THR 150 Theatrical Design Foundations
THR 150 – Theatrical Design Foundations
Instructor: Brad G. Graham
Winter 2019
Katherina Stegerman
Course Grades Total Grade Your Grade Worth to Final
Attendance & Participation 10% 90% 9%
Positive Professional Attitude 10% 85% 8.5%
Homework/Assignments (30%)
Goblet of Fire 15% 85% 12.8%
Patsy Cline 15% 80% 12%
Projects (2) (50%)
Hedges 25% 90% 22.5%
Othello 25% 95% 23.8%
TOTALS 100% Average – 88% Final Grade: 89%
Instructor Comments:
I’d anticipated some very strong and unique work from Katherina in the realm of costume
design in this course, but was also charmed by the scenic design work she provided and her
growing sense of imbedded imagery and symbolism through the time we worked together. It
was really great to get to see and hear some of her ideas about costume design and rendering
practices and understand some of the background she has in that area.
The early painted costume sketches and renderings she presented, especially the ones for
Hedges, but for a few of the projects along the way, displayed her really beautiful, artful style
and I was really impressed with them.
It may be a function of the way she is learning to digitally render, or the process she is
working through in terms of her growing design abilities, but through much of the design work
she did, especially the sets rendered on computer, there was a crispness that occasionally felt inorganic
and too clean or tidy to feel real. While I also saw her fighting against that in strategic
ways, I felt like it was worth mentioning that consideration to keep her thinking about ways to let
natural lines and textures interrupt the precision that a digital image tends towards.
The first thing to remark on about the Othello design was that there was a real keenness
to how Katherina formatted her final design presentation materials. Her framing and nameplate
detail was really professionally executed and I was impressed by the classiness she added to
what were already very solid costume and set renderings. She created characters with style and
character who would fit well into both the world of the play and the world of the scenic design.
Great work in this class Katherina – I look forward to seeing how your style continues to grow in
this field!
Thoughts: This class helped me begin to apply my design training to theatre and helped me find my confidence and artistic voice as a designer. It was also my first foray into set design.