OISTAT Celebrates 50 Years of Design & Cultural Influence at RWCMD

9 February 2018

OISTAT Celebrates 50 Years of Design & Cultural Influence at the Royal Welsh College this Summer
29th August – 2nd September 2018

Applications will open on April 16th 2018

This year the International Organisation of Scenographers, Theatre Architects and Technicians (OISTAT) will be celebrating fifty years of cultural influence and international importance over the performance landscape.

The celebration takes place at Cardiff’s Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama between 29th August and 2nd September 2018.

The Royal Welsh College, which was the venue for World Stage Design 2013, will be the host for the four-day series of public celebratory activities and events, including workshop and performance presentations, exhibitions, symposium and keynote speakers.

Events will cover areas from performance design to technical theatre, theatre architecture to education and research. Highlights include a collaboration workshop with National Theatre Wales’s STORM project, and workshops with guest artists renowned Japanese scenographer Kazue Hatano, and leading scenographer and art director Aby Cohen.

The Celebration will also see the launch of the Society of British Theatre Designers new digital gallery.

The College’s Linbury Gallery will feature a graphic installation exhibition charting OISTAT’s fifty year history, and there will be a chance to reminisce and reflect on OISTAT’s contribution to cultural life with RWCMD International Chair in Design, Pamela Howard OBE.

“As Director of Drama at the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama and a member of the OISTAT executive Committee, it gives me enormous pride, five years after hosting World Stage Design here in Cardiff to return to the College to celebrate OISTAT’s fiftieth year.

OISTAT has been an inspirational influence on the production and design courses at the College and is at the centre of our international activity.”
Sean Crowley Director of Drama, RWCMD

As with World Stage Design 2013 volunteers are encouraged to apply to come and join the OISTAT community to help with workshops, performances and events.
Additional Workshops Proposals are welcomed but cannot guaranteed to be included.

For more information contact: admin@theatredesign.org.uk

Editors notes
OISTAT – International Organisation of Scenographers, Theatre Architects, and Technicians was founded in 1968 as a cooperative, global, non-governmental organization. OISTAT serves those who facilitate and create design for live performance, including practitioners, researchers, students, and associated partners.
OISTAT has 6 commissions; they are Architecture, Education, Performance Design, Publication & Communication, Research and Technology. OISTAT has four renowned international projects: World Stage Design, Scenofest, Theatre Architecture Competition and Technical Invention Prize. The Headquarters of OISTAT relocated to Taipei in 2006.

The Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama, the National Conservatoire of Wales, and part of the University of South Wales Group, operates within its international peer group of conservatoires and specialist arts colleges. It trains young artists drawn from around 30 countries to provide a constant flow of emerging talent into the music and theatre industries and related professions.

In June 2011, the College opened new £22.5 million performance and rehearsal spaces. The world-class facilities include the Richard Burton Theatre, the Linbury Gallery, a café bar, rehearsal studios and the Dora Stoutzker Hall.

The College was recently ranked in the Guardian University League tables as the top Drama training programme in the UK for the third time in four years.