Set model by Oliver Messel for Pamina's boudoir, Act I, Scene II, in Mozart's opera The Magic Flute, Royal Opera House, 1947

A set model by Oliver Messel for Pamina's boudoir, Act I, scene ii. A wooden box with a hessian border and velvet strips on the inside. The set is composed of cut cloths and backcloths. Pamina's boudoir is framed by two yellow curtains, painted on card. Trees also frame the bedroom. In the foreground, tree stumps and leaves. The boudoir decoration is in Baroque style, with yellow coloured walls and gilt mirrors. The entrance to the bedroom is framed by two classical columns, which are topped with winged figures. There is a view to arches in the background. Blue backdrop. A paper model of a female figure in eighteenth century dress stands in the middle of the set.

Acquired with the support of the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Art Fund and the Friends of the V&A

The Magic Flute (1791), an opera in two acts by Mozart with libretto by Schikaneder from Christoph Martin Wieland’s Lulu, or, The Magic Flute. Oliver Messel’s production was first performed at the Royal Opera House, London, by the Covent Garden Opera Trust on 20 March 1947. It was directed by Malcolm Baker-Smith and featured Kenneth Neafe as Tamino and Victoria Sladen as Pamina. Messel created new costume and set designs for a Glyndebourne production, first presented 19 July, 1956. Directed by Carl Ebert, Ernst Häefliger played Tamino, Pilar Lorengar was Pamina and Drago Bernardic was Sarastro.
Lord Snowdon, Oliver Messel's nephew, inherited Messel's theatre designs and other designs and artefacts. The designs were briefly stored in a disused chapel in Kensington Palace before being housed at the V&A from 1981 on indefinite loan. The V&A Theatre Museum purchased the Oliver Messel collection from Lord Snowdon in 2005.

Historical significance: Oliver Messel's first designed costumes and sets for an opera in 1947. However, this design could relate to Messel's run of productions at Glyndebourne from 1951 to 1959. These productions were two of three stagings of this opera after the Second World War.

According to the Oliver Messel exhibition catalogue, the model is for the 1947 production at the Royal Opera House.

Reason For Production: Commission

Great Britain’s leading theatre designer from the early 1930s to the mid 1950s, Oliver Messel (1904-1978) won international acclaim for his lavish, painterly and poetic designs informed by period styles. His work spans ballet, drama, film, musical, opera and revue. Messel’s traditional style of theatre design became unfashionable from the mid 1950s onwards, and he increasingly concentrated on painting, interior and textile design, including designing luxury homes in the Caribbean.

Messel designed two versions of Mozart’s opera The Magic Flute (1791), at Covent Garden Opera Trust (1947) and at Glyndebourne (1956), for which he adapted his designs from 1947. These productions were two of the first three stagings of this opera after the end of World War II. Reviewers found his designs elegant and a fantastic spectacle; however, some critics thought the designs were too fussy and the sets ill-adapted from the large stage at Covent Garden for the smaller stage at Glyndebourne.

Pamina, daughter of the Queen of Night, is held prisoner by Sarastro, the high priest, and Monostatos, the black slave. Papageno helps her escape.

S.196-2006