In alphabetical order
Chris Berchild is the chairperson and an associate professor in the Department of Theater at Indiana State University where he teaches Theater History and Theory, Play Analysis, Directing, Dramaturgy, and Sound and Projection Design. Berchild received his PhD in Drama and Theatre from the University of California San Diego. He has published on Czech theatre, scenography and technology for the theatre, and Irish theatre. Berchild is also the director of the Interdisciplinary Center for Media Technology in the Arts (ICMTA), which is housed in the ISU Department of Theater. Berchild is also the artistic director of Crossroads Repertory Theatre, a professional repertory theatre in Terre Haute, Indiana, where he has most recently directed The Lonesome West (2016), RENT (2015), Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (2014), The Woman in Black (2013), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2012), Titus Andronicus (2011), Frankenstein (2010), Much Ado About Nothing (2009), and Macbeth (2008). He is currently working on two book projects on projection design and international Shakespearean scenographies.
Christian M. Billing is Senior Lecturer and Head of Drama within the School of Arts at the University of Hull, UK. He studied Drama, Theatre Studies and Greek Civilisation at the Universities of Kent, London, Leeds and Warwick, and first joined the academic staff of the School of Arts at the University of Hull in 2001—after eleven years working professionally in film and theatre, as well as teaching dramatic literature and theatre practice at various universities in the United Kingdom and the United States of America. He is a recognised international authority on Shakespeare in performance and author of Masculinity, Corporality and the English Stage 1580 – 1635 (Ashgate, 2008), as well as numerous book chapters and journal articles, particularly in Shakespeare Survey, Shakespeare, Shakespeare Quarterly, Shakespeare Bulletin and New Theatre Quarterly. As an editor he has produced Rehearsing Shakespeare: Alternative Strategies in Process and Performance (special issue of Shakespeare Bulletin, 2012); and with Pavel Drábek Czech Stage Art and Stage Design, (Masaryk University Press, 2011) and Czech Puppets in Global Contexts (Masaryk University Press, 2014). His research primarily considers the theory and practice of scenography; transnational and intercultural theatre and performance; professional rehearsal and performance practices for historically-distanced playtexts; and gender studies, particularly in relation to early modern English and ancient Athenian drama and society.
Dennis Christilles is an Associate Professor of Theatre at the University of Kansas where he teaches, directs and designs and is currently serving as University Theatre Artistic Director. He has been the Director of the KU Summer Theatre in Greece program since 2000. For that program he has adapted and directed shared language productions of Trojan Women, Eumenides, Agamemnon, Bacchae, Orestes and Electra for performance in the Ancient Theatre of Oiniades, Greece. His other directing credits include Jungalbook, The Odyssey, Through the Looking Glass, King Stag, Talley’s Folly, as well as his own adaptations of Aristophanes’ Congress of Women, H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine and Bram Stoker’s Dracula. He has created designs for West Side Story, Jesus Christ Superstar, Company, Measure for Measure, Blithe Spirit, Othello, Tartuffe, Threepenny Opera, The Crucible, The Norman Conquests, As You Like It, Pageant, Abide With Me, Spitfire Grill, Hedda Gabler, Sea Gull, Ghosts, HMS Pinafore, Kiss Me Kate, A Doll’s House, Mousetrap, Temptation and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Jules Deering is Technical Director of the Drama department at Queen Mary University of London, where he lectures in scenography, and teaches technical theatre methodologies. His early career was that of a sound and lighting designer, frequently for experimental theatre. He has been working in education for the past 12 years, and delivered his first conference paper on Malina’s 1984 design for Sen Noci Svatojánské at Hull during the inaugural conference on Czech and Slovak Scenography for Shakespeare.
Pavel Drábek is Professor of Drama and Theatre Practice at the University of Hull. His research interests are in Shakespeare, early modern European theatre, in drama translation, and theatre theory. He has published a book České pokusy o Shakespeara (Czech Attempts at Shakespeare, 2012) on Czech translations within a cultural history since the 1770s, on Shakespeare’s collaborator and successor John Fletcher (Fletcherian Dramatic Achievement: The Mature Plays of John Fletcher, 2010), on seventeenth-century English comedy in Germany, on early modern puppet theatre, and on theatre structuralism (in a forthcoming anthology Theatre Theory Reader: Prague School Writings). He is currently working on a book called Adapting and Translating for the Stage. From 2003 to 2015 he was Artistic Director of the Ensemble Opera Diversa, a professional music and modern opera company based in Brno, Czech Republic. He has written opera librettos, radio plays and dramas, often collaborating with composer Ondřej Kyas. He is also an active translator and theatre director.
Cat Fergusson Baugh is a lecturer in Drama at the University of Hull. Her research has a twin focus on the applications of computer visualisation in contemporary production design and theatre history, and the use of theatrical space (architecture and scenography) in the 17th – 19th centuries. The focus of her current research combines these two areas in an exploration of the opportunities for the scholar to enhance their fundamental understanding of theatrical space through the process of computer reconstruction. In this area, she has made contributions to Channel 4’s Lost Buildings series, THEATRON, a virtual exploration of historical theatre space and to Exhibitions of the work of Edward Gordon Craig and Phillip Loutherbourg for the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
Zuzana Koblišková is a Curator of the Scenography Collections at the Museum of the Theatre Institute in Bratislava (with a specialization in online database development, maintenance and digitizing of the museum collections). Her research at the Museum has resulted recently in co-authoring a publication on the collections: A small museum with a large collection (A Guide to the Museum of the Theatre Institute). She earned her Master’s degree in Art History at Comenius University in Bratislava and she is currently doing her PhD at the University of Hull researching the Slovak Scenography for Shakespeare from 1920-1989.
Vlasta Koubská teaches history and theory of stage design at the Theatre Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. For many years she has been a curator and head of the Theatre Department of the National Museum in Prague responsible for the collections of stage and costume designs and stage models. Her main research interest covers Czech avantguards of the 1920s and 1930s. She has authored and curated numerous scenographic exhibitions and books (e.g. on F. Tröster, F. Zelenka, J. Čapek, B. Feuerstein, F. Muzika, V. Hofman, A. V. Hrska , F. Tichý, J. Malina, J. Svoboda, O. Schindler, J. Zborilova, Theatre costume etc.). Besides that she is also active in theory of stage design and authored several monographs on history of arts.
Šárka Havlíčková Kysová received her PhD from Masaryk University, Brno in 2010 with the doctoral thesis Hastaabhinaya. Hand gestures in traditional theatre art of India. From 2009 to 2012 she taught theatre theory at Palacký University in Olomouc. From 2011 to 2015 she worked on two Masaryk University research projects; ‘Czech Structuralist Thought on Theatre: Context and Potency’ and ‘Operational Programme Education for Competitiveness – 2.2 Higher Education’. Since 2012 she has worked as assistant professor at the Department of Theatre Studies at Masaryk University. In her research and teaching, she focuses on theatre theory with an emphasis on the cognitive approach in theatre studies. She also specialises in opera staging and the traditional Indian theatre form – Kootiyattam. Since 2015 she has lead the research project ‘Generation of Miloš Wasserbauer, the theatre director, and progressive dramaturgy of State Theatre in Brno’ which is focused on operatic productions in Brno in the second half of the 20th century (supported by the Czech Science Foundation project No. GA15-06548S).
Dan Matthews started his theatre career in his home town of Rock Springs, Wyoming where he earned an Associate of Fine Arts degree in Musical Theatre from Western Wyoming Community College. While continuing his theatre studies at the University of Northern Colorado he began exploring the Design and Technology fields. This led him to The Ohio State University where in 2006 he received an MFA in Theatre Arts with an emphasis in Scenic and Lighting Design, all the while honing his construction skills in the Scenic Studio. After 3 years as the Faculty Technical Director for the Kansas State University Theatre Department Dan relocated to Chicago, IL to pursue a freelance career in Design and Technical Direction. He found a niche with Chicago Shakespeare Theater as a House Carpenter and Tour Technical Director. As Tour TD he helped bring professional Shakespeare productions to schools all over Chicagoland, northwest Indiana, southern Wisconsin, and western Illinois. He is all too familiar with driving big trucks through Chicago rush hour traffic. As an Assistant Professor for the Ohio State Lima Department of Theatre Dan fulfills the roles of Scenic Designer, Lighting Designer, Technical Director, and Production Manager. His Jack-of-All-Trades approach to theatre has prepared him well for this multifaceted position. His interest in Czech Scenography began in 2005 with the Prague Theatre Program, an international study tour led by Dr. Joseph Brandesky. If all goes according to plan he willcontinue his exploration of Central European Scenography with his new, old, local, and international friends and colleagues.
Jana Preková is a visual artist, scenographer, costume designer, light designer, curator, and co-founder of the Studio of Body Design at the Faculty of Fine Arts, Brno University of Technology and Department of Scenography at the Theatre Faculty of Janáček Academy of Music and Peforming Arts. She studied Scenography at the Theatre Faculty of Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. She cooperates with directors J. Nebeský, J. A. Pitínský, M. Bambušek and V. Čermáková. Her projects include studio, site specific or low cost experimental productions and realizations for the National Theatres, television and film. Preková exhibits visual works, she is a curator of young artists’ presentations. She received the Golden Medal PQ 99 for costume and she is a member of the team, which received the Golden Triga PQ 99. Creative teams she was a member of have been nominated and awarded by the Alfréd Radok award. Her works are to be seen in the Czech Republic and abroad.
Barbora Příhodová received her PhD in theatre history and theory at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. Her research interests include contemporary and historical forms of design and space in performance, modern Czech theater, and Josef Svoboda’s work in particular. She is a co-author of the book Czech Theatre Costume (2011) and the documentary film Theatre Svoboda (2011). Her edited book Scenography Speaks: Conversations of Jarka Burian with Josef Svoboda (2014) was nominated for the Czech “Theatre News Award” 2014 in the category Best Publication in the Field of Theatre. She is the contemporary section curator of the exhibition Shakespeare in Prague: Imagining the Bard in the Heart of Europe. Currently, she is working on a book-length project about Czech scenography in the second half of the 20th century. She teaches at Villanova University.
Jana (Bžochová-)Wild is a professor at the Academy of Performing Arts Bratislava, Slovakia. Her writings on Shakespeare include Slovak language monographs—Hamlet: the Adventure of a Text (1998), The Enchanted Island? Shakespeare´s “The Tempestˮ Otherwise (2003), A Short Cultural History of Hamlet (2007), Shakespeare. Zooming (2017)—as well as editing and translating a section on Shakespeare, “From Women´s Reading to Feminisms ˮ for the feminist revue Aspekt (Aspekt, Nr. 2, 2001). Recently she edited two collections of essays— “In double trust.ˮ Shakespeare in Central Europe (2014, in English) and Mirrors of/for the Times. Shakespeare in Central European Theatre (2015). In Bratislava, she was organiser of two international conferences on Shakespeare (Chronicles of the Time, 2013; Shakespeare in Between, 2016) and of the internet platform Shakespeare-Slovakia.info (forthcoming).