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DESIGNING THE 2023 MTV VIDEO MUSIC AWARDS Production Designer, Matt Steinbrenner and Lighting Designer, Tom Sutherland collaborate with an array of performing artists, support teams and technical production crew to deliver VMAs’ largest and most spectacular stage yet.
Words: Jacob Waite Photos: Getty Images for MTV
The 2023 MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs) returned to New Jersey’s Prudential Center in September for its biggest and most striking show yet. The event celebrated acts from across the globe including Beyoncé, BLACKPINK, and Taylor Swift – including a tribute to 50 years of hip hop featuring Run-D.M.C., Slick Rick, and Grandmaster Flash, among others. EMMY Award-winning Production Designer, Matt Steinbrenner and Lighting Designer, Tom Sutherland were among the key personnel responsible for creating and designing this year’s production, which saw 16 captivating performances across two identical stages. Speaking to TPi, the two acclaimed designers share their insight into the creative process. The production team used several steadfast vendors in Concord Creative (scenic), ER Productions (lasers), Fuse Technical Group (video), Jet Sets (scenic), Kish Rigging, Scenic Express (scenic), Solotech (lighting), Strictly FX (special effects) with a shared history of the annual showcase. “These vendors have been collaborators with me and my team for
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decades… they, quite literally, make this set a reality,” Steinbrenner remarked. Having institutional knowledge of how the VMAs and other large-scale awards shows operate was critical to the success of this year’s design, according to the VMA veteran. “Over the past 13 years, I’ve gathered a wealth of knowledge that I was able to reference to make sure the stage design was not only impressive and dynamic but worked logistically. The VMAs are unique to other awards shows due to the sheer scale of the event. We had two stages, each about twice as large as the other awards shows with lighting, video, special effects, and scenery infrastructure for 16 performances.” Steinbrenner began sketching in March with the final scenic concept established in April. “The Helmet scenic piece alone took over three months to get technically drawn, engineered, and built,” he said, harnessing the creative capabilities of Procreate on his iPad to sketch design ideas before turning to Vectorworks and Cinema 4D to model the ideas in 3D. “The design was conceived
by imagining what a world would look like if audio waves ripped through the arena and sculpted the environment. A 35ft tall Moon Person helmet appears as if the power of sound was so intense that it carved its waves into the metal, etching an entirely new version of the distinctive MTV award. The chrome Moon Person’s visor appears to be shaped by equaliser bars frozen in time, creating a central portal from which the celebrity presenters emerged,” Steinbrenner described. Arching over the Moon Person sculpture was a video installation designed to “evoke the movement of audio waves” through the air and connect both stages anchored at opposite ends of the arena. Each stage featured LED floors and monolithic bi-parting LED walls with integrated lighting. “Intermixing these two medias as if audio waves left their indelible mark as they flowed through the space,” he remarked. The need for versatility of the stages, Steinbrenner highlighted, was foundational to the design. “From a creative standpoint, I worked to ensure that the video canvas behind