Course summary

The MA Performance Design course explores scenography and performance-making from various perspectives informed by current research and innovative practices including immersive and participatory forms of performance design, design-led performance, audience experience and contemporary spectatorship. On this course, you will experiment with the creative application of design elements, including light, space, sound and costume discovering how to shape live performance and generate meaning for contemporary audiences.  This course allows you to extend your own creative practice through developing an understanding of the theories and concepts of scenography and designing for live performance. You’ll use our specialist facilities to explore the performance experiences that can be created with light, space, objects, costume, sound, projection and digital technologies like pervasive media and mixed reality, creating original performance work that is design-led.   You’ll work collaboratively to create dynamic cutting-edge work and you’ll develop skills in documentation and reflection so that you can develop your individual creative practice.  You’ll devise and carry out an independent research project into an aspect of performance design that interests you. You’ll also examine contemporary performance practices, from immersive and participatory experiences to site-specific work staged outside of traditional theatre spaces and locate these within their wider social and cultural contexts.  Leeds has a thriving cultural scene, and is home to contemporary performance events like Light Night, Compass Festival and Transform Festival. Our industry connections allow you to work closely with local organisations such as Leeds Playhouse, Opera North, IOU and innovative artists in the field of performance design. Recently, students have worked with; Imitating the Dog, ZU-UK, Quarantine, Louise Ann Wilson, David Shearing, Julie Rose Bower, Freddie Wulf, Lucy Thornett, Rosie Elnile, Max Johns and Naomi Kuyck-Cohen. Explore some of the projects our students work on during their degrees on our gallery of student work: ahc.leeds.ac.uk/homepage/273/student_work The staff on this course are at the forefront of the study of scenography, especially at postgraduate levels (Masters and PhD). They have researched and published on how scenography makes a distinct contribution to performance both on and off the stage. Their books such as The Cambridge Introduction to Scenography (2009), Light (2013), and Scenography Expanded (2017) are used widely by educators, researchers and creative professionals around the world.