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Oliver Messel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Oliver Hilary Sambourne Messel (b. January 13, 1904 - d. July 13, 1978) was an English artist and one of the foremost stage designers of the 20th century.
Messel was born in London, the second son of Lieutenant-Colonel Leonard Messel and Maud, the only daughter of Linley Sambourne, the eminent illustrator and contributor to Punch magazine. He was educated at Hawtreys, a boarding preparatory school in Kent, Eton--where his classmates included Evelyn Waugh, Harold Acton, and Brian Howard--and at the Slade School of Fine Art, University College. After completing his studies, he became a portrait painter and commissions for theatre work soon followed, beginning with his designing the masks for a London production of Serge Diaghilev's ballet Zephyr et Flore (1925). Subsequently, he created masks, costumes, and sets--many of which have been preserved by the Theatre Museum, London--for various works staged by C. B. Cochran's revues through the late 1920s and early 1930s.
- Pinkham, Roger, ed. Oliver Messel: A Biography. New York: Thames and Hudson, 1986.