Susannah Henry:
Autoscenography

With Thanks

I would like to thank my supervisory team: Alex Mermikides, Rachel Hann and Dinah Stabb for their inspiration, support and encouragement throughout - and around - this project. I have been very lucky to have a team whose expertise bridges theatre-making, performance and scenography and three complementary perspectives on practice research.

Many thanks also to Helena Gaunt and Ben Sumner, who were part of the supervisory team in its early stages and who listened to me as I found my feet. Emily Orley and Kathrine Sandys were my upgrade examiners and their careful attention resulted in a turning point for the project, for which I am very grateful. Likewise, a masterclass with P.A. Skantze gave me permission to make my own practice the focus of my research. Sarah Gorman gave me my mock viva and some excellent food for thought about questioning the masts to which you nail your colours. Jane Collins and David Shearing were my final examiners, who made generous space for this project and tackled - via incisive comments and questions - the task of settling it further into its home field of scenography. Thanks to Cormac Newark for chairing the viva and for opening with a cheery headline.

My partner, Rhodri Marsden, has provided invaluable support in the form of music, IT knowledge and proof-reading, and has often been my first audience for papers. My former colleague Rhian Jones was a quietly essential support across the PhD, helping to make space for periods of intensive work around our co-teaching on the MACTPD programme at the Guildhall School. The MACTPD class of 2019 was a warm and encouraging audience as I rehearsed and delivered my paper for PQ2019. 

I am very grateful for the company of peer researchers on the doctoral programme at Guildhall School, and beyond. Nick Bonadies and Stephania Donini enrolled at the same time as me and were fantastic companions during writing sessions. Sarah McCabe, Anna-Helena McLean, Imogen Flower and Christina Vasileiou have all supported feminist confidence through their generosity and discussion. Thanks to Meg Cunningham, Ele Slade and Eleanor Field for their friendship from TaPRA 2018 onwards and into the future. There are collaborators, named and unnamed within all projects, who ensured that making autoscenography was not an isolated endeavour - thank you for your contributions and for keeping me company.

Lastly, I would like to acknowledge the contribution my family has made to this project. My maternal grandparents, Douglas and Constance Henry and my mother, Marilyn Wood (nee Henry) would not have imagined themselves as part of a PhD, but it was a particular pleasure to invoke their names and embody their gestures in front of an international conference audience in Prague in 2018. My father, Peter Wood, has been a source of unwavering support for this project, at points where I have managed to articulate what its focus was, or where I could not.