The Costume Designers List of Competence

The costume designer´s list of competence "Costume is critical. It is critical to making performance, critical to spectatorship, critically overlooked within scholarship, notable when in crisis, and a means of critically interrogating the body. /.../ A critical discourse of costume aims to promote new questions and scholarship on the intersections between body, design and performance. This is the concern of critical costume." Sidsel Bech and Rachel Hann: Critical Costume. Scene Volume 2 Numbers 1 & 2. 2014 Intellect Ltd Editorial. Costume design, as scenography, are disciplines with one foot in the discourse of performing arts and one foot in the discourse of design/ fine art/ architecture. Costume design is a field of study that is sometimes organized at the theatre department, sometimes at the design- or fine art department. Where the costume study is located, seems more as a result of tradition, than of a critical discussion on what is necessary to educate competent costume designers. Wherever the location is, there is a need for securing access to being a part of both discourses and to access both fields of knowledge. With the concept of Critical Costume, the need for such a discussion becomes clear. Christina Lindgren has over the past year developed a costume designer´s list of competence, based on dialogue with colleagues and research on study plans as well as literature. During the congress World Stage Design in Taipei 2017, she presented the list, conducted a discussion for professionals, educators and students. The discussion resulted in a revision. This lecture will focus on how the list been build up and how it potential can be a tool for working with study plans, conduction of survey among alumni students and in question about affiliation. The revised list will be handed out. This lecture, The costume designer´s list of competence, will center on the question: How can we secure a broad, deep, relevant and advanced competence for the costume designer of tomorrow?