Ilona Gaynor designs staging for a hypothetical court case
London designer and filmmaker Ilona Gaynor looks at how the setup of a courtroom can manipulate how a case is perceived for her Designers in Residence commission at London's Design Museum (+ slideshow).
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Ilona-Gaynor_Designers-in-Residence-Luke-Hayes_dezeen_468_9.jpg)
Based around a fictional court case in which a National Lottery draw is fixed, Ilona Gaynor presents scripts, props and camera directions that consider how the staging of the courtroom affects how details of a case are relaid to a jury.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Ilona-Gaynor_Designers-in-Residence-Luke-Hayes_dezeen_468_4.jpg)
"The essential premise of it is that the materiality of the design you see here is all designed to mimic how directors relate to actors," Gaynor told Dezeen.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Ilona-Gaynor_Designers-in-Residence-Luke-Hayes_dezeen_468_3.jpg)
Among the pieces on show is a courtroom diorama that shows how a director might begin to stage a theatrical production of the case.
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A green, flocked Chroma Key Set, designed to be edited out in post-production, takes on the exact geometry required to conduct a court case.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Ilona-Gaynor_Designers-in-Residence-Luke-Hayes_dezeen_468_5.jpg)
"Technically I could drag these down to the river front and if I brought a judge I could have a legal proceeding because this triangulation of furniture is the legal requirement," Gaynor told Dezeen.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Ilona-Gaynor_Designers-in-Residence-Luke-Hayes_dezeen_468_7.jpg)
Traditional courtroom sketches show how the fixtures of a cinematic courtroom might start to creep in. "You begin to see leakages in the drawing of cinematic placement, so a green screen and a few lights," said Gaynor.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Ilona-Gaynor_Designers-in-Residence-Luke-Hayes_dezeen_468_12.jpg)
A sequence of moodily lit photographs imagines a lawyer practicing dramatic gesturing ahead of a trial. For the images, which were shot in a mock courtroom at University College London, Gaynor took inspiration from newly uncovered images of Adolf Hitler rehearsing his oratory.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Designers-in-Residence_Ilona-Gaynor_dezeen_468_1.jpg)
Accompanying the exhibition, a show reel condenses 100 years of courtroom drama. The films demonstrate how different filming techniques are used to add comedy or gravity to a performance.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Designers-in-Residence_Ilona-Gaynor_dezeen_468_2.jpg)
"This is a kind of proof of concept," said Gaynor. "You can very clearly see by watching it how the genres change. In Liar Liar, Jim Carey is pulling stupid faces in a court and it's a comedy. It's shot very differently to the Rainmaker."
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Designers-in-Residence_Ilona-Gaynor_dezeen_468_0.jpg)
Ilona Gaynor is founder of research studio Department of No and teaches digital and media students "how to tell better stories" at Rhode Island School of Design.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Designers-in-Residence_Ilona-Gaynor_dezeen_1.jpg)
Designers in Residence is on display at London's Design Museum until 8 March 2014.
![Ilona Gaynor at Designers in Residence](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2014/09/Designers-in-Residence_Ilona-Gaynor_dezeen_21.jpg)
Exhibition photography by Luke Hayes.