Agony of Ecstasy

Agony of Ecstasy presented me with my first solo lighting design opportunity for a full production. Filmed during COVID-19 without an audience, I faced the challenge of balancing camera visibility with design elements within the confines of our black-box theater. 

Each of the four one-act plays were filmed on separate nights, each with its own distinct mood, locale, set, and spatial arrangement to the cameras. (Teeth, pictured below, was shot through a rigged puppet mouth!) 

As my own operator for this production, I adapted my design and programming to the sensitivities of our recording equipment and shot order, as well as included live busking effects. 

I worked closely with director Dr. Gina Sandí-Díaz to surrealistically personify relational and emotional trauma, power dynamics, machismo, and political unrest through the use of saturated colors shifting the audience between reality and heightened expressionistic terrors.