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Leslie Hurry set model

Set Model
1942 (made)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

Leslie Hurry (1909-1978) trained at the Royal Academy and during the 1930s became known as a surrealist painter. A one-man show in London in 1942 was seen by the theatre director, Michael Benthall, who recommended Hurry to the dancer and choreographer, Robert Helpmann, then planning a ballet based on Shakespeare's Hamlet. The success of his designs set Hurry on a second career as one of the most distinguished theatre designers of his generation. He designed operas, ballets and plays, notably Swan Lake for the Sadler's Wells Ballet in 1943, a production which stayed in the repertoire for thirty years; Venice Preserv'd for Peter Brook (1953); the Ring Cycle at Covent Garden (1954), and Troilus and Cressida at Stratford for Peter Hall (1960), famous for being staged in a sand pit.

Helpmann's one-act ballet was inspired by Shakespeare's lines 'For in that sleep what dreams may come When we have shuffled off this mortal coil'. The ballet presents the distorted memories of the dying Hamlet. Hurry was initially reluctant to take the commission but eventually agreed to make one design to express his own reaction to the play. This was exactly what Helpmann wanted and became the basis for the set.

Helpmann asked for a decadent palace and Hurry created a nightmare vision, loaded with symbols of death and decay. The figure of Revenge, literally two-faced, looms over the dancers; the architecture is itself symbolic: a column transforms into a hand clutching a dagger, the receding perspectives suggest the unknown, with the stage as a point of transition on a journey. The blood red sun is both an emblem of doom and of light breaking through Hamlet's mind at the point of death. The curling vegetation is decay.


Object details

Categories
Object type
TitleLeslie Hurry set model (generic title)
Materials and techniques
Gouache, card and wood
Brief description
Set model by Leslie Hurry for Robert Helpmann's ballet Hamlet, Sadler's Wells Ballet at the New Theatre, London, 1942
Physical description
Model of the permanent setting for the ballet, Hamlet, Sadler's Wells Ballet at the New Theatre, London, 1942, with a painted backdrop and freestanding painted wing pieces to each side. On the left an open doorway with columns on each side, the column to left rising to become a hand holding a dagger, to the right a classical doorway surmounted by obelisks. On the backdrop a palace with staircases and columns, to left a two-faced figure holding a sword and to right a red sun within a ring of dull yellow rays and with fronds of dark green foliage across centre.
Dimensions
  • Height: 52cm
  • Width: 94cm
  • Depth: 52cm
Gallery label
Set model for Hamlet 1942 This was the first stage work of the painter Leslie Hurry, who had a distinguished career as a designer. The ballet presents the distorted memories of the dying Hamlet. Robert Helpmann asked for a decadent palace and Hurry created a nightmare vision. The figure of Revenge looms over the dancers. The red sun is an emblem of doom. Ballet by Robert Helpmann, 1942, based on the play by William Shakespeare, 1600-1 Sadler’s Wells Ballet at the New Theatre (now Noël Coward Theatre), London Gouache, card and wood Designed by Leslie Hurry (1909-78) Given by the British Council Museum no. S.307-1978(March 2009)
Credit line
Given by the British Council
Object history
Robert Helpmann's ballet Hamlet was first performed by the Sadler's Wells (now Royal) Ballet at the New (now the Noel Coward) Theatre on 19 May 1942. The ballet used music by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
Literary referenceHamlet, William Shakespeare
Summary
Leslie Hurry (1909-1978) trained at the Royal Academy and during the 1930s became known as a surrealist painter. A one-man show in London in 1942 was seen by the theatre director, Michael Benthall, who recommended Hurry to the dancer and choreographer, Robert Helpmann, then planning a ballet based on Shakespeare's Hamlet. The success of his designs set Hurry on a second career as one of the most distinguished theatre designers of his generation. He designed operas, ballets and plays, notably Swan Lake for the Sadler's Wells Ballet in 1943, a production which stayed in the repertoire for thirty years; Venice Preserv'd for Peter Brook (1953); the Ring Cycle at Covent Garden (1954), and Troilus and Cressida at Stratford for Peter Hall (1960), famous for being staged in a sand pit.

Helpmann's one-act ballet was inspired by Shakespeare's lines 'For in that sleep what dreams may come When we have shuffled off this mortal coil'. The ballet presents the distorted memories of the dying Hamlet. Hurry was initially reluctant to take the commission but eventually agreed to make one design to express his own reaction to the play. This was exactly what Helpmann wanted and became the basis for the set.

Helpmann asked for a decadent palace and Hurry created a nightmare vision, loaded with symbols of death and decay. The figure of Revenge, literally two-faced, looms over the dancers; the architecture is itself symbolic: a column transforms into a hand clutching a dagger, the receding perspectives suggest the unknown, with the stage as a point of transition on a journey. The blood red sun is both an emblem of doom and of light breaking through Hamlet's mind at the point of death. The curling vegetation is decay.
Collection
Accession number
S.307-1978

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Record createdFebruary 7, 2008
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