Margaret L. Nelson, Lighting Designer and Stage Manager, has received two Ruth Page Dance Achievement Awards for Lighting Design and Stage Management in the dance community and a Joseph Jefferson Citation for Lighting Design at the Organic Theatre. She received the Inaugural Dance Chicago Excellence in Production Art award.
Margaret’s design projects and Production Management have taken her to every state of the USA and six continents. She has taught Lighting Master Classes from Duluth, MN to Montevideo, Uruguay.
Current projects include acting as Production Stage Manager and/or Lighting Designer for Ballet Chicago, CRDT, Red Clay Dance, Muntu’s 50th anniversary season, including Dance Africa, and Chicago Repertory Ballet. Recent projects include River North Dance Chicago’s in-town and national dates, Ensemble Espanol’s tours of the USA and China, 27 years as PSM for Dance For Life in Chicago and Palm Springs , 25 years as Production Management and Lighting Design for Siamsa Na Ngael, Festival of Irish Arts at Symphony Center, and lighting Dance Africa at the Auditorium Theatre for WTTW, at the Harris Theatre and in Atlanta.
Projects include acting as Lighting Designer for the Notre Dame Easter Special broadcast on NBC, JUBA, the Chicago Human Rhythm Project, including lighting it for WTTW, three years as Production Manager for the Skyline Stage and special events at Navy Pier and producing benefits for the Children’s Memorial Foundation and Old St. Pat’s Church. She was also PSM and Lighting Director for the Trinity Irish Dancers ’97 tours and for the 1997 through 2008 Dance Chicago, designed new works for Jan Erkert and Dancers and was Artist in Residence at the Cairo Opera House. While in Egypt, she acted as the US Lighting Director for A Message from Thebes, the memorial concert for the victims of the massacre at Hatshepsut’s Temple in Luxor. Other dance projects have included acting as Production Manager and resident Lighting Designer at the Dance Center of Columbia College, lighting evening-length works for Robin Lakes Rough Dance at Columbia and Northwestern University, lighting design for X-SIGHT! Performance Group, and the Joel Hall Dancers travels to Europe and Norway.
In a past life, Margaret was Lighting Designer in Residence at the Theater Department of Columbia College Chicago and toured internationally with Goat Island Performance Project and Joffrey Ballet of Chicago.
Non-dance projects have included lighting and road managing the National Tours of Big River and Pump Boys and Dinettes; Production Management for Chamber Opera Chicago, designing scenery and lighting for Hansel and Gretel, and lighting design for Man of La Mancha and The Sound of Music, among others. She has also designed lighting for the Next Theatre, Organic Theatre, and Remy Bumppo Productions, and industrials for Saturn, Ameritech and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange both in the US and Asia.
Her companies, M L Nelson Design and Lumen Siccum Productions, are involved in ongoing consulting work for architectural and performance projects in too many places to keep track of.
Photo Credit: Todd Rosenberg