John Eberson (1875 – 1954) was an american designer who was known for his cinema décors. One of his earliest, the 1923 Majestic Theatre in Houston, Texas, was a loosely recreated garden of a late-Renaissance palazzo in Italy. Through his workshop Michelangelo Studios, he was was successful at producing elaborate plasterwork for his theatre décors in Spanish, Moorish, Dutch, Chinese and other styles.
Over the course of his 50-year career, he designed over 500 theatres. He earned the moniker “Father of Atmospheric Theatre.”
Biography
John Eberson was born in Bukovina, Romania in 1875 and studied at the University of Vienna in 1893 and immigrated to the United States in 1901.
“We visualise and dream magnificent amphitheater, an Italian Garden, a Persian Court, a Spanish patio, or an Egyptian templyard, all canopied by a soft moonlight sky.”
John Eberson
Eberson settled in St Louis Missouri, where he learned theater design while working for the Johnston Theatrical firm. Upon gaining knowledge of all facets of theatre building he moved to Hamilton, Ohio, in 1904, where he continued his architectural practice.
The Atmospheric Theatre
While he also planned conventional theatres, he was best known for the unique concept of atmospheric design. He provided theatre audiences with a romantic fantasy escape, an outrageously diverse architectural tradition. His work took on four basic atmospheric styles: Moorish, Persian Courtyards, Italian Gardens and Egyptian Temples.
While other designers hung elaborate chandeliers Eberson created simple Mediterranean blue evening skies with wispy clouds and twinkling lights simulating stars, which brought his design costs to 25% less than other builders of the day.
The Atmospheric Theatre – the experience
An atmospheric theatre recreated the sensation of being in an exotic outdoor setting, typically a Mediterranean courtyard or garden, with an azure sky overhead. The introduction of new technology in the form of the Brenograph projector resulted in wispy clouds drifting lazily across cerulean heavens, which were actually a domed plaster ceiling resembling that of a planterium. As the film began, the illusion of a sunset began, gradually deepening to a deep velvet mauve. Twinkling lights in constellation patterns became visible as the ceiling was revealed.
Eberson’s goal was to bring the outside in. His nine “P” motto was: Prepare Practical Plans for Pretty Playhouses – Please Patrons – Pay Profits.
With the 1923 opening of The Majestic in Houston, Texas, Eberson’s first atmospheric theatre came the demand for the more of the same. He built in many different parts of the United States as well as overseas. But, as quickly as the birth of the atmospheric theatre arrived, it departed. In just seven short years, with the arrival of the Great Depression came the death of the boom of Eberson’s atmospherics.
Sources
Byars, M., & Riley, T. (2004). The design encyclopedia. Laurence King Publishing.
Naylor, D. (1981). American picture palaces: the architecture of fantasy. Van Nostrand Reinhold.
Williams, C. M., & Froehlich, D. E. (n.d.). In Contribution and Confusion: Architecture and the Influence of other Fields of Inquiry = 2003 ACSA International Conference. https://www.acsa-arch.org/proceedings/International%20Proceedings/ACSA.Intl.2003/ACSA.Intl.2003.80.pdf.
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Alexander Girard (1907 – 1993) American interior, & Textile designer
Alexander Girard (1907 – 1993) was a man of many design talents. He trained as an architect, and he practisedRead More →
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Alexander Calder (1898 – 1976) American Designer & Artist
He worked as an engineer in Rutherford, New Jersey, in 1919, and as a draftsperson and engineer in West Coast logging camps from 1919 to 23; from 1923 to 1930, he was active in New York, sketching for the National Police Gazette 1925—26; in 1926, he travelled to England and Paris, where he produced his…
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Don Albinson (1921- 2008) – American furniture designer
The 1965 stacking Albinson chair produced by Knoll was similar to British Designer’s Robin Day trendy chair for Hille, although Albinson’s was more sophisticated. They stack, hook together side by side and comfortable to sit in. After Knoll he became a consultant designer to Westinghouse on office seating and furniture systems.Read More →
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Winold Reiss (1886-1953) German artist and designer
Influenced by the international modern art movements that had recently swept across Europe, he blended cubism, which used geometric shapes to create abstract images, and fauvism, which favoured the use of bold colours to suggest shapes, with interest in ethnography to create a unique style of portraiture that sought to reveal the subject more thoroughly…
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Herb Lubalin (1918 – 1981) renowned graphic designer
Renowned American graphic designer, Herb Lubalin, best known for his collaborations with Ralph Ginzburg on the magazines Eros, Fact and Avant Garde, is regarded as one of the seminal designers of the 20th century. The, 17 March 2018, will mark what would have been Lubalin’s 100th birthday.Read More →
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Ray Eames an American Designer
Ray Eames (b. Bernice Alexandra Kaiser 1912-88) was an American designer. She was born in Sacramento, California. She was the wife of Charles Eames. Read More →
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Milton Glaser (1929 – 2020) American Graphic Designer
Co-founder of Push Tin Studios. The colourful posters of designer-illustrator Milton Glaser epitomise an era for the Woodstock generation. His psychedelic ‘American Sixties style’ was a synthesis of various influences ranging from Surrealism to Islamic painting.Read More →
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Mainbocher (1890 – 1976) – Simplicity without Boredom
When designing his 1945 spring collection, Mainbocher – the noted French designer who worked in New York after the fall of Paris in WWII. Declared that he had attempted more than ever to make clothes “that would embody the right amount of novelty, were stimulating for today,Read More →
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Albert Frey (1903 – 1998) and Desert Modernism
Frey was born in Zurich, Switzerland, and obtained his architecture diploma from the Winterthur Institute of Technology in 1924. Frey got technical training in traditional building construction rather than design education in the then-popular Beaux-Arts style. Frey worked in construction during his school vacations and apprenticed with architect A. J. Arter in Zurich before getting…
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Samuel Yellin (1885 – 1940) Polish American Blacksmith
Samuel Yellin was born in the Russian Empire in 1884 to a Jewish family in Mohyliv-Podilskyi, Ukraine. He was apprenticed to a master ironsmith when he was eleven years old. He finished his apprenticeship at the age of sixteen in 1900. He left Ukraine shortly after and travelled across Europe. He arrived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,…
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Oliver Messel (1904 – 1978) British theatre, film and interior designer – Encyclopedia of Design
Oliver Messel was a British theatre, film, and interior designer who lived from 1904 to 1978. He worked professionally in London and Barbados. He attended the Slade School of Fine Art in London. He met Rex Whistler at the Slade, with whom he began making papier-maché masks.
Josef Pohl (1894 – 1975) Czech lighting designer – Encyclopedia of Design
Josef Pohl (1894 – 1975) was a Czech lighting designer. He designed the 1929 precursor of the adjustable lamp. Gerd Balzer produced his model. As part of its Kamden collection, Korting und Mathieson created a similar lamp. Pohl and others at the Bauhaus also executed the prototype adjustable wall lamp illustrated in Staaliches Bauhaus, Weimar and produced by Jucker.