2018 - 2019 Exchange Grant Recipients

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The TEAM (Brooklyn, NY) will travel to Tennessee and Kentucky for Crossing Roots: A Rural-Urban Theatre Workshop, a performance lab and intercultural exchange for diverse Appalachian artists hosted by Cardinal Cross (Whitesburg, KY). The TEAM will perform Anything That Gives Off Light, lead a Devising within a Democracy workshop, and participate in workshops led by local artists in Kentucky, in an exchange of artistic practice, cultural heritage, and audience engagement. Throughout 2019, The TEAM, Cardinal Cross, and their cohort of workshop participants from across the U.S. will create arts, media, and convenings to reflect and build upon workshop activities.

Eric Bass of Sandglass Theater (Putney, VT) and Linda Parris-Bailey (Knoxville, TN) are sharing and learning each other's approaches to writing, dramaturgy, puppetry, and song; they will examine how both artists stand in the moment of passing the legacy of their theaters into younger hands, while continuing to be creators of theater. The resulting project will address both an exchange of creative practices and the act of leadership succession.

Touchstone Theatre (Bethlehem, PA) and Pregones/Puerto Rican Traveling Theater (Bronx, NY) will engage in a yearlong intercultural and intergenerational exchange centering on strategies for art-centered community engagement. Working in English and Spanish, the project will engage a diverse group of Anglo, Latinx, and other participants in ensemble-based playmaking, leading to a headline performance in the October 4-13 Festival UnBound in Bethlehem, PA.

Applied Mechanics (Philadelphia, PA) and Philadelphia Young Playwrights (Philadelphia, PA) will create STEM FEMMES, an interactive play about women who have made significant contributions to scientific fields. STEM FEMMES will be written by and for Philadelphia Young Playwrights students ages 14 - 18, and performed with Applied Mechanics in Fall 2019.

Su Teatro (Denver, CO), The SOURCE Theater Company (Denver, CO) and Cleo Parker Robinson Dance (Denver, CO) will produce the Artists of Color Summit, a series of dialogues, exchanges, readings, and performances designed to break down the isolation of artists and organizations of color in the Denver area and nurture these relationships.

TeAda Productions (Santa Monica, CA) and the Program for Torture Victims (Los Angeles, CA) will engage refugees and asylum-seekers who are survivors of torture through Theater for Asylum Seekers The six-month project will consist of theater workshops rooted in TeAda methodology and Community Resiliency Models, leading up to a week-long theater intensive and culminating in a free public performance.

Ping Chong + Company (New York, NY) Collaborator-in-Residence Ryan Conarro and Nuskmata Mack (Nuxalk/Secwepemc) will collaborate with Southeast Alaska Indigenous Transboundary Commission's Tis Peterman (Tlingit) and with Salmon State (Juneau, AK). They will lay the groundwork for the creation of a multidisciplinary sharing of community stories, amplifying voices of the Alaska-Canada transboundary region, and advocating for protecting and sustaining the cultures and economies of the region's salmon rivers in the face of aggressive corporate mining and climate change.

Storytellers, singers, and musicians from Guardians of the Flame Maroon Society (New Orleans, LA) and poet, playwright, and performer Deidre R. Gantt (Washington, DC) will create a performance inspired by 2019 (the 400th year since African slavery began in America), New Orleans' indigenous and Mardi Gras Indian culture, and the experience of being American in different parts of the African diaspora.

Ninth Planet (Philadelphia, PA) will consult with cultural strategist and youth advocate Michael O’Bryan (Philadelphia, PA) to design a new model of community responsive programming. Using Homeworld, a performance experience for 3-to-18-month-old babies and their caregivers, they will reimagine how they produce their work to extend beyond a singular artistic experience and create potential for long-lasting community building opportunities.

The peer panelists for the 2018-19 NET/TEN Exchange Grants included: Sabrina Hamilton, Artistic Director, Ko Festival of Performance (Amherst, MA); Milta Ortiz, Associate Artistic Director, Borderlands Theater (Tucson, AZ); Devi Peacock, Executive Director, Peacock Rebellion (Oakland, CA); Stephen Sapp, Co-Founder/Core Member, UNIVERSES Theater Company (Ashland, OR); and Nick Slie, Co-Artistic Director, Mondo Bizarro (New Orleans, LA).