Theater as Art: The Costume Sketches of Harvey Jurik

This exhibit features costume sketches drawn by Professor Emeritus of Theatre Harvey Jurik and then matched with photographs from University Archives from the actual productions. The exhibit compares what Professor Jurik imagined the costumes to look like against what actually was produced.

Jurik drew the sketches for “non-contemporary” St. Cloud State productions. The sketches then were primarily used as guides for students to create costumes.

Born in 1930 in Newark, New Jersey, Harvey Paul Jurik grew up in nearby Irvington. He left New Jersey for Pittsburgh in 1949 to attend Carnegie-Mellon University, where he earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1954. After graduation, Jurik worked briefly for the Pittsburgh Playhouse but soon left for Honolulu, Hawaii. Here, Jurik was employed by the Honolulu Community Theatre, now known today as the Diamond Head Theatre. Jurik left Hawaii for Colorado in 1962 to attend the University of Denver. Here he earned a Master of Arts in 1964. After graduation, Jurik landed a position at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, to teach theatre and serve as a theatre designer and technical director, costumer, and scene designer.

Jurik left Macalester College in 1972 for St. Cloud State. Over the next 20 years, he taught theatre classes, primarily in costuming, but also designed sets and occasionally directed St. Cloud State productions. Jurik also directed productions at Theatre L’Homme Dieu, a summer theatre in Alexandria, Minnesota, as well as helped establish the County Stearns Theatrical Company. Jurik retired in 1992 and passed away on November 14, 2018.

The physical display was mounted in March 2018.

To see all 500 sketches created by Jurik, see the finding aid for the Theatre records in University Archives and go to Series 4: Costume Sketches. Click on the production name and scroll down to the link in the "Scope and content" box. The link goes the Minnesota Digital Library. Scroll down and click on the "Download" or "Download All" button.

Credits

Thanks to Kasey Solomon, Kayla Stielow, Paige Gayle, Andrew Romitti, Will Meyerhoff, and Tom Steman