Josef Svoboda: Theatre Artist in an Age of Science

Jarka M. Burian
Educational Theatre Journal, Vol. 22, No. 2. (May, 1970), pp. 123-145.
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JARKA M. BURIAN

Josef Svoboda: Theatre Artist in an Age

of Science

A Ze

approaches his fiftieth birthday, Josef Svoboda is in mid-career and at

height of his powers as an architecturally trained stage designer.l
Although he is without a doubt the most productive, celebrated, and sought
after designer in Europe today, he is known in America primarily by vague
reputation, which is rather ironic in view of the substantial element of modern
technology that he employs in much of his work.? A consideration of the main
features of his creativity and an account of a few of his most striking scenographic
techniques may help to place in perspective the special combination of talents
that identify him as a truly distinctive theatre artist in an age of science.
T h e sheer quantity of his productivity is in itself remarkable: in less than
twenty-five years he has designed almost three hundred and fifty productions,
roughly split between the operatic and dramatic repertoire, for most of the major
theatres of Europe. During much of this same period he has been chief designer
and technical director of the National Theatre in Prague, a repertory complex
that produces between fifteen and twenty new productions annually and performs
an average of thirty different productions monthly. Although he himself designs
only three to five productions for the National Theatre annually, he is responsible
for all technical and scenic elements on its three stages and supervises the activity
of the several hundred technical personnel of the theatre and its workshops.
H e has, moreover, taught at various times, and is currently Professor of
Architecture in the College of Fine and Applied Arts in Prague. Still another
branch of his creativity is his exhibition work at major international expositions.
At Brussels, in 1958, for example, he won three medals for his work displayed
in the Czechoslovak pavilion, and his several kinetic and film projects were
among the most popular attractions at Expo 67, Montreal. Other international
Copyright @ 1970 by Jarka Burian.
M r . Burian is a Professor i n t h e Department of T h e a t r e at t h e State University of N e w York at
Albany. T h i s article represents portions of a book length study, T h e Scenography of Josef
Svoboda, t o be published b y t h e Wesleyan Uniuersity Press i n 1971. Material for t h e article nnrl
t h e book were gathered by M r . Btirian i n 1968-69 during a t e n - m o n t h residence i n Czechoslovakia
sponsored by t h e Inter-University C o m m i t t e e o n Travel Grants. M r . Btirian's research included
a n u m b e r of tape recorded interuiews w i t h M r . Svoboda. Citations marked by a n asterisk (*)
are taken from those interviews. A l l translations are by M r . Burian.
1 Svoboda was born on May 10, 1920, in CAslav, a small city about fifty miles from Prague.
His liberal arts education was interrupted by the German occupation in 1939. After the war,
he completed a five-year, university-level architectural study in Prague, while concurrently
functioning as chief designer of the largest theatre in Prague, the Smetana.
2 Svoboda has designed one production in the United States: Luigi Nonno's opera, Intoleranza,
for the Opera Group of Boston (February 1965). Two other productions failed to materialize:
Robert Graves' adaptation of the Iliad for Lincoln Center in 1967, and Strauss's Salome' for the
Civic Opera in Chicago, 1968.

honors have included the gold medal award of the Sao Paolo Biennale in
international stage design (1961), an honorary doctorate from England's Royal
College of Art (1969). and the Sikkens Prize of the Netherlands in architecture
(1969)~
a previous winner of which was LeCorbusier.
Although Svoboda's name is chiefly associated with a full-scale exploitation
for stage purposes of the latest mechanical, electronic, and optical devices (many
of which he has developed himself), with the so-called kinetic stage, and with
wide-ranging use of sophisticated lighting and projection techniques (including
new theatrical forms uniting film and stage), the role of the technical in his
scenography is slightly ambivalent and requires elucidation. I t is true that he
welcomes the contribution of the latest techniques and devices and is able to
derive maximum benefit from them, but their use or non-use is really not
essential. Underlying his scenography is a basic pragmatism:
What is essential is the approach to the job: I would be delighted to create a setting of
cheese if it best suited the plaj. You have to use expressive means that precisely {it the
production concept. And that's where the true beauty of my work lies, for me.*

Nevertheless, forming the background of Svoboda's scenography, both at its

boldest and its simplest, is his profound, scrupulous respect for the frequently
painstaking technical experiment and research that precede its ultimate appearance before the public. Many critics and artists sincerely believe that science,
technology, and systemization are inherently hostile to art ant1 creativity. Svoboda
is emphatically not of their number. He has, if anything, a rage for order, for
precision, for the laws that define his work because, as he puts it, "it means
that the given element has been mastered and can be used as an instrument." *
His feelings about music are significant in this respect:
I admire its order, its purity, its cleanness-this is what I would like to establish in scenography. I know it's impossible but at least I want to aim for it. I'd like to eliminate dilettantism
and make theatre truly professional. I've been pursuing an ideal for twenty-five years: precision, systemization, perfection, and control of the expressive means available to scenography,
even the ordinary means. IYhy shouldn't this age make the most of its technical developments as previous eras did? that is, the machinery of the baroque era, the electric light
at the turn of the century.*

OR-setting what may seem to be an excessive pre-occupation with the technical

in such statements, especially when they are taken out of context, is Svoboda's
more characteristic observation that the technical is solely a means: "My dream
would be not to have it there; but I have to use it now because certain things
would not otlierc\.ise be possible. I n five years there may be other means and other
results." * Perhaps most directl) to the point is Svoboda's simplest assertion,
"Kno.ivletlge of the technical makes creativity possible." *
Trying to classify Svoboda's scenographic mode as primarily symbolistic, constructivistic, expressionistic, or even illusionistic, is ultimately a fruitless exercise.
T h e fact is that his work exhibits instances of each of these modes as well as
combinations of them. Svoboda's comment is characteristic: "Style is a matter
of solving each work by the given conditions, which means not only consideration
of the specific author, but also the given director, the theatre building itself,

the main actor or actors: each element is unique, and you have to consider the
features special to each one. Theatre is a synthetic, componential phenomenon
that ideally needs balancing-if
it's short here, say in acting, you add there,
in the scenography-or the opposite." "
What underlies all of his sceriography, however-with the exception of the
made-to-order literalism or monumentalism that was evident in it during the
Stalin era-is his search for the intangible essence of a work and his attempt
to express it in the most appropriate manner, on the stage, in theatrical terms,
which, for him, implies a synthesis of expressive elements. Almost without
exception, moveover, he sees dynamism as fundamental to any work of theatre
art; if nature abhors a vacuum, Svoboda abhors a fixed, static stage, which
strikes him as being a perversion of the essence of theatre. Quite inadvertently, perhaps, it is as if Svoboda approached his work with the attitude of
a classicist basing his position on Aristotle's repeated dictum that action is the
very heart of the drama; not, of course, in any crude sense, but in the sense
that drama means responsiveness, change, and movement when conceived in its
broadest sense:
I don't want a static picture, but something that evolves, that has movement, not necessarily
physical movement, of course, but a setting that is dynamic, capable of expressing changing
relationships, feeling, moods, perhaps only by lighting, during the course of the action.*

T h e last phrases are very important, for it is all too easy to assume that
Svoboda is obsessed with sheer movement, an assumption that is somewhat
encouraged by the term "kinetics" that has been applied indiscriminately to
his scenography in general. As he likes to point out, perhaps only thirty of
his nearly three hundred and fifty productions have involved material, tangible
movement. But most of his productions, if not indeed virtually all, have
indeed involved a subtler form of kinetics that accompanies the action as an
expressive, responsive reinforcement, perhaps most often through lighting"lighting as a dramatic component, not merely illuminating the scene or providing
atmosphere." *

Suggestive is perhaps as close as one can come to a single term that describes
the fundamental scenographic effect intended by Svoboda, which is to say that
he steers clear of both illusionism and alienation. I n this as in many other
respects, Svoboda avoids extremes, instinctively preferring to reinforce theatre's
inherently evocative, metaphoric power with as much leeway as possible in the
specific scenic mode that would seem most appropriate to a given production.
What remains constant, however, is Svoboda's conviction that the setting must
not foreshadow the action o r provide a summary illustration of it; it is as if
Svoboda took offense at a setting, no matter how impressive otherwise, that
seems to announce the heart of the play in one brilliant image: "Theatre
means dynamics, movement; it is a living thing; therefore, scenography should
not be fixed and tell at once, as expressionistic design tends to do." *
T h e setting should evolve with the action, cooperate with it, be in harmony
with it, and reinforce it, as the action itself evolves. Scenography is not a back-

ground nor even a container, but in itself a dramatic component that becomes
integrated with every other expressive component or element of production
and shares in the cumulative effect upon the viewer. I t is, of course, an
essentially imaginative, poetic process, one that demands an innate capacity
for synthesis and metaphoric thinking:
T h e I-elationship of scenic details, their capacity for association, creates from the abstract
and undefined space of the stage a transformable, kinetic, dramatic space and movement.
Dramatic space is psycho-plastic space, which means that it is elastic in its scope and alterable
in its qualitv. It is space only when it needs to be space. It is cheerful space if it needs to be
cheerful. It certainly cannot be expressed by stiff flats that stand behind the action and
hate no contact with it.2

Developing this general principle further, Svoboda subsequently noted the

analogous relation between this approach to scenography and the element of
acting:
T h e goal of scenography cannot merely be the creation of a tangible picture . . . and in itself
[scenograph!.] is not a homogenous totality. It separates into a series of partial elements,
among which certainly belong form, color, but also tempo, rh)thrn-in
a word, the elements
that are at the disposal of an actor. And it is precisely b v means of these elen~entsthat the
scene enters into closc contact with the actor, becomes capable of dynamic transforniation. and
can advance in time just as a stream of scenic ilnages created by the actor's performance.
I t can transform itself s)nchronousl~with the progress of the action, with the course of its
moods, with the develop~lientof its conceptual and dl-amatic line.$

Briefly, the underlying premise of Svoboda's approach is the belief that theatre
distinguished from all other arts precisely by what Svodoba emphasizes as
intangible forces: time, space, movement, non-material energy-in
a word,
dynamism. And it is precisely to the enhancement and intensification of this
end that all of Svoboda's technical resources are dedicated. Several aspects of
the general principle of dynamism may be illustrated in a brief examination
of a few of the scenographic techniques that Svoboda has distinctively evolved:
kinetic scenery, mirrors, and projections.
Variations in the use of kinetic scenery and mirrors are evident in Svoboda's
productions of Romeo and Juliet, Insect Comedy, and Hamlet. Romeo and
Juliet (Figs. 1, 2 , and 3), as presented by the National Theatre in Prague (October
1963) under the direction of Otomar Krejta, was a milestone production in
which Svoboda fused his principle of dynamism with his profound sense of
architecture. T h e result was a kinetic architecture that provided a definitive
example of the creation of one kind of psycho-plastic space: stage space that is
[lui~llyresponsive to the emotive tleinands of the action.
T h e setting extended over the orchestra pit and consisted of a remarkably
homogeneous, intricately balanced group of architectural components-platforms, frames, walls, plinths, stairs-representing
various objects and locales
as well as purely architectural supplements. Essentially neutral in form, except
for a few pieces (such as the scenic p i k e de rksistance, a graceful Renaissance
3 Stoboda, "ScCna v diskusi." Divndlo (Ma\ 1963), p. 3.
4From a speech by Svoboda, printed in Zpruvy Divadelniho Ostavt~,N o. 8 (1967), pp. 28-29.

, --

I
I

Figure I . The Prague production of Romeo and Juliet (1963), showing several basic scenic
elements. Downstage right an elevatable unit of two sections that functioned variably as
fountain, bed, table, or catafalque. The arcade unit at upstage center "floated" forward and
backward. The downstage figure (Romeo) stands on a unit that could be elevated to a height
of seven feet and thereby represent either a bench or a wall.
(Photo by Jaromir Svoboda)

Figure 2 . The balcony scene

from Romeo and Juliet, showing the arcade in its forward
position and Romeo standing on
the elevatable wall unit.
(Photo by Jaromir Svoboda)

Figure 3. Groundplan of Prague production of Roineo and Juliet, showing

the disposition of the scenic units for scene 5. (1) movable arcade-balcony
unit; (2) acting platform elevatable to height of approx. eight feet; (3) laterally
movable slats with heavy, deep-set frames, the one at stage right with a
maskable window unit; (4) specially constructed proscenium frame; (5)
trapdoor with separately movable vertical elements, elevatable and sinkable;
(6) vertically movable wall, from floor level to a height of approximately
seven feet; (7) stairs leading into orchestra pit; (8) acting area built over
orchestra pit; (9) laterally movable, suspended flat; (lo) elevatable unit
sometimes used as a ledge in conjunction with (2)

arcade that seemingly floated along an upstage-downstage axis at a height of

ten or twelve feet above stage level),Vhe architectural elements were covered
with a rough canvas that in turn was covered with a thin burlap, the final suggestive effect being that of the structural facade of a Renaissance palace. T h e
separate elements could form a seemingly infinite number of static spatial
compositions or else go into an orchestrated series of movements: rising, sinking,
advancing, retreating, or moving laterally. Particularly impressive was the
dramatic quality of the movement, especially in its counterpoint to the movement of the actors during scene changes, which became, in Svoboda's words,
"dramatic caesuras in the action, a new type of 'curtain' without curtains, like a
cinematic crossfade, reinforced by carefully plotted, expressive lighting." *
Finally, the mobile architectural scenography created a paradoxical impression
of lyric grace and menace: the delicate, airy arcade suspended in air offset by the
irresistible meshing of solid structures: a remarkably suggestive projection of the
antagonistic forces within the play.
Svoboda has designed two productions of the modern Czech classic, T h e Insect
Comedy, by the Capek brothers; the first production, in 1946, was his premiere
project for the National Theatre. T h e second production, which concerns us
here, occurred almost twenty years later (January 1965), again in the National
Theatre. An episodic, satiric parable of mankind viewed in the image of an
insect world, the play is an open invitation to a designer's creative fantasy.
Svoboda's scenography represented a fusion of a basic image or concept of the
play with expressive scenic principles, in this case special application of two of
Svoboda's recurrent but variable techniques: kinetics and mirrors (Fig. 4).
T h e problem was how to project on the stage the dominant image of the
play: "the sheer multitudinousness of man, the sheer numbers that make one
question the difference between insects and people." *
T h e final set embodied the answer: two large mirrors (about 25' x 25') set at special angles
at the rear of a turntable. No flats or scenic decor were used, but the floor of the rotating
turntable became a positive motif when covered with vari-colored carpets, a different one for
each scene. Only the floor was lit: we thereby gained light via reflection and also avoided the
technical problenls of directly lighting the mirrors. In fact, we created space by means of the
overhead view provided by the mirrors: two mirror surfaces in themselves would multiply the
image reflected, but their honeycombed segmentation is what chiefly created the effect of
space and multiplicity here. T h e six-sided shape of the segments had the added advantage
of being a biological key sign and being easy to assemble. T h e sheer size of the mirrors was
made feasible by a new process that enabled us to put a silver coating on lightweight plastic.
It was an example of scenography precisely expressing the play, of a design hitting the nail
on the head one-hundred percent; there were no holes in the conception or execution. I t was
also an example of the technical being absolutely in the service of the total production, and
not obtrusive. I t wins the spectator over; not until later does he wonder how it was done. . . .
Today, using newer techniques, we could do even more--especially with flexible, pneumatic
mirrors that could alternately shrink and enlarge each image and increase the number of
objects mirrored.' 6
5 Actually, the arcade was supported by a narrow black plinth that slanted obliquely toward
the rear, thereby being virtually invisible from the audience.
6 Such mirrors have now been developed and Svoboda is planning to use them in a production
of Prokofiev's Fiery Angel, scheduled for La Scala, Milan, in 1970.

T h e production of Hamlet in Brussels (January 1965) featured an audacious

interpretation of the play by its director, KrejEa, along with scenography by
Svoboda that not only embodied the underlying production concept but positively supplemented it. T h e set itself, at first glance, suggested a massive wall
composed of rectilinear elements, both solids and cavities (Figs. 5 and 6). But
then elements of the "wall" began to move: parts slid forward to form platforms
and staircases, while others receded and intermeshed to reveal still further configurations. Most striking of all, however, was the multiplication of this extraordinary effect by the mirror that hung over the full width of the set at an angle
of forty-five degrees and provided a reflection of the set as seen from above.
One's initial impression might well have been of cubism and constructivism
run riot, with the mirror acting as an intensifier of the basic effect. Actually,
however, the mirror was the starting point and essence of the scenography.
Svoboda's reflections on the production indicate the main points of the entire
creative process:
It all started with KrejEa and his key to the production: the ghost as an alter-ego of Hamlet;
not Hamlet's father, but a fiction created by Hamlet to gain support of the people and turn
them against the usurper. In effect, then, Hamlet talks to himself, he makes the dialogue,
and persuades himself. T o concretize the alter-ego concept, a mirror was the only answer; it
became the principle of the play. Its technical problem was the control of its reflections by
lighting; sometimes we wanted a reflection, sometimes we didn't. The final step came about
as a result of my poking at the model of the set one day after gazing at it for a long time
without being quite satisfied. I pushed one piece and suddenly saw the reflection of the
movement in the mirror. And suddenly I saw Elsinore as a certain spiritual world, a microcosm of Hamlet's world, one which must change psycho-plastically along with the development
of the action. It became a world that grinds and weighs on man; it suggested the atmosphere
of the middle ages, a castle without feeling, anti-human. In short, we represented Elsinore
ultra-flexibly, plastically. The photographs suggest a sheer mass of cubes, solid and fixed, but
in performance only selected portions were visible as a result of controlled lighting and movement. T h e set was extremely playable, not as puristic and austere as the photos suggest. In
fact, it became an instrument with many possibilities; another good example of the technical
becoming an instrument, a means.*

T h e scenography as a whole bears obvious kinship to that of Romeo and

Juliet in creating psycho-plastic space by means of three-dimensional kinetics:
the movement of solid masses in space; and to T h e Insect Comedy in the combined use of mirrors and scenic movement. All three productions, moreover,
classically embody Svoboda's idea of movement being the manifestation of the
duality of matter and non-material energy, an interesting variant of the Appian
idea of movement unifying the arts of time and space.
Another scenic dimension is revealed in Svoboda's creative work with slide
and film projection in a seemingly endless variety of combinations with stage
action and scenery. A few examples of the projection techniques in a relatively
pure form as well as their subsequent integration with traditional scenic elements
will suggest the evolution of the techniques and also their underlying consistency
in the service of a metaphoric, poetic vision.
Central to Svoboda's use of projection techniques in whatever form are
his theatrically oriented concerns with space and synthesis: "We in theatre are

Figure 5. The model for the Brussels Hamlet (1965). indicating the simultaneous front and top
view of the architectonic set, an arrangement that became particularly striking with the
introduction of movement of the specific scenic units.

Figure 6. The Brussels Hamlet, showing Hamlet's confrontation of his alter-ego; also to be
noted is the sharply controlled lighting that reveals only a small portion of the mirror that ran
(Photo by Jaromir Svoboda)
the full width of the stage.

constantly aware of space, and we can enhance it by many means, whereas

film can only transcribe space. I n fact, in theatre we can enhance space by the
use of film; that's why theatre is the art of greatest synthesis."
Of the two primary projection systems or forms devised by Svoboda, Laterna
Magika and Polyekran, the latter is relatively simpler, and although its evolution
is difficult to disentangle from that of Laterna Magika, it was Polyekran that
contributed to the final form of Laterna Magika, rather than the other way
round, according to both Svoboda and Alfred Radok, Svoboda's creative partner.
For these reasons, Polyekran (literally, "multi-screen") will be described first.
Polyekran (Fig. 7), one of Svoboda's contributions to the Brussels World's
Fair of 1958, is fundamentally a pure projection form; it is not combined
with live acting or scenic elements. Its origin was related to Svoboda's response
to the development of various wide-screen techniques of the 1950's; in contrast
to such techniques, all of which attempted to eliminate the impression of a
screen and to give the spectator the sensation of being part of the picture,
Polyekran deliberately emphasizes the presence of the screen, or, rather, screens.
Its principle is a simultaneous and synchronous projection of slides and film on
several screens during which the images on the individual screens are in dramatic
interplay with each other in the creation of a total, organic composition. Svoboda
adds:
Polyekran offers the possibility of free composition, a free shaping and creation on several
screens. Images of real objects and people are projected, but the relationships among them
are not realistic, but rather supra-realistic, perhaps surrealistic. Essentially, it's the principle
of abstract and pure collage, which is an old and basic technique of theatre. "Op art" is
perhaps simply a more recent name for it. In any case, the contrast of varied things on stage
is basic to theatre; the objects thereby acquire new relationships and significance, a new and
different reality.*

Technically, the elements of the Brussels production consisted of seven

screens of different size and shape suspended at different angles from horizontal
steel wires in front of a black velvet backdrop. Eight automatic slide projectors
and seven film projectors, synchronously controlled by electronic tape, threw
images upon these screens. T h e visual collage was accompanied by stereophonic
sound (also carried on the electronic tape), the total ten-minute performance
being thematically unified by its depiction of the context of the annual Prague
Spring Music Festival.
I n describing the relation between Polyekran and Laterna Magika, Svoboda
says:
In comparison with Polyekran, which is totally a film spectacle and technically a concern of
film, Laterna hfagika is theatre with living actors, singers, dancers, musicians. . . . On the
one hand we used familiar scenographic techniques such as slides and film projection. Sew
expressive possibilities were added by panoramic film and projection with multi-exposure on
several screens at once. A second feature is the use of mobile screens that are joined to the
performance of a live actor.8
7 Svoboda, quoted in "Entretien sur la Laterne Magique," The'atre en Tchecoslouaqz~ie, ed.
V. Jindra (Prague, 1962), p. 53f
8 Svoboda, quoted in "0 svetelnem divadle," ZnformaEni Zprauy Scenografickt Laboratoi-e (Sept.
'95Q P. 5 .

Commenting on the essential non-autonomy of each medium, film and

living actor, in Laterna Magika, Svoboda added, "The play of the actors cannot
exist without the film, and vice-versa-they become one thing, a synthesis and
fusion of actors and projection. Moreover, the same actors appear on stage
and screen, and interact with each other. T h e film has a dramatic function." *
Laterna Magika becomes, in effect, a new, hybrid medium, the potential
force and expressiveness of which are perhaps suggested best in some remarks
by Marshall McLuhan made without reference to Laterna Magika, when he
spoke of "true hybritl energy": "The hybrid or the meeting of two media is a
moment of truth and revelation from which new form is born. . . . T h e moment
of the meeting of media is a moment of freedom and release from the ordinary
trance and numbness imposed on them by our senses." !'
Like Polyekran, Laterna hlagika (Figs. 8 and 9) was devised for the Brussels
Fair of 1958, where it enjoyed a spectacular success. I t consisted of three film
and two slide projectors, synchronously controlled, plus a device that enabled
deflection of one projection beam to any desired spot, including a moving screen.
In a stage space measuring approximately 50' x 24' x 20' were arranged eight
mobile screens with special, highly directional reflecting surfaces; they could
rise, fall, move to the side, fold up, rotate, appear and disappear in precise
rhythm with the actors. T h e stage itself was provided with a moving belt and
special scissor traps to accommodate the need for virtually instantaneous live action
in response to the film. One of the screens, moreover, was equipped with a
diaphragmatic framing curtain that could alter both the size and shape of the
screen. And the total presentation was enhanced by multi-speaker stereophonic
sound.
Jan Grossman, himself a theatre director as well as a critic in Prague, was
involved with the theoretical groundwork of Laterna Magika; his remarks on
the new form elaborate some of its potentials:
Laterna Magika offered the dramatist, film scenarist, poet, and composcr a new language:
a language that is more intense, sharply contrasting, and rhythmic: one which can captivatingly
project statistics as well as ballet, docut~ientsas well as lyric verse, and is therefore capable of
absorbing and artistically working over the density and dynamics, the nlultiplicity and
contrariety of the world in which we live." lo

Alfred Radok, director of Laterna Magika, suggested its special quality in this
way: "Above all, Laterna Magika has the capacity of seeing reality from several
aspects. Of 'extracting' a situation or individual from the routine context of
time and place and apprehending it in some other fashion, perhaps by confronting it with a chronologically distinct event."
T h a t Laterna Magika was not without its special problems, however, became
evident even while it was experiencing its greatest success. For example, the
McLuhan, Understnnditzg Media (New York, 1966), p. 3 5 ,
Grosstnan, "0 hornbinace d i ~ a d l aa filtnu," Lnter?tcl Mngikn, ed. J. H r b a ~(Prague. 1968),
P. 76.
11 Radok, quoted by Grossman, p. 77.
9

10

Figure 8 . Groundplan and elevation of Laterna Magika in its Prague edition,

1959. ( I ) slide projector; ( 2 , 3, 4) film projectors synchronously connected;
(5) movable, hinged screens; (6) curtains, scrim and velvet; (7) treadniills;
(8) hinged and rotatable screens; (9) mechanized disks; (lo) laterally movable
screens; (11) curtain; (12) wide screen; (13) wide screen, vertically vented to
allow passage for actors; (14) screen for rear projections; (15) movable screens;
(16) film projector for rear projections, synchronized with front projectors.
(Drawing prepared by David Fuller from an illustration in Josej
Svoboda, a catalogue published by the National Theatre, Prague, 1961)

Figure 9. Laterna Magika: a simple juxtaposition employing only the wide screen. Few photographs exist of the more complex, multiple image sequences.

Figure zo. Diapolyekran as exhibited at Expo 67, Montreal. The photograph indicates the size
of the wall of screens and provides one example of the complex collage effects readily attainable.

137 /

filmed portions had to be prepared far in advance of their integration with the
live performers, which meant that many artistic decisions had to be made and
became binding long before there was any way of knowing how they might
work out months later. A more profound problem was that the film virtually
enslaved the live performer, whose margin of variability in performance approached zero because the film was a prefabricated element to which the performer must inflexibly adapt. Svoboda put it this way: "It means that Laterna
Magika is to a certain extent deprived of that which is beautiful about
theatre: that each performance can have a completely different rhythm,
that the quality of a performance can be better or worse, that a production can
expand its limits." l2
Again, on a more fundamental level, Laterna Magika never experienced the
ultimate test of presenting a work that was written especially for it; that is, a
work other than revue or cabaret entertainment. I n its original version, as an
entertaining propaganda piece for Czechoslovakia, it was a success. Its original
creators had hopes of eventually using the form for Shakespeare or explorations
of challenging contemporary realities, for example the Eichmann case, but
managerial and administrative elements viewed Laterna Magika in terms of
economics and politics, as a source of profit and an instrument of propaganda,
with the result that its subsequent artistic career was aborted; its several sequels
rarely rose above tourist level entertainment.
One other noteworthy and recent variant of Svoboda's projection techniques
is the Diapolyekran system, which had its first public exposure at the Montreal
Expo 67 as a ten-minute feature entitled T h e Creation of the World (Fig. lo).
It, too, employs a multi-screen, multi-projection (only slides) technique reminiscent of Polyekran in its pure film, non-actor features, but in a tighter, shallower,
and more stable form. As the illustration suggests, the projection screens form
a wall composed of cubes, one-hundred and twelve in all. Each cube has two
automatic slide projectors mounted at its rear, capable of flashing five images
per second, even though the actual rate was considerably slower; a total of
thirty-thousand slides were used, and the whole operation was computerized.
Moreover, each cube was capable of sliding forward or backward approximately
twelve inches, thus providing a surface in kinetic relief for the projections. T h e
basic technique is of course a collage or montage that allows for a great range
of visual effects: the entire wall of cubes may unite to present one total,
conventionally coherent picture, or else literally distintegrate that picture into
fragments, or, indeed, present a surrealistic collage of disparate images. And
all of this occurs in a dynamic, rhythmic flow ideally suited to projecting
process as well as startling, abrupt confrontation. T h e original presentation
was an eloquent, sensitive expression of wonder at the miracle and mystery of
creation, evolution, and civilization.
12 Svoboda, "ProblCmy sckny Laterny Magiky," Laterna Magika, p. 103. Svoboda managed to
overcome this problem to some extent in a few subsequent productions by employing live T V
transmission onto screens during the course of the performance: e.g., Nonno's Zntoleranra
(Boston, 1965) and Orff's Prometheus (Munich, 1968).

Within a year after the introduction of Laterna Magika and Polyekran

at Brussels, Svoboda began to apply their techniques to conventional theatre
production. Polyekran became the basic scenographic principle in the National
Theatre's production of a new Czech play, Josef Topol's T h e i r Day (October 1959)
(Figs. 11 and 12). T h e play, a study of the aspirations and disenchantments of
youth in the late ig~jo's,was notable for its impressionistic, episodic manner.
I n Brussels, the Polyekran system was based on fixed, stable screens; in Their
Day, Svoboda added a Laterna Magika technique: mobile screens that appear
and disappear in rhythmic connection with the movement of other scenic elements; namely, three specially prepared stage wagons that transport scenic objects
such as furniture and properties. T h e basic principle, however, remained that of
Polyekran, this time nine screens distributed in space, in different planes, with
two slide projectors covering each screen; three of the screens, moveover, had
film projectors assigned to them; the result was a great flexibility in the choice and
blending of pictures at will. Svoboda's subsequent remarks on the production
point u p its chief characteristics:
Why Polyekran for this production? T h e play presents a mosaic of city life, a mosaic that
evolves with the action of the play. We deliberately avoided a simultaneous scene because
you can't get rid of its scenic elements when you don't want them, no matter how sharp the
lighting. Besides, here we wanted changes in the dimensions of space as well as rapid shifts
of scene. Because we could project various images at various angles, we could create space
and spatial relations at will. My essential point in using projections is the creating of new
stage space, not as a substitute for decor or establishing a locale. We could use all the screens
or only one, not merely to describe a locale, but to establish different relations. T h e result is
real psycho-plastic space created by transforming the dimensions of space in response to the
nature of the scene. T h e basis is a confrontation of selected realities: actions, objects, people,
plus the accenting of things. For example, an object or projection functions and then disappears, very much like the film techniques of cutting and transitional blending. T h e method
is essentially more persuasive, because more theatrical, than all the painted sets and usual
stage constructions. T h e larger point is the creation of a total instrument to be used on stage
like a concert piano. I've been pursuing this goal for twenty years. Krejta [the director of
Their Day] says that so far it's an instrument that can only play a child's nursery tunes. But
eventually it may be much more. I think, for example, that T h e Last Ones and T h e Soldiers
show progress. We must keep on learning to play the instrument.*

T h e Last Ones (Fig. 13), a dramatization of a Gorki novel produced by the

National Theatre in Prague (September 1966) under the direction of Alfred
Radok, gave particular satisfaction to Svoboda. I t was the first work he had done
with Radok in several years, and it featured, in Svoboda's words, "a revision, a
refinement of Laterna Magika." *
T h e Last Ones indicts a whole era and regime in depicting a family dominated
by a tyrannical, insecure career officer. T h e deterioration of values, the shabbiness of life, the compromises and stupidities, the cruelties inflicted and endured,
all of these social deformations are mirrored, with frequent irony, in the family's
material and spiritual bankruptcy. T h e inherent duality of the subject, the
family and its larger social frame, blended superbly with the modified Laterna
Magika form, the very nature of which is rooted in a juxtaposition and interplay
of elements: the dramatic integration or counterpoint of screened image and

Figure I I . Groundplan and elevation of T h e i r Day (Prague 1959). T h e dark border

of screen # 3 was a diaphragmatic curtain by lrreans of which the projection surface
could be diminished or enlarged at will; screen # y moved laterally across the stage
and could "select" partial images from a full stage projection cast against a black
backdrop; all the other screens could disappear or become invisible by being rotated,
folded, or raised out of sight.
(Drawings prepared by David Fuller from an illustration in L e Theatre e n Tchecoslovaquie, Prague, 1962)

Figure 12. Their Day (Prague 1959): a production that integrated several aspects of Polyekran
and Laterna Magika in order to create a variable sense of stage space and multiple impressions
of locale.
(Photo by Jaromir Svoboda)

Figure z j . Gorki's The Last Ones (Prague 1966). illustrating the evolution of the Laterna Magika
technique; only one screen is used and the emphasis is on stage cornposition in depth rather than
laterally.
(Photo by Jaromir Svoboda)

live actor, of the same character on film and on stage, and the powerful, implicitly
ironic comment of the one on the other.
Svoboda's observations on the production suggest its significance for him:
In effect, we rehabilitated the Laterna Magika principle after its discreditation by business
interests. [Svoboda refers to its use in connection with commercial enterprises.] This production expressed our credo, an honest application of Laterna Magika, with certain changes and
the addition of new techniques. Originally, Laterna Magika operated with a lateral format
of images and stage action, but in T h e Last Ones we changed this to a depth principle in
order to create a cumulative effect, to increase the impact rather than disperse it, to intensify.
We stacked things, people, scenes behind each other; for example, action around the wheelchair downstage, above that a girl in a tub being stroked by twigs, "in front" of her a boy
being flogged on the screen; then, suddenly, a drape covering part of the screen opens and
we see a small, live orchestra playing a waltz, with pomp-an image of the regime. A space
collage using a tryptich principle, truly a dramatic poem-what I want to do. A clear spatial
aesthetic is formed by the contrast of stage action, flat projection, and live orchestra behind
the screen on which the images are projected. It's all structured like music, and a law is
present. Break it and a new one is set up. This is what attracts me-leitmotifs and repetitions,
then sudden contrast; plus tempo indications. Themes disappear only to crop up again later.
Radok is especially good at this. Why the crumpled projection screen? I wanted to prove
that you can project on a relief surface with a depth of more than fifteen centimeters and
create the effect of a smooth surface; and then, too, the surface at other times suggests the
deteriorated conditions depicted by the play.*

T h e Soldiers (Figs. 14, 15, and 16), a contemporary German opera by Zimmermann that had its premiere in Munich (March 1969) is the latest product in the
evolution of the Polyekran and Diapolyekran forms; it follows the latter more,
closely in that its screens are, with one dramatic exception, immobile and rather
tightly clustered together in parallel planes. They depart from the Diapolyekran
model, however, in being far fewer (thirteen), much larger (up to 18' x iz'), and
in several planes. Another distinctive feature is the placement of two box-like
spaces in the midst of the screens; spaces which may be used as interior acting
areas or curtained off to form two screens. Rear projection is employed on all
of the screens, and the two acting areas just mentioned have front projections
as well. Black and white slides form the basis of projection, with film projection
being available for three of the screens.
A striking example of the evolutionary process in Svoboda's creative work with
a given form is the kinetic variant of the Diapolyekran principle employed at the
climax of the opera: the total cluster of the screens literally disintegrates, the
screens separating from one another and moving offstage. As they sink below
stage level, rise u p out of sight, or move off laterally, a huge, futuristic "war
machine" grinds forward toward the footlights, accompanied by a pulsating,
increasingly blinding light and ear shattering dissonant music:
With the help of improved instruments and materials, and with new placement and composition of the screens, I was able to create a concentrated, massive visual impact, a collage of
military life from Rome to the Franco-Prussian war in confrontation with World War I1 and
Vietnam. Especially effective was the juxtaposition of Goya's etchings with photographs
depicting intolerance and martyrdom today. T h e sheer size of the stage and auditorium [the
Munich Staatsoper] was another factor: aiming at psycho-plastic space, I designed everything
with the proportions of the theatre in mind.*

Figure 14. A model of The Soldiers set (Munich 1969), indicating the arrangement of screens
in several planes as well as one of the acting spaces; the second acting space is immediately
stage right of the one shown here.

4-It-

Figure 15. The Soldiers, illustrating the relative size of the total set (see the live actors silhouetted in the two acting spaces), and one of the varied projection techniques: combined slide
(negative) and film projection (the facial closeup, and the rear of the two acting spaces).

145

What is especially interesting is that Svoboda does not feel that he has yet
found the right dramaturgic material for the Diapolyekran system: "The form
has yet to be employed with a congenial artistic-poetic text, at least not in the
same sense that other forms or devices reached full realization, for example the
use of mirrors in Insect Comedy, or Laterna Magika in T h e Last Ones." *
Common to all of the projection forms here briefly discussed, as well as to
virtually all of Svoboda's work, is a vivid sense of separate elements imaginatively
combined to express new insights into reality. I t is a principle that may take
a variety of forms, including, for example, cubism, especially as defined in the
following remarks by Marshall McLuhan, remarks that suggest yet another
aspect of Svoboda's work:
Instead of the specialized illrtsion of the third dimension, cubism sets u p an interplay of
planes and contradictions or dramatic conflict of patterns, lights, textures. . . . [It] drops the
illusion of perspective in favor of instant awareness of the whole. . . . Is it not evident that
the moment that sequence yields to the simultaneous, one is in the world of the structure'and
of configuration? 13

These few examples of the kinetic, mirror, and projection forms in Svoboda's
scenography suggest the fundamental characteristics of his work as a whole: a
synthesis, a sophistication, and a masterful application of the theories and practical experiments that are considered the coordinates of modern stage design
and production. Svoboda's scenography bears obvious kinship to that of such
giants of modern theatre theory and practise as Appia, Craig, and Piscator, as well
as the Soviet avant-gartle of the twenties. Nevertheless, such comparison requires
qualification in order to define the essential features of his talent. H e is less of a
theoretical visionary than either Appia or Craig but surpasses them in his
mastery of sophisticated materials and techniques as well as in sheer practical
experience. Although many of his productions recall the emphasis on scenic
dynamics and stage-as-mechanism evident in the early post-revolutionary work
of the Soviet theatricalists, Meyerhold and Tairov, Svoboda's greater technical
sophistication and more suggestive approach provide a richer, more emotive
experience. Similarly, although some of his most audacious work in the fusion
of film and stage relates to the earlier work of Piscator, he has carried the work
to a much higher, more complex level that amounts to the creation of a new,
hybrid medium combining actor and screened image.
More than anyone else in contemporary scenography (one is tempted to say,
uniquely), Svoboda embodies a fusion of artist, scientist, and professional
theatre worker. Technically a master of his complex medium, and thoroughly
conversant with the realities of theatre production-the
pressure of deadlines,
budgets, personnel supervision, and inter-artistic cooperation-he
is above all
a superb theatre artist whose approach to each production challenge is that of a
poet in its exercise of creative imagination applied to the fundamentals of space,
light, and movement.
13

McLuhan, p. 13.