Costume Design
1946 (painted)
| Artist/Maker |
Design by Hugh Stevenson for a Reveller in Andrée Howard’s ballet, Mardi Gras. The atmospherically foreboding ballet showed a young girl lost in a nightmare world of pre-Lenten carnival. Hugh Fisher noted that in the ballet the girl ‘sees many strange and horrific happenings’.
Mardi Gras was choreographed to an original score by Leonard Salzedo with the production’s sets and costumes designed by Hugh Stevenson for Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet and first performed on 26 November 1946. The ballet was short-lived only receiving 25 performances. The ballet was photographed by Edward Mandinian
Hugh Stevenson was one of the leading designers for dance during the first quarter of a century of the development of C20th British Ballet. Although not revolutionary in style or concept, Stevenson's work, in its sympathy with both the subject and mood of the works he designed and needs of the dancer, exemplifies the best in dance design at that time. Stevenson also created the scenario for Mardi Gras.
Also created a frontcloth showing a pierrot playing a guitar to Columbine with a quotation from Shakespeare’s sonnet 50 ‘My grief lies onward, and my joy behind.’
Mardi Gras was choreographed to an original score by Leonard Salzedo with the production’s sets and costumes designed by Hugh Stevenson for Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet and first performed on 26 November 1946. The ballet was short-lived only receiving 25 performances. The ballet was photographed by Edward Mandinian
Hugh Stevenson was one of the leading designers for dance during the first quarter of a century of the development of C20th British Ballet. Although not revolutionary in style or concept, Stevenson's work, in its sympathy with both the subject and mood of the works he designed and needs of the dancer, exemplifies the best in dance design at that time. Stevenson also created the scenario for Mardi Gras.
Also created a frontcloth showing a pierrot playing a guitar to Columbine with a quotation from Shakespeare’s sonnet 50 ‘My grief lies onward, and my joy behind.’
Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Materials and techniques | Pencil, watercolour and gouache on paper |
| Brief description | Costume design by Hugh Stevenson for a female Reveller in Andree Howard's ballet Mardi Gras, Sadler's Wells Theatre Ballet, 1946 |
| Physical description | Design for a female Reveller in Andree Howard's ballet Mardi Gras, depicting a full length female dancer, facing front with arms outstretched and splayed-out fingers, the feet turned out, wearing a Venetian-style mask and veil, the eye and nose mask in bright mauve, the surrounding veil in alternating stripes of dark and light Indian red spotted with small black dots, the lower edge trimmed in blue. On the head is an elaborate hat with a broad black straight brim and an exaggeratedly serrated crown in dark Indian red edged in blue, from inside whcih spring straight black 'feathers' and bright mauve 'ostrich' plumes. From the waist of the fitted black bodice rise two narrow dark Indian points. The fitted sleeves are in black and bright mauve vertical stripes ending in a bold blue cuff. The ankle length skirt is divided into three areas, a hip band in bright mauve the lower edge cut into points from which hangs a panel in Indian red cut into exaggerated long points and reaching nearly to the hem of the black underskirt. Beside the word 'Reveller' is a rough sketch of a crown. |
| Dimensions |
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| Production type | Unique |
| Marks and inscriptions |
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| Credit line | Cyril W. Beaumont Bequest |
| Object history | One of six designs for this ballet from the Cyril Beaumont collection. Historical significance: An example of a costume design by one of the leading dance designers of his period, who worked extensively with the emerging British ballet companies in the 1930s and 1940s. Although not revolutionary in style or concept, Stevenson's work, in its sympathy with both the subject and mood of the works he designed and needs of the dancer, exemplifies the best in dance design at that time. |
| Literary reference | Mardi gras |
| Summary | Design by Hugh Stevenson for a Reveller in Andrée Howard’s ballet, Mardi Gras. The atmospherically foreboding ballet showed a young girl lost in a nightmare world of pre-Lenten carnival. Hugh Fisher noted that in the ballet the girl ‘sees many strange and horrific happenings’. Mardi Gras was choreographed to an original score by Leonard Salzedo with the production’s sets and costumes designed by Hugh Stevenson for Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet and first performed on 26 November 1946. The ballet was short-lived only receiving 25 performances. The ballet was photographed by Edward Mandinian Hugh Stevenson was one of the leading designers for dance during the first quarter of a century of the development of C20th British Ballet. Although not revolutionary in style or concept, Stevenson's work, in its sympathy with both the subject and mood of the works he designed and needs of the dancer, exemplifies the best in dance design at that time. Stevenson also created the scenario for Mardi Gras. Also created a frontcloth showing a pierrot playing a guitar to Columbine with a quotation from Shakespeare’s sonnet 50 ‘My grief lies onward, and my joy behind.’ |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | S.144-2000 |
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| Record created | June 21, 2000 |
| Record URL |
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