• Louis Jean Desprez (draughtsman)

Design for a Stage Set

late 18th century

- This drawing is typical of Desprez's designs for flat-wing stage sets. Flanking what would have been a large painted canvas set at the back of the stage (here decorated with antique buildings on the slope of a hill) are two rows of façades receding into the distance. These buildings were painted on a series of wooden wings placed in grooves or runners at intervals on each side of the stage. In more elaborate theatres, the wings attached directly to machinery housed below the stage. The wings could be moved easily in these runners, either manually or mechanically, thus facilitating swift changed of scenery. Desprez's use of the flat wing system may still be seen, in a number of stage sets, executed after his designs, that survive in the theatre in Drottingholm (see plates IX and X in M. Baur-Heinhold, 'Teatro Barocco', Munich, 1971)

• dessin de présentation

Pen and brown ink and grey and brown washes with watercolour and gouache

sheet: 37.3 x 53.2 cm

DR1987:0070

• finished drawing

• perspective drawing
• pictorial drawing

• design de théâtre

• theatre design