The living arts

Press, 13 July 1976, Page 28

The living arts

The western front Don McAra's production of "Oh, V.„it a Lovely War,” Joan Littlewood’s documentary play about World War I, which was performed in the Christchurch Teachers' College drama workshop last week, will have a second season this week — in Greymouth. Theatre groups on the West Coast have invited the production to play for a night in the Regent Theatre, Greymouth, as part of their promotion of drama in ‘he threatre, which was recently threatened with closing. There will be two performances, a matinee for schools and an evening show for the public. The play is a satirical documentary, mostly set to music, with choreography by Sue Lister. Silver threads T went y-three pieces submitted for the first National Weaving Award, sponsored recently by the Dowse Art Gallery in Lower Hutt, are on show in the C.S.A. gallery this week. They include wall hangings, rugs, off-loom pieces, and threedimensional sculptural works, and have as the star attractions the award-

winning pieces done by Gorgia Suiter (traditional loom techniques), of Auckland, Margaret Thompson (off-loom techniques), of Wellington, and the work by Kathleen Low, of Wellington, who won an unscheduled award of merit for loom techniques. The contest was prompted by the success of a competition run in 1974 for Wellington weavers only, and the Dowse gallery hopes it will become an annual event. This year’s winners got $750 each. All the works are for sale, and at the end of the month they will go on to Dunedin to be exhibited there. New light A $4O lamp has added to the Queen’s priceless art treasures by casting fresh light on her Leonardo drawings, the British Press Association reported. Its ultra-violet light has revealed details, and even complete drawings, wh : ch seemed to have vanished with the passage of *he centuries. Sir Robei t Mackworth-Young, the Queen’s librarian at Windsor Castle, said that he had seen the lamp advertised in a museum journal, and had recaded that an art expert had examined other drawings under ultra-violet light more than 20 years ago.

to see hidden details. So he had decided to try it. The result was a revelation. Vanished drawings sprang up as if new. Faded drawings produced a wealth of hidden detail and modelling. Sir Robert explained how it works: "Pencils were net invented in Leonardo’s day. If he wanted to achieve a pencil effect he prepared the surface of the paper with a special ground, and scratched on it with a metal point. A metal deposit is left, but it sterns that with the passage of time — most of the drawings date from the 1480 s — it reacts to become invisible in ordinary light It absorbs ultra-violet light, though, and shows up in it as a black line.” If the drawings are lit by an ordinary lamp ano the ultra-violet lamp at the same time, they appear faintly, as in normal light, with all the losses caused by time. Wotan’s gold? A long-playing record featuring the New Zealand bass-baritone, Donald Mclntyre, and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. conducted by John Matheson, recorded and released in New Zealand last year, will be sold throughout Europe under a distribution agreement just announced. RCA

Schallplatten GMBH.of Hamburg, will first release the album in Germany, processing it from tapes supplied by the New Zealand company, Reed Pacific Records, Ltd. This release will be timed to coincide with the centennial Wagner Festival at Bayreuth, where Donald Mclntyre will appear as Wotan in three of four complete performances of Wagner’s cycle of musicdramas, The Ring of the Nibelung. Mclntyre is acknowledged today as the world’s leading exponent of this great role. The record will be released later in Austria, Switzerland, France, Scandinavia, and Great Britain. Stage downed Raymond Boyce, a wellknown figure in Wellington theatre for many years, has retired after eight years as chairman of the professional company, Downstage Theatre. His successor is Mr A. A. Jennings, an insurance broker, who is the first non-actor appointed to the position in the 12 years since the company began. Another Downstage development is the announcement of a United States State Department grant to the associate director, Collin McColl. He will study the theatre in the United States.