ACFNY Recommended | “Artists as Stage Designers” Book Presentation

November 18, 6 PM ET

Slag Gallery, 522 W 19th St, New York, NY 10011

Slag Gallery invites you to the launch of Painting The Stage: Artists as Stage Designers, with its limited editions by the Kabakovs and William Kentridge and in presence of the author Denise Wendel-Poray.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Denise Poray-Wendel takes us into the uncharted territory of the intertwining of visual and musical arts. Painting the Stage first examines more than 200 years of opera stage design, unraveling this rich historical tale through more than 250 illustrations, interviews, and accurate reconstructions. The most complete resource book yet on the subject, it will be of great interest to those in the fields of art as well as opera.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Denise Wendel-Poray is a Canadian writer, journalist and curator. She has authored books and essays concerning the relationship between art, theatre and music including her latest book  Painting the Stage. She has curated extensive exhibitions at the Wilhelm Lehmbruck Museum in Germany and the Rupertinum Museum (William Kentridge) and Sammlung Friedrichshof in Austria. 

ABOUT THE LIMITED EDITION

The exquisite wooden sculpture created and signed by archistar Mario Botta functions like a proscenium theatre framing each one of the numbered prints created exclusively for this publication by the artists William Kentridge, the Kabakovs, and Jan Fabre. A luxury cloth-covered copy of Denise Wendel-Poray’s Painting the Stage is hidden in a sliding drawer in the back. There are four separate and distinct versions of this limited edition, with special woods for each: an ash wood sculpture for the two William Kentridge prints, walnut for the print by the Kabakovs, and durmast for that of Jan Fabre. Mario Botta designed the box exclusively for the project, and Riva1920 made them. All the prints have been numbered and signed by the artists. Each print is related to an opera production that was designed by the artist and that is discussed in detail in a chapter of Painting the Stage.