Glen Forrester

This concept for Black Medea is centered on the moral question the Chorus wishes to deliver to the audience, and focuses on an attempt to place the audience themselves at a similar level of narrative abstraction to the Chorus as outside forces surrounding the family’s drama. It is performed in the round with the family contained within a minimalist transparent enclosure representing the apartment. Actors do not enter or exit the enclosure, perhaps with the exception of Jason and the Child at the conclusion of the play, but rather move into shadow when not active in a scene. The Chorus and audience are free to circulate around the enclosure and view it through any side. As the audience moves they will observe that the enclosure’s windows are polarising, allowing them to see into but not through the apartment and obscuring the audience on other sides. Although the actors within are able to see outside, this may not be apparent to the audience initially, lending a voyeuristic sense to the experience.

The proposal was developed with digital techniques as a virtual lab for rapid prototyping of set elements, simulated materials, and lighting. Building an accurate 3D model of the Grant Street space allowed the fabrication of 3D printed models onto which texture and lights could be projection-mapped for transition sequences animated in real time.