Brecht curtains

custom systems

The Brecht curtain has a central or lateral opening and is equipped with rings hanging on one or two cables tense horizontally.Technically it is a rudimentary Traveller curtain, which modest height covers only the lower part of the scene, but has a strong symbolic impact, having been introduced by the Brechtian epic theater, and is now used by various forms of contemporary theater.

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Piccolo Teatro, ''Harlequin Servant of Two Masters'' A famous staging by Giorgio Strehler and Ezio Frigerio which uses three Brecht curtains made of painted ASC - Sceno muslin with walk along central opening system.The three 3A - Aircraft cables along which the WAL - Wooden rings of as many Brecht curtains are made to slide to make scene changes are visible.

Piccolo Teatro, ''Life of Galileo'' Luciano Damiani, sketch for Life of Galileo.Beneath the stage, in full view, the winch inspired by the famous theatrical mechanical devices by Nicola Sabbatini with which the opening of the Brecht curtain was operated.It was a brilliant scenographical expedient with which Damiani conjugated the theater by Brecht ...

... with the seventeenth-century stage machines contemporaneous with Galileo.Valerio Morpurgo explains in his book 0.Lavventuradelsipario - Figurazione e metafora di una macchina teatrale, Ubulibri, 1984:«Brecht's lesson offers some of its best fruits in the shows by Giorgio Strehler who, enjoying from some Brecht curtains of all the manner and fabrics ...»

«... and from the innumerable exploitations of their functionality that countersigned the era of the epic theater found an exemplary solution in the creation by Luciano Damiani for Life of Galileo, an authentic machine moved by winches in full view.»

Piccolo Teatro, ''The Threepenny Opera'', 1956 «It's enough then to quote the two stagings of The Threepenny Opera: while in the first in 1956 [in this photograph, Editor's Note] Teo Otto, faithful to Brecht's lesson, articulates the representation with the opening and the closing of the authentic Brecht curtain set to a half height and showing the title of the opera ...»

Piccolo Teatro, ''The Threepenny Opera'', 1973 «... in the second staging in 1973 Ezio Frigerio makes of it an appendix for the different impending emblems that echo in the show.»The Brecht curtain made of painted ASC - Sceno muslin ...

... during its opening.Note that the traction system of the curtain has been made in such a way that its surface is kept taut during opening.

The Brecht curtain normally has two tails with a central opening and is similar to the Traveller curtains, of which it can be considered a stylization more suited to the needs of the Epic theatre.
Its height is usually between 2.5 and 4 m and above the curtain one can see the background of the stage.
Its realization is normally carried out with rather simple and crude methods.
The tails, usually made without fullness, are hung with visible WAL - Wooden rings or WAM - Metal rings on one or two 3A - Aircraft cables stretched in retracted position compared to the proscenium.
The opening is operated, as a rule, manually.

This material was used for...

Piccolo Teatro, ''Harlequin Servant of Two Masters''

Commedia dell'arte

Piccolo Teatro, ''Life of Galileo''

Prose theatre

Piccolo Teatro, ''The Threepenny Opera''

Prose theatre

Teatro i, ''Before the Retirement''

Prose theatre

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