Master in Stage Design and Art Direction

This module explores the historical origins of scenography, mapping the relationships between the current theatrical context and its evolution throughout different stages. We provide a solid foundation for interpreting images and consolidating personal references, as well as a critical look at the history of cinema and artistic direction.

The module delves into the interrelationship between stage and film language through the analysis of key works that blur the boundaries between the two media and introduces a decolonial perspective to question hegemonic narratives and neocolonial gestures present in both scenography and audiovisual production.

Theatrical Contexts
The methodology is based on a combination of direct experience, which takes the form of visits to different emblematic theatrical spaces in the city, encouraging students to conceive of space not only as a container but as a device charged with history, politics and narrative possibilities. 

Cinematic (Re)visions
Exploration of the intersection between the performing and audiovisual arts from a critical and decolonial perspective. The objective is to develop a broad and critical visual culture, based on viewings of fundamental works that intertwine cinema, theatre and performance.

This module focuses on providing students with the essential tools to effectively express concepts and ideas through graphic representations, with the aim of communicating the project to the client, director, or the rest of the creative team. 

On the other hand, we also open our eyes to new visual representation techniques, in order to positively incorporate the technological advances that are constantly being offered on the market.

Graphic Representation Techniques I: Concept Art
Improvement in freehand drawing techniques for quick sketching. Image post-processing with Photoshop/Procreate.

Graphic Representation Techniques II: SketchUp and Models
Use of tools for 3D graphic representation (SketchUp) and creation of scale models, applied to theatre and audiovisual projects.

Graphic Representation Techniques III: AI
Application of new technologies in stage design, such as the creation of images with artificial intelligence

This module aims to provide students with a specific overview of various profiles, working methodologies and specialities through interaction with renowned experts and professionals in the sector. Each workshop lasts four consecutive days, once a month throughout the programme.

Workshop 1: World Building with Juan Díaz Bohorquez
Worlds emerge from their limitations, like narrative ecosystems. World Building invites us to think, imagine and create in a different way: to adopt a narrative language that is as fluid, dynamic and interconnected as the worlds that the art director seeks to bring to life, assimilating the process, the method and the different paths to be able to tackle film projects.

Workshop 2: Scenic Lab with Judit Colomer
Looking beyond the landscape before us is one of the tasks of the set designer. In this laboratory, we train this focused gaze that proposes a dialogue between the observer and the observed object. A dialogue based on exploration and play that involves losing oneself in the object and being surprised by the image.

Workshop 3: Art Direction with Jose Tirado
The main objective of this workshop is to understand what art direction consists of and its specificities in the fields of advertising, music videos and fiction. The reason for the diversity of nomenclatures and the differences between the most commonly used terms: art director and production designer.

Workshop 4: Still life with Marcia Lennona
This workshop offers an approach to the practice of still life as an exercise in observation, composition and visual creation. Over four days, students work on exploring the object and its narrative potential.

Workshop 5: Costume design and characterisation with Xènia Gasull
Students will discover the process of stage and audiovisual costume design: from the creative concept to the coherent construction of characters. We will understand the role of the costume department within a production, identifying its functions, professional profiles, methodologies and working times.

Workshop 6: Dramaturgy of light with Andrés Galián
In this workshop, participants will learn the tools necessary to carry out basic lighting design and competently express lighting ideas, understanding lighting as the backbone of the dramaturgy of a stage piece, which can be expressed independently and whose basic technical knowledge will help us to better understand the scene as a whole.

Workshop 7: Reenactment with Gala Hernández López
The Reenactment workshop explores how contemporary non-fiction cinema works with the lack of historical images and the need to (re)invent them through creative devices. It studies different hybrid forms between documentary and fiction —docufiction, docudrama, mockumentary— as well as the use of reenactment (cinematic reconstruction) as a narrative and aesthetic strategy

This individual project module consists of two projects — one theatrical and one cinematographic — which cover all stages of the creative and pre-production process, starting from a theatre text and a screenplay respectively.

Throughout each project, students seek to defend a solid conceptual and formal proposal that takes into account specific directing and production premises. The concept and development of the project are explored in depth through personalised tutorials.

Theatrical project

Each student will develop a scenographic project based on a theatrical text, from the concept of space to the physical model, going through all the phases of the creative and pre-production process:

• Analysis of the play/script in terms of scenography. 
• Development of a concept, storyboard and mood board. 
• Effective communication with the artistic and technical team. 
• Execution of the implementation and construction plans. 
• Creation of a physical and virtual model.

Audiovisual project

We develop an audiovisual project based on a feature film script to formalise a complete project from an artistic direction perspective, going through the following steps:

• Initial analysis of the text. 
• Development of a concept, storyboard and mood board. 
• Effective communication with the artistic and technical team. 
• Selection and search for props and materials. 
• Preparation of itemised budgets.
• Preparation of concepts, mock-ups and, eventually, a short audiovisual piece.

To sell a horse - Exhibition design with Aina Roca

The aim of this practical capsule is to analyse different exhibition formats and tools for use in the development of two temporary exhibitions or installations, which will showcase the students' performing arts and audiovisual projects, respectively. The aim is to work on the coherence between content, context and audience, incorporating elements such as light, sound, voice, body and space to enrich the presentation of the students' material.

The music video project integrates all the content taught in the programme and is also a way to explore the experience of a shoot in full action.

As part of the project, a music video is developed for a working artist. Students work in groups, with diverse roles and specific responsibilities within an art department. Teamwork is key to this module, in which we build three full-scale sets, learn to manage real timings and budgets, and face the challenge of filming on a set.

The music video is made in collaboration with a film school, where we learn to work together with different departments: directing, photography, lighting, production, and editing. We recreate a situation that is as close as possible to the professional context of the sector, as well as creating the ideal environment for future synergies between students from both institutions.

Project phases:

• Collaboration with film school
• Design and conceptualisation with CUBE.BZ
• Props design and rental (Bcn Props)
• Set construction and patinas with Juan Carmona
• Pre-editing and filming of the music video at the BAU facilities in collaboration with film school students.

The Master's Final Project (MFP) consists of developing a project focused on artistic direction, based on a script, or designing a set design project based on a play or a specific theatrical context.
The MFP follows guidelines similar to those for audiovisual and theatre projects, delving deeper into a more investigative dimension of the documentation process and establishing lines of interest between the learning achieved during the master's programme and specific personal objectives.