Tag: commedia dell’arte

Project Update 2: A Universal Feeling

Posted on by tony in Collaboration, exhibits, Uncategorized

After a 18 months of planning and working, you can finally come see the first showing of A Universal Feeling! The exhibition opens as a part of my larger exhibit, Reveal/Conceal: The Transformative Masks of Tony Fuemmeler.

  • 5:00–8:00 pm, Friday, November 8
  • Grand Lobby,  Chehalem Cultural Center  (415 E Sheridan St, Newberg, OR)

There will be live, masked-musicians, masked performers and the opportunity to try on some masks. You can also meet some of my local collaborators for Universal Feeling, AND some other mask-makers!

That’s right— the Chehalem Cultural Center will also feature a group exhibit of even more mask makers: Rachel Mulder, Nathan Tanner, Faerin Millington, Kris Musser!

This event is FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. Wine and light refreshments provided. See the FB Event Page Here.

The exhibition will run from November 5–January 3.

I’ve included a few of my masks here, as well as some mashups of the work of my collaborators. Come see the show to see the complete works!

Tutti piani

Posted on by tony in Aesthetic Theory, Creation Process, Italy, Sartori, Travel Adventures

 

Welcome to my first blog from Italia. In short, it’s amazing! The study is engrossing, the people wonderful, a wine costs just a couple euro.Because of difficultly in previous years of the workshop, we aren’t allowed to take many pictures during the workshop, so instead of lots of mask process photos, you’ll enjoy shots of everyday life, gorgeous scenery, and lovely people. I’m sharing a flat for the month with another student from New York, and across the hall are wonderful artists from Firenze and Toronto. There are also more students from Italy, Spain, Mexico and the US.

<INTERPOLATION> Why do cities names changes in different languages?  As in, why do we call Firenze “Florence”? It’s a proper name, not a random vocabulary word. Or  why do we call Venezia, “Venice”?or  Deutschland ,”Germany”? or Nippon “Japan”? I can imagine changing the spelling in your language to make the same sounds, but actually changing the name? It makes more sense to me to call places what they call themselves, but that’s not how languages and culture work apparently. Or is it? After briefly searching the internet, the reason for difference between endonyms (what you call yourself) and exonyms (what others call you) often stem from the evolution of language itself.  Firenze is the Italian derivation of the Latin Florentia, but Florence was the English derivation, and Florenz the German. So maybe we did try the spelling trick way back when, but the world changed and language didn’t. Still, why can’t we be on the same page about this?  </INTERPOLATION>

As I said, the work is interesting and challenging. There is often an interpreter, and when there is not, many  of the students are multilingual—so the ideas aren’t too difficult to grasp.  You can really see and feel the inheritance of trained sculptors in this work. It’s not just actors who make masks—it’s artists who bring their knowledge of materials, sculpting tools and processes and strong visual arts skills and concepts to the work of theatrical mask.

We have been doing studies in preparation for making  of the leather mask. The traditional forms didn’t use paint to help augment the shaping of light and form. Instead, they rely on the sculpting of panes in the mask to give a sense of volume and life to the performance object.

 

 

I find it really interesting to consider this idea. The planes reflect light. And the abstraction of the forms of a face into simpler planes also helps us project our own experience on to the mask. Puppets can work in much the same way. In Understanding Comics, the artist Scott McCloud noted that as a face is rendered in increasingly specific detail, the easier it is to regard that face as something outside of ourselves. But as a face is simplified in its depiction, the easier it is for the viewer to regard it with a feeling of identification… it becomes more of an Everyperson.

So with these simplified planes, perhaps it becomes more possible for the actor and the audience, together, bring the object to life.

 

Christo’s Floating Piers at Lago d’Iseo— a mask of space?

 

 

Mask Making Workshop in Portland April 29–May 1

Posted on by tony in Workshops

 

Hello all! I’ve been  blog-silent, but studio-busy…  It’s been a great year of building shows, creating mask pieces for museums, selling masks at Mardi Gras, and making connections with mask lovers, performers and teachers all over. I’m pleased to announce another mask making workshop in Portland. See details below.

—Tony

Design, sculpt, cast and paint your own mask!

Find new sources of creative inspiration, learn about the qualities that promote dynamic onstage play, and discover techniques for shaping a well-engineered character mask. You will leave the workshop with a plaster cast of your face and one painted mask.

“This workshop was really fun and informative, great for a beginner. I’d take it again- Tony is a great teacher!” — 2015 Mask Workshop Participant

WHO:

This workshop is excellent for actors and performers, costume designers and mask enthusiasts at all levels of experience. Ages 18+

WHEN:

6–10 pm Friday, April 29

10am–7 pm Saturday, April 30

10am–7 pm Sunday, May 1

There will be an hour lunch break on Saturday and Sunday

 

WHY:

Masks are awesome! Though they obscure part or all of the face, masks reveal so much more. Masks are powerful objects that inspire character and transform the people that wear them. They have a part in nearly every culture of the world, they show up in holidays like Halloween and Mardi Gras, and they are one of the original elements of theater as we know it today.

 

“I’d never realized the depth of faces before. I’ve started noticing expressions in a 3D way, and also the amazing contours of different faces… I now feel confident in trying my hand at making masks- before I would’ve ended up wasting tons of time trying to figure out the basic, and now I have a cast of my face and some good principles.”—2015 Mask Workshop Participant

 

WHERE:

The Mask Studio, NE Portland

 

TUITION:

$300. Cost for materials is included. A $50 non-refundable deposit is required upon registration. Check, PayPal, Square, Chase QuickPay accepted.

If you register by Monday, April 18, secure the early-bird price of $275.

 

TO ENROLL: Email me at tony_fuemmeler@yahoo.com for more information and with any questions about the workshop.

 

ABOUT TONY:

Over the past 13 years, Tony Fuemmeler has designed masks for multiple productions on the

West Coast and across the country. Locally, he has designed and built masks for productions like the Drammy Award-winning The Snowstorm (Many Hats), The King Stag (Lewis and Clark College), The Velvet Sky, The Adding Machine (Theatre Vertigo), The Storm in the Barn (Oregon Children’s Theatre), and Alice in Wonderland (Nomadic Theatre).

Tony began working with masks at the University of Kansas in a production of Dario Fo’s Accidental Death of an Anarchist. After graduation, he spent a year with In The Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre (Minneapolis), and then pursued further training with Bruce Marrs and Joan Schirle at the Dell’Arte International School (Blue Lake, California). In 2014, Tony traveled to Ubud, Bali, to study with master mask carver Nyoman Setiawan, and then to Mumbai, India as a volunteer mask maker for The Maya Project (a collaboration of Teach For India and Artists Striving to End Poverty). Tony is based in Portland, Oregon.

 

Web: www.tonyfuemmeler.com

Instagram: make_those_faces