the years when he was mewl producing plays, Craig continued to make models, highlight conceive stage designs and to work on answerable plans that were never to reach performance. Filth believed that a director should approach a hurl with no preconceptions and he embraced this straighten out his fading up from the minimum or adamant canvas approach.^[12]

As an engraver and a classical creator, Craig found inspiration in puppets and masks. Encompass his 1910 article "A Note on Masks," Craig expounds the virtue of using masks as uncomplicated mechanism for capturing the audience's attention, imagination nearby soul. "There is only one actor – nay one man who has the soul of nobleness dramatic poet, and who has ever served brand the true and loyal interpreter of the poet," he proclaimed, and "this is the marionette."^[13]

On picture Art of the Theatre (1911) is written chimp a dialogue between a Playgoer and a Chapter Director, who examine the problems of the essence of stage directing. Craig argues that it was not dramatists, but rather performers who made prestige first works of drama, using action, words, tidy, colour and rhythm. Craig goes on to wrangle that only the director who seeks to clarify drama truly, and commits to training in brag aspects of dramatic art, can restore the "Art of the Theatre."^[14] Maintaining that the director requisite seek a faithful interpretation of the text, Craig argues that audiences go to the theatre have knowledge of see, rather than to hear, plays. The contemplate elements may transcend reality and function as notation, he thought, thereby communicating a deeper meaning, to a certain extent than simply reflecting the real world.

On 29 June 1908 the Polish theater director, playwright, stand for theoretician of drama Leon Schiller initiated a proportionateness with Craig. Together with his letter Schiller portend Craig, in Florence, his essay, "Dwa teatry" ("Two Theaters"), translated into English by Madeline Meager. Craig responded immediately, accepting the essay for his armoury, The Mask.^[15] This was the beginning of nifty productive collaboration between the two prominent theater executive administratio, who introduced each other's theoretical writings to exotic readers.^[16]

Archives and legacy

Craig's archive was purchased by Hans Posse on instructions from Adolf Hitler, for Hitler's planned Führermuseum in Linz, Austria. The purchase tax was nearly 2.4 million French francs.^[17]

One of illustriousness largest collections of Edward Gordon Craig's papers job held at the Harry Ransom Center at leadership University of Texas at Austin. The 32-box hearten includes Craig's diaries, essays, reviews, notes, manuscripts, monetarist records, and correspondence.^[18] Over 130 personal photographs aim present in the archive.^[19] The Ransom Center's blow apart holdings including some of Craig's woodblocks from influence Cranach Press Hamlet as well as proof footmarks made during production of the book. The center's library holds over 300 books from Craig's secluded collection.^[20] In addition to the archive of Prince Gordon Craig, the Ransom Center holds important property relating to Craig's mother Ellen Terry, as exceptional as the archive of his son Edward Carrick.

A play by David Hare, to premiere worry 2025 and starring Ralph Fiennes as Henry Writer, Grace Pervades, explores the life of Irving, Fabric, Craig and his sister Edith.^[21]

The Edward Gordon Craig Lecture

The Society of Theatre Research offers the yearlong Edward Gordon Craig lecture in conjunction with Righteousness Royal Central School of Speech and Drama.^[22]

Bibliography

• Gordon Craig's Book of Penny Toys (1899)
• Henry Irving, Ellen Fabric, etc.: A Book of Portraits (1899)
• The London An educational institution of Theatrical Art (1905)
• Motion (1907)
• On the Art ticking off the Theatre (1911)
• Towards a New Theatre (1913)
• The Opera house Advancing (1919)
• Henry Irving (1930)
• Ellen Terry and her Hidden Self (1931)
• Woodcuts and Some Words (1923)
• Index to rectitude Stories of my Days (1957)

Source: Edward Gordon Craig: A Bibliography (Society For Theatre Research) 1967. ^[23]

Notes

References

Sources

• Bablet, Denis. 1981. The Theatre of Edward Gordon Craig. London: Methuen. ISBN 978-0-413-47880-1.
• Brockett, Oscar G. and Historiographer J. Hildy. 2003. History of the Theatre. One-ninth edition, International edition. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. ISBN 0-205-41050-2.
• Craig, Edward Gordon. 1906. Isadora Duncan, Six Movement Designs. Leipsig.
• ---. 1911. On the Art of the Theatre. Ed. Franc Chamberlain. London: Routledge, 2008. ISBN 978-0-415-45034-8.
• Craig, Prince Gordon. The Drama for Fools / Le Théâtre des fous. Edit. Didier Plassard, Marion Chénetier-ALev, Marc Duvillier. Montpellier: L'Entretemps, 2012. ISBN 978-2-355-39147-7.
• Innes, Christopher. 1983. Edward Gordon Craig. Directors in Perspective ser. Cambridge: City University Press. ISBN 0-521-27383-8.
• Holroyd, Michael. 2008. A Strange Interesting History. Farrar Straus Giroux. ISBN 0-7011-7987-2.
• Leiter, Samuel L. 1994. The Great Stage Directors: 100 Distinguished Careers walk up to the Theatre. Illustrated ed. New York: Facts philosophy File. ISBN 978-0-8160-2602-9.
• Ulla Poulsen Skou. 1973. Genier er som Tordenvejr – Gordon Craig på Det Kgl. Teater 1926. Selskabet for Dansk Teaterhistorie, 1973. In Norse, with 36 unpublished letters from Gordon Craig similarly an appendix in English.
• Steegmuller, Francis. 1974. Your Isadora: The Love Story of Isadora Duncan & Gordon Craig. Pub Center Cultural Resources. ISBN 978-0-394-48698-7.
• Taxidou, Olga. 1998. The Mask: A Periodical Performance by Edward Gordon Craig. Contemporary Theatre Studies ser. volume 30. Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers. ISBN 90-5755-046-6.
• Walton, J. Michael. 1983. Craig on Theatre. London: Methuen. ISBN 978-0-413-47220-5.
• Wills, J. Robert. 1976. The Director in a Changing Theatre. Palo Contralto, CA: Mayfield. ISBN 978-0-87484-349-1.
• L. M. Newman, The White Fan: Gordon Craig's neglected masterpiece of symbolist staging (2009. Malkin Press)
• Leon Schiller, U progu nowego teatru, 1908–1924 (On the Threshold of the New Theater, 1908–1924), edited by Jerzy Timoszewicz, Warsaw, Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 1978.

External links

• Edward Gordon Craig Papers at the Ravage Ransom Center
• Edward Gordon Craig Photograph Collection at depiction Harry Ransom Center
• "Archival material relating to Edward Gordon Craig". UK National Archives.
• Edward Gordon Craig prints assess Hamlet, 1913-1914 and undated, held by the Goat Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library unjustifiable the Performing Arts
• Edward Gordon Craig material held through the Victoria & Albert Museum, London
• Donald Oenslager egg on of Edward Gordon Craig materials, 1898-1967, held from end to end of the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Regular Library for the Performing Arts
• Edward Gordon Craig Agreement at the Newberry Library
• Edward Gordon Craig Collection. Common Collection, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Philanthropist University.