For scenic designer, collaborative effort necessary to show’s success

As the opening night for “Dead Man Walking” nears, the technical crew is perfecting the final details of the show. Scenic designer and graduate student Jared Rutherford said creating and building the set for the stage has involved endless work and patience, but the experience has been an invaluable lesson.

“It has definitely helped me grow as a designer,” he said. “I learned a lot about how to effectively communicate my artistic ideas with a production team and how my ideas can evolve when working with other people.”

As scenic designer, Rutherford works with the director and other production members to create a set that will realize the collaborative vision of the team. He found inspiration early in the process and said the results went beyond his expectations.

“Working with the rest of the team has really let that inspiration grow into something bigger than I originally envisioned,” he said. “It has been very exciting to see the whole process come together.”

Rutherford began by pencil sketching a basic design to give the director an idea of his vision. Then, he refined his idea based on the feedback he received from the director and his team. He also built a small white paper model, that he took apart and dissected with the director to understand how each piece fit into the overall design. He constructed a more detailed color model to showcase the final design.  

When designing the set, Rutherford’s goal was to create a backdrop that would reflect the mood of the play and facilitate the smooth telling of the story.

“I see this play as a memory,” he said. “(The character) is remembering events that have already happened, and she often steps outside of the story to tell us how she felt at the time. So for me, the world I created needed to reflect her memory, and I chose imagery that I felt would have been burned into her memory during this experience.”

Despite his careful crafting of the set, Rutherford doesn’t want the backdrop on stage to distract the audience from the performance. He said he prefers them to absorb the story unfolding on stage.

“The best compliment a designer can get is for the audience to hardly notice the set at all,” he said.

Rutherford has been designing sets for years. As an undergraduate in his senior year, he designed the set for “Anything Goes.” At IU, he has designed sets for several plays, including “Big Love,” and “Measure for Measure.” He also designed “The Boys Next Door” for the Brown County Playhouse.

After this, Rutherford will take on scenic design for “Oklahoma!” as his thesis production for graduation in spring. He will also be co-propsmaster on “Hamlet” and scenic artist for “An Ideal Husband.”