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Community-Based Workshops and Performances

I believe that theatremaking can facilitate growth in the life of any community and that the strength of theatremaking processes rely on assets and strengths of the community engaged in the work. In my theatremaking and teaching both inside and outside of traditional theatre spaces, I work to engage everyone in the community in practices that support social connectivity, storytelling, honest reflection on the needs of our communities and our agency within them, celebration, the understanding of power dynamics, collective recognition of the gifts each of us bringing to our work, and the freedom to try new things.

My influences include Augusto Boal's image theater and forum theater, the process drama of British practitioners such as Dorothy Heathcote and Jonothon Neelands, communal storytelling processes as theorized and practiced by John O'Neil with the Free Southern Theatre and Junebug Productions, and collaborative, ensemble-based devising processes of theatre artists worldwide, with a particular reliance on moment work as developed by Tectonic Theater Project, all of which I have experienced as transformative methods for building and bridging community, promoting leadership, cultivating self- and communal expression through the embodied storytelling.

 

"Il faut triompher pour être vraiment eux-mêmes."
"We must triumph to be truly ourselves."
Léonora Miano

Core Values

Whether in classrooms, rehearsal studios, living rooms, community centers, dance studios, or places of worship---these core values guide my work. They may be expressed differently depending on the project or community, and they have changed as I have grown. I also consider it an necessary part of most creative processes to reflect openly with the group of artists about the values that are essential to our work together. 

  • Theatremaking and community building are a shared practice.

  • Meaningful theatre engages the experiencing, the expressing, and the theorizing of everyone in the room.

  • Creative work in both art and life is an embodied practice. 

  • The work of listening bridges individuals, communities, and institutions.

  • The creative process is both action and source of hope.

  • Creative acts at their most powerful, lasting, and effective will tend to the culture, resources, and ongoing leadership of the community.

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