Zane is a New York based set and costume designer whose work has been seen all over the world. Upcoming productions in 2017-18 include a world premiere of the first interactive video game opera PermaDeath, Boston (director Sam Helfrich); The Dolls House, Gotenburg, Sweden (director Yana Ross; L'enfant et les sortilèges, Seattle Symphony (director Anne Patterson); The Perfect American, Long Beach Opera and Chicago Opera Theater (director Kevin Newbury);
Rev22, Boston (director Mark Streshinsky); and The Ugly One, Shanghai (director Dmitry Troyanovsky)
He continues to work extensively with international avant-garde theater director Yana Ross. Work with Ross includes scenery and costumes for Eurydice at The Finish National Theater (Helsinki); scenery and costumes for Uncle Vanya and Heart of a Dog at The Uppsala State Theater (Sweden); scenery and costumes for Macbeth at the Volksbühne Am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz (Berlin); costumes for Our Class at The National Theater of Lithuania; costumes for Bambiland at The National Theater of Lithuania and the Oskaras Korsunovas Costumes and Scenery for The SeagulThe Reykjavik City Theater; and scenery and costumes for Sleeping Beauty at The Seoul Performing Arts Festival (South Korea).
Other international work includes sets and/or costumes for The King Stag (dir. Dmitry Troyanovsky) at The Shanghai Theater Academy, China; and You, We, Us, All (dir. Andrew Ondrejcak) co-produced by
deSingel International Arts Campus, Antwerp, Beligum
and Kampnagel Sommerfestival, Hamburg, Germany. 4:48 Psychosis (dir. Dmitry Troyanovsky) at The Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center, China
Since 2008, Zane has been the resident designer for Company XIV, a neo-baroque dance theater company based in New York City. He continues to collaborate with visual director and choreographer Austin McCormick on his intensely physical productions that fuse opera, dance, burlesque, circus and fashion. Company XIV productions are inherently dark, sensual, re-imagined versions of classic operas and fairy tales. Zane has designed costumes and/or scenery for almost all productions with Mr. McCormick, thus developing a decadent company aesthetic that is often intentionally visually self-referencing. In 2014, their production of Nutcracker Rouge received Drama Desk Nominations for Best Costume Design and Most Unique Theatrical Experience and, in 2015 Nutcracker Rouge was nominated for Best Choreography. In 2012, Zane and Austin won the Opera America Director/Designer Competition. Their fully designed proposal for John Adams’s A Flowering Tree was presented at Boston’s conference.
In New York City, Zane frequently collaborates with Beth Morrison Projects. BMP’s focus is to develop new operas and music pieces with today’s emerging and established composers. Zane has designed scenery and/or costumes for Sumeida’s Song (Here Arts Center); Song of the Uproar and Binibon (The Kitchen Theater) and The Ouroboros Trilogy (Boston).
Also in New York, Zane designed the costumes for the premier production of Tarrell Alvin McCraney's The Brothers Size (dir. Tea Alagic, The Public Theater) with subsequent tours to The Studio Theater (Washington, D.C.) and The Abbey (Dublin, Ireland). Tea and Zane created a new production at The Actors Theater of Louisville in 2014.
Awards and Recognition: Drama Desk Nom (2014), Bessie Nom (2012), New York Innovative Theater Award Nom (2011), The Opera America Director/Designer Competition (2012), Donald and Zorka Oenslager Travel Fellowship (2006), The Donald and Zorka Oenslager Award in Stage Design (2005 and 2006), and the 2004 Michael Merritt Scholarship Award in Stage Design. Zane’s costume sketches and scenic models were exhibited at the Prague Quadrennial in 2007.
Education: BFA, DePaul University. MFA, Yale School of Drama. Zane is a member of the theatre collective Wingspace Theatrical Design.
