Chelsea Jewell
Chelsea Jewell
Production Designer, Visual Artist
Chelsea Jewell is an architect, artist and maker. Primarily trained to make places for people, creating worlds for characters and immersive visual environments has been a natural evolution of her creative practice. At the core of this practice is an obsessive pursuit of meaning as an act of creativity, social engagement and sustainability.
Biography
Chelsea Jewell resides in South East Queensland and has been a regular collaborator with director Heide Gledhill, predominantly as a production designer. Trained as an architect and more recently completing a long format Contemporary Visual Arts program at the Byron School of Art, Chelsea is an avid explorer of many creative disciplines. As an emerging artist Chelsea seeks to explore themes connected to body, place and (dis)order. As a maker of environments, places and garments, Chelsea has engaged throughout her career with design, fashion, art, writing and performance, developing a rich creative practice that is diverse and multifaceted. Within the context of production design for theatre, Chelsea seeks to interrogate spatial archetypes, mining new and established visual languages that can be employed to create engaging, thoughtful enriching set designs and costumes that are additive to the audience experience.
Ad Astra Plays
Upcoming Plays
Past Plays
Other Theatre
2016 – Ladies in Black, QPAC, Set dresser
2017 – The Eisteddfod, Metro Arts, Production Designer
2018 – The Hanging, Playlab, Production Designer
Training
1998-2007 QUT, Bachelor of Architecture
2008-2010 Mt Gravatt TAFE, Fashion Design (millinery)
2020-2022 Byron School of Art, Contemporary Visual Art
Representation
Freelance
Reviews
Chelsea Jewell has designed a minimalist set with framed fabric veils and small props to keep the spotlight on the actors and their impactful performances. Madelyne Leite's lighting and Tommi Civili's sound complement each scene, designed to highlight the emotional undercurrents as the characters’ lives unravel.
Stage Buzz Brisbane | Read Review Here
The creatives Chelsea Jewell, Maddy Leite and Tommi Civili, emphasised the focus on the action, by designing a minimalistic set, around the onstage narrative, which served to support an electrifying but memorable performance and kept the audience awake and wondering.
Lilian Harrington - Absolute Theatre | Read Review Here
‘Surrounding the characters is Chelsea Jewell’s finely crafted production design. Jewell cleverly combines an uncomfortable suggestion of the generic suburban home with an imaginative fashioning of specific objects into functional and beautiful storytelling devices.’
— Rhumer Diball, Downstage Discernments | Read full review
‘Chelsea Jewell’s production design grounds The Eisteddfod, locking us with Abelone and Gerture in their basement cloister with just a ladder and a wire bedframe.’
- Zenobia Frost | Read full review