| Abstrakt: |
Despite turning professional in the first decade of the 20th century, the material and practical capabilities of Estonian theatres initially remained modest. This hindered the development of stage design - a field dependent on the creative ideas of artists as well as on technical resources. The stage designs that used stock scenery, were stylistically uneven and often not suitable for a play's material, received criticism from viewers-critics who were familiar with the modern developments in European and Russian theatre, especially from the members of the group Young Estonia. While Estonian artists were already familiar with the avantgarde trends in the European, and specifically German cultural life prior to WWI, in Estonian theatres expressionism appeared in the 1920s, both in terms of ideas, ideals and stylistic methods. Larger theatres were able to refresh their theatrical language with the expressionist, stylised acting methods and new visual and scenographical solutions. The stage designer for Estonia Theatre's innovative productions was Peet Aren, who had already established himself as an expressionist artist by the 1920s. On the stage, he also realised his unique artistic style: by luxated perspectives, deformed shapes, excessive colourfulness and playfulness. The ideological plane of expressionism was central in Morning Theatre (Hommikteater), active in Tallinn in 1921-1924. Morning Theatre's troupe of amateurs under the direction of the visionary August Bachmann brought out three plays which were expressionist in their message and style. Although in theatre history the stage designs of Morning Theatre have been associated with Peet Aren, the study of original sketches in the archive of the Estonian Theatre and Music Museum confirms that the author of Morning Theatre's stage designs was artist Aleksander Möldroo, a representative of the more powerful and robust style of expressionism. With Morning Theatre's laconic, stylised scenography, Estonian stage design made an important developmental leap from commonplace stage design towards a theatrically conditional and artistic stage décor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
