ATHE TASC Focus Group Membership Meeting
11:30am-1pm Saturday August 13th, 2011
Palmer House Hilton Hotel, Chicago, Illinois
Welcome – Cathy Plourde
Introduction of Officers: Cathy Plourde, Peter Harrigan, Reid Davis, Chanelle Vigue, Lisa Brenner
- Cathy’s Report: work on awards, not much else to report except.
- Peter’s Report: Workshop panel – open session; Debut Panel was a great hit.
- Facebook Page: Chanelle
- Liz’s work on the New website – Peter/Cathy
o Please contribute, more we use it and add to it the more visibility it will track.
Willa Taylor:
Conference Info for Next Year! ARTS AS ADVOCACY, ADVOCACY FOR ARTS!
o Washington DC, Arts and Arts advocacy.
o Grants: helping people get here, AV support is expensive
o No one-day passes, but you can get session passes to bring in guest speakers.
o All conference passes are very hard to get except for keynote speakers, etc.
o Top 3 panels as we rank them are guaranteed. MD panels: top 3 focus groups
o Cheryl Kaplan Zachariah: Partnership with Applied theatre subcommittee?
o Critical reading and analysis of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
o Other FGs are thinking of performative works as well.
Awards: (Willa Taylor)
This year the Awards Subcommittee worked to formalize the process, suggestions, criteria, voting.
o Decided: Organization and Individual, 7-10 years of operation/practice, in the city where the conference is held, no consideration of budget.
§ Albany park – organization award,
§ Story Catchers – Mimi (last name?)
- The award will not be presented until it is useful for them – an opening night, press release, etc.
- Both 2011 winning organizations have been notified, and are in communication with Cathy and Willa
- Concerns:
o What happens if we don’t have a person to coordinate the award in the city?
- We need volunteers for the award committee this year.
o Ann Elizabeth Armstrong, Doug Paterson.
- Dani Snyder: ATHE Community-Based Theatre Award: This Year – Doug Paterson won this year.
o New rules: Nominations can roll over to the next year, but then that individual cannot be nominated for two years.
o Nomination info will go out on the listserv – and if you know of another listserv that would be interested, please let Dani know.
o Openings on the ATHE awards committee – not a heavy time commitment, email Dani if you are interested!
Other Announcements: (Cathy Plourde)
- If you need documentation of the work you have done with TASC, a panel you have presented, etc. Please contact Cathy Plourde and let the leadership know. You must ask for it, but we will be happy to provide it.
- If you are already committed to bringing an international artist in for the 2012 conference, would you be interested in asking them to come early and having them come to ATHE?
- Cheryl Kaplan Zachariah: Would TASC like to collaborate with the Interactive Theatre Subcommittee to host a Pre-conference?
Elections!
- Focus Group Representative Elect: Jason Bisping
- Secretary: Chanelle Vigue
- Grad Reps: Spike Wilson, Liz Foster-Shaner, Rita Reis, Noah Lelek,
- Member(s) at Large: Mathew Jennings, Lisa Brenner, Cheryl Kaplan, Charlie, Greg Grobis, and Reid Davis.
Discussion:
- Lisa Brenner: Possibility of passes for students to participate in performance at the capital? Willa says that’s necessarily not probable.
- Norma Bowles: when negotiating, please include free wireless at the hotel!
o Laurie: (Rep on Conference Committee) That’s been raised and noted.
- Matthew Jennings: Can TASC support bringing in International artists?
o Interactive Theatre Subcommittee: Pre-con, Partner with TASC? Both ask for money, cooperate to bring in artist?
- Doug: contact Liz Lerman for a possible paid workshop?
- Michael: Heading up the Performance Committee for TASC 2012 Performance Event in DC.
o Other interested parties: Mary, Reid, Chanelle, Spike, Christine
o TO DO: Press release - Christine will be on the committee and help with the press coordination.
o We need a focus: Arts and Advocacy - Can we work with the Advocacy group? Local activists?
o Can we all give a feeling of what the focus should be?
- Lisa Merrill – Hosting the Debates – Frederic Douglas, Lincoln, found documents that framed the last debate.
- Flash mob version of the Declaration of Independence.
- Tourism, Civil Rights Museum, MLK Monument?
- Michael/Doug: 3 months to election: Fight Fascism on the steps of the capital.
- Plenary: AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS.
ATHE TASC Focus Group Networking Meeting:
8am-9:30am, Sunday August 14th, 2011
Palmer House Hilton Hotel, Chicago, Illinois
1. Discussion of ATHE 2011 TASC Panels and Future Plans:
- Peter: Debut panel, workshop panel discussion:
o Debut panel was successful
o Workshop was unplanned administratively, but successful.
§ SO: Do we keep an “open” session?
§ Or just keep the workshop?
§ Double-session, back to back workshop/debut? And a discussion session the next day?
§ Tasc social justice warm-up?
§ More panels with Shorter/summarized papers and more time for dialogue
§ Follow-up to the breakout/plenary discussion – a forum for follow-up discussion?
o Perhaps we can help to fill in the gap of the Community Arts Network?
o Can PTO fill that gap? Too focused on TO?
o Resources – Who is doing “this kind” of work, where, what programs?
o Can this discussion become a round table?
- Intro to “What I did in CB/TASC” this year – an intro to our work, discussion of new works, ongoing projects
- Performative Event in DC:
- Are we having a pre-con? Is the “performative event committee” that we put together yesterday also in charge of planning the pre-con?
o Are we bringing in a guest artist?
o General acclaim for partnering with a local organization.
o Doug and Michael: Legislative theatre event! Keynote of Pre-con?
Research Interests and Panel Ideas for Conference 2012:
- Spike: Interested in a Theatre for Literacy Panel
- Chanelle: The Critical Performance of Legislature/Electoral Theatre: Theatre, Rhetoric, Politics and Media
- Dani Snyder Young: More conversation on facilitation/practitioner priviledge
o Roll or function of applied theatre scholar in the field writ large.
- Reid: LGBTQA programming – how can we be more intersectional, non-
- Michael Mufson: Building the national network/resources, Dismantling hierarchy that places CB theatre @ the margins, Pre-con/Performance, Teaching Intro to theatre w/ the philosophy of Pedagogy of/TO
- Doug: Practicing CB work: making new work/partnerships; Can we use PO/TO to create an education/curriculum that would support
- Michael: Self as facilitator – personal identity working with groups
- Amy: Rust Belt Identity, Questioning Boal
- Lisa Brenner: Process vs. Product – social change and empowerment or the creation of “shows”
- Cathy Plourde: LGBTQA in religious communities, research on performance impact
- Peter: Working with the oppressors – not becoming one of them
- Lesly: Museums of war, peace, memory
- George Nelson: Applied theatre, esp. w/ prison system
- Spike: Literacy, Theatre and Therapy – TO and Buddhism
- Valerie: Anti-Human Trafficking and Legislative Theatre
- Willa: Offer Training for activists for using arts-based practice for future activism and engagement – possibly an ongoing thing that we can do every year.
- Matthew Jennings: international networks, practitioners but also scholars: Individual practitioners; INDRA, in place of war, International Community Arts Festival, ICAN, etc.
- Jason Bisping (In absentia): Research Interests -Theatre for development; TO; Interactive Theatre. - Panel Ideas: Applied Theatre Applications on Campus; T.O. or Applied theatre dealing with sexual assault and/or underage drinking; Anything with Advocacy!
