Scenic arts personal statement example

Why do you want to study this course or subject?

The first time I saw a set being struck, I was more interested in the dismantling than the play. It was a college production of The Crucible, and once the lights came up I could see that the heavy oak panelling was painted hardboard, the floor was scuffed ply, and the whole convincing world of it weighed almost nothing. I had spent weeks helping to paint those panels, dry-brushing grain onto flat surfaces, and seeing them carried off in sections taught me something about how theatre works: an audience will accept a suggestion if it is made confidently and in the right light. I want to study scenic arts because I want to be one of the people making those suggestions properly, with real skill behind them rather than guesswork and enthusiasm. What draws me is the combination of craft and problem-solving. A set has to serve a director's reading of a text, survive being moved twice a night, fit through a particular door, and read correctly from row F as well as row A. I enjoy that these requirements pull against each other. I am also interested in scenic painting as a discipline in its own right: the way marble, stone, rust and timber can be built up in layers of glaze and spatter, and how much of it depends on understanding what an audience expects to see rather than what is actually there. Studying this formally would give me the drawing, drafting, model-making and materials knowledge I currently lack, along with the workshop practice and safety training that a hobbyist cannot pick up alone. In the longer term I would like to work in scenic art or set construction in regional theatre, where budgets are tight and inventiveness matters.

How have your qualifications and studies helped you to prepare?

My A levels have each fed into this ambition in different ways. In Art and Design I have concentrated on constructed and three-dimensional work rather than painting on paper, and my current project examines domestic interiors as evidence of the people who live in them, which has meant making small room boxes, photographing them under raking light, and thinking about how objects carry a story without anyone explaining them. Design and Technology has been the most practically useful subject: I have learned to produce orthographic drawings, work to tolerances, and think about how a structure resists loads, and my coursework project was a collapsible market stall that had to be assembled by one person. Failing to account for the weight of the canopy taught me to test assumptions at full scale early. English Literature has changed how I look at a script. Studying A Streetcar Named Desire, I became interested in how much of the atmosphere Williams places in the stage directions, and in how a designer might handle the walls becoming transparent rather than treating it as an inconvenience. I have started reading around the subject, including Pamela Howard's What is Scenography?, which made me think about design as something that emerges with a production rather than being decided beforehand. I also attended a free drawing workshop at a local gallery to improve my perspective, which was weaker than I had realised. Alongside my A levels I completed an online health and safety introduction, partly out of interest and partly because I wanted to understand the rules I was working under backstage.

What else have you done to prepare outside of education, and why are these experiences useful?

At college I have worked backstage on two productions, first as part of the paint crew and then as assistant stage manager for a devised piece. As ASM I kept the prop table, ran the book for two rehearsals when our SM was ill, and made a Victorian-looking hatbox out of an old shoebox, brown paper and shellac, which cost nothing and survived twelve performances. I also spend Thursday evenings with a community pantomime group in my town, mostly painting cloths, patching flats and repairing things that were built before I was born. Working with people who have done this for thirty years has taught me a lot about sequencing tasks so that paint has time to dry, and about being useful without being in the way. On Saturdays I work in a fabric and haberdashery shop. It sounds unrelated, but I now know how different weights of calico, hessian and velvet behave, how much a pattern repeat affects what you can cut from a length, and how to explain to a customer why the fabric they want will not do what they hope. Helping people plan projects within a budget has made me more realistic about materials than I would otherwise be. At home I look after my younger brother, who has additional needs, for a few hours most weekday afternoons. This has made me organised, because I plan my coursework around fixed times, and patient, because things often take three attempts. It has also made me notice how much he responds to texture, colour and sound in a space, which is not a bad thing for a designer to think about. I am used to committing to a schedule, working alongside people much older than me, and finishing things that are less glamorous than they looked at the start.

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