How do you envision the future? What aspects of that world are already here? The Future Within Us kicks off our 5th Climate Change Theatre Action festival with original short plays that grapple with a changing world. Join us in person in New York City or online for this funny, poetic, and poignant evening of theatre, music, and magic tricks!

Featuring original short plays by Nicolas Billon (Canada), Chantal Bilodeau (U.S.), Miranda Rose Hall (U.S.), Ethan King (Philippines), and Kevin Matthew Wong (Canada). Conceived by Chantal Bilodeau and Julia Levine. Directed by Britt Berke.

Sunday, September 17, 2023
5:00-6:30 pm
In-person and Online
Caveat, 21A Clinton Street, New York, NY

$20 early bird (until Sep 10)
$25 standard
$25 at the door
$10 livestream

GET YOUR TICKET NOW!

The Future Within Us is officially part of Climate Week NYC, an annual climate event that brings together business leaders, political change makers, local decision takers, and civil society representatives of all ages and backgrounds to drive the transition, speed up progress, and champion change that is already happening.

The Future Within Us is made possible with funds from Creative Engagement, a regrant program supported by The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) in partnership with the City Council, and administered by LMCC, as well as by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature .

We gratefully acknowledge the State of New York and The Puffin Foundation for their support of this project.

Submissions Open!

No submission fee for the upcoming:

Fifth Annual International Human Rights Art Festival

December 4th – 10th, 2023

@ The Tank – 312 W 36th St., New York, NY 10018

Submissions Window Open: AUGUST 1st – OCTOBER 1st, 2023

Results announced by October 15th, 2023

Looking for work around the following activist concerns, though are open to any social justice and human rights issue:

• Climate Change
• Celebration of Women’s Power
• Celebration of Immigration
• Celebration of Black Men
• Celebration of Indian Dance
• Any other activist/social justice/human rights issue
• Ten Minute Play Festival

Please note:

The performances must be fully produced by you; IHRAF is a presenting platform.

Considering 10-30 min long pieces!

Work may not have been produced within the last year in NYC, or be scheduled in the next six months of December 10th, 2023

All accepted performers will receive:

• Performance stipends
• Two hours free rehearsal space
• PR and Marketing support
• 30-minute tech rehearsal
• Festival TD and SM
• Free photographic documentation of their performance.

…and bragging rights as participants in this vital and growing NYC creative-activist institution!

Please email our Festival Assistant Producer Costanza Bugiani at costanza@ihraf.org with the following:

• A brief description of your piece, including approximate running time – we’re encouraging 10-30 mins works. We’d love to include as many artists as possible!
• A cover letter, including details regarding the piece’s discipline, issue of concern treated and a brief summary of your artistic goals
• Your bios or resumes and the names of any collaborators already on board
• A sample of work (scripts, pics, videos, songs, any other links or files that could help us to know more about your project)
• As email subject, please type IHRAFestival 2023, then add the interested category and Association/Company/your name (i.e. IHRAFestival 2023 : Celebration of Immigration, Joan Doe)

For more information and details about submitting to International Human Rights Art Festival 2023, please have a look at IHRAF Festival Submissions Open!

“IHRAF believes that creative engagement with all members of the society is the surest path toward social justice and positive change” 

(Top image: L’il Angelique at the IHRAF Festival, Photo by Steven Pisano)

The masterclass introduces the notion of Ecoscenography merging ecological design thinking and stage design to create engaging work which reflects and impacts the current world, especially in relation to climate change and social justice concerns.

We will explore both theory and practical ways to take responsibilities for what and how we create theatre and collaborate with the wider ecosystem at all stages of personal practice and projects. 

Participants will be introduced to interdisciplinary practices with case studies, living examples of the connection between individual creativity and sustainability showing how ideas can be translated into actions. You are invited you to explore approaches to integrating holistic environmental principles within your own creative practice. 

The course will include time for discussions, Q&A and plenty of breaks.

Take action. Help to build a movement of ecologically-aware performance makers.

MORE INFO AND TICKETS

Who

All performing arts practitioners at all stages and scales of production to provide knowledge sharing between different experiences. I’m especially keen to reach out to producers, directors, stage managers and others who are part of the decision-making process.

Why

• Learn about Ecoscenography
• Comprehend the importance and advantages of integrating ecological considerations within your creative practices
• Examine worldwide case studies of sustainable work
• Exchange knowledge with diverse roles in the theatre industry
• Understand what is your role and how to approach sustainability with varied teams.
• Co-create sustainable new narratives for the new paradigm of our society and the planet

Cost

Cost is designed to keep knowledge affordable for all and depends of your financial means. Trusting that you’ll choose the appropriate amount for your needs and support fair exchange. Income based sliding scale £200/£170/£140 (high/medium/low) + booking fees.

For those with limited funds I’m offering 2 ‘pay it’ forward exchange bursaries consisting of 1 day of work with me in exchange for taking part in the masterclass. Please email a CV and a short paragraph of why you require the bursary and what skills you can offer in exchange (assisting, making, painting, construction, marketing, admin, etc…) by 24th July – places available confirmed upon acceptance.

Accessibility

The 2 days will be divided between indoors and outdoors work – weather dependent.

Lift is available. Suitable entrance for wheelchair is from the basement carpark.

Please share any personal and accessibility needs ahead of time if need be to help prepare.

MORE INFO AND TICKETS

Facilitated by Mona Kastell, an international award-winning ecological designer, educator and shamanic practitioner who places Nature, well-being, interconnectedness and authentic community engagement at the heart of her creative process. She’s one of Ecostage’s co-directors – a grassroots initiative and website that provides a holistic framework, tools and resources for embedding practice-based ecological thinking at all stages of our creative processes and scales of production. Her design for ‘Glimpsing Air Pockets’ is featured in Tanja Beer’s book on Ecoscenography and won 1st prize at World Stage Design 2022 in ‘Alternative Design’.

We’re thrilled to share that our CCTA 2021 anthology, The Future Is Not Fixed: Short Plays Envisioning a Green New Deal, was recently featured in the article “Books to help you stay inspired to fight climate change” on Yale Climate Connections. Thank you Michael Svoboda for mentioning us! You can get your copy of the book here or from your domestic Amazon store.

ABOUT THIS BOOK

The Future Is Not Fixed: Short Plays Envisioning a Global Green New Deal

By Chantal Bilodeau

For all of the political, economic, and technological obstacles that stand in the way of addressing climate change, perhaps the greatest challenge is in the realm of imagination. Can we envision a better world? What might an equitable, sustainable, decarbonized, and just society look like? What if the concept of a Green New Deal—the initiative to reduce greenhouse gas emissions while addressing interwoven social problems like economic inequality and racial injustice—could become reality? 

The Future Is Not Fixed presents a dazzling variety of answers to these questions in the form of fifty plays—from writers representing all inhabited continents—commissioned for Climate Change Theatre Action 2021, a global participatory theatre festival that brings communities together around climate issues. The pieces gathered here feature a wide range of styles and perspectives, from realist dramas to experimental works, encompassing the dangers that we face as well as ecstatic possibilities for a renewed social contract. With contributions suitable for both conventional and nonstandard theatrical settings, these plays can be performed in intimate readings, staged productions with extensive sets and props, and everything in between. Climate Change Theatre Action plays have been performed on street corners, at the foot of glaciers, in churches, schools, libraries, backyards, community centers, and bars. They have been enjoyed by audiences as diverse as water treatment workers in Montana; homeless youth in London; refugees in Denmark; children in New York City, Iran, and Nigeria; faith communities in Florida and Washington State; unsuspecting passersby in Brazil and New Zealand; and students in every corner of the world. Regardless of style, audience, or venue, each play offers a bracing, affecting vision of how we might come together to face the challenge of global climate change.

MORE INFO AND TO PURCHASE

ABOUT THIS AUTHOR

Chantal Bilodeau is a playwright and translator. In her capacity as artistic director of the Arts & Climate Initiative, she has been instrumental in helping theatrical and educational communities, as well as diverse audiences in the United States and abroad, to engage in climate action through programming that includes live performances, talks, publications, workshops, and national and international artist gatherings. In 2019, she was named one of “8 Trailblazers Who Are Changing the Climate Conversation” by Audubon Magazine.

A Series from Africa on Climate Emergencies, Sustainability Practice in the Arts, and Planetary Crises

This is a broad-based interdisciplinary, intercultural, and cross-sectoral exploration of climate justice within the context of theatre and performance with a focus on the Global South. The series comprises seven episodes and two articles.

Guests range from theatremakers to climate change artivists/activists to scholars from the Global South sharing their perspectives on different topics within the broad theme of the series.

Produced in partnership with The Centre for Sustainable Practice in the Arts (CSPA), Centre for Socially Engaged Theatre (C SET), and Theatre Emissary.

More Info

A two-day symposium on sustainability to share good practice and foster conversations across higher education and the performing arts

Fri, 9 Jun 2023 09:15 – Sat, 10 Jun 2023 13:00 BST

Katharine Worth Building Department of Drama & Theatre Royal Holloway, University of London Egham TW20 0BQ United Kingdom

Co-organised by Professor Helen Gilbert, Professor Liz Schafer, and Dr David Bullen

Climate change and related ecological crises unfolding across vast parts of the Earth have given environmentally-focused arts new urgency as well as increased resonance in recent years. At the same time, educational and cultural institutions with a stake in the arts are gradually embedding environmental sustainability into their core vision, albeit sometimes more in principle than in practice. Wider imperatives to heed claims to justice among those disproportionately affected by environmental stress are also poised to inflect discourses and practices in the sector. With these developments in mind, this one-day symposium explores sustainability initiatives in the realm of performance practice and in relation to how we teach, train, research, and act on ecological issues, individually and in tandem with stakeholder groups. Motivating questions for the event include:

• What do we know about the greening of performance-based arts in Britain and how local ecological actions and/or challenges might connect with initiatives elsewhere?
• What tools are already available in the creative kits of performance makers, teachers, trainers, curators, scholars and publics who want to prioritise sustainability in the arts, and how can their efficacy be assessed in ecological terms? 
• What new, performance-related tools, technologies and pedagogical practices are being mobilized—or could be mobilized—to spur better care for the environment in particular places or among specific constituencies? 
• What roles can hitherto marginalised performance practices among Indigenous and Global South activists play in fostering environmental justice and opening windows to alternative futures? 
• What present and future platforms could be harnessed for the exchange of ideas, practices and teaching approaches that strengthen and energise ecological action in the performing arts sector?

The symposium is designed to showcase existing research and practice as well as generate and further dialogue in, and between, higher education, performance training, and performance industries. As such, panels will feature short provocations rather than papers. All sessions will be accessible remotely via Teams – joining instructions will be sent to those who register via Eventbrite.

Keynotes include:

• Kate Mitchell, ‘A Journey at the Intersection of Ecology and Anthropocentric Theatre Tradition’
• Michael Walling and Vou, a contemporary dance company based in Fiji whose work has toured widely in Asia and Europe, ‘Engaging with Indigenous Ecological Knowledge’
• Roberta Mock, ‘Transitioning to Sustainable Production with The Theatre Green Book’

Full programme to be released in due course.

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way.
On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.

― Arundhati Roy

In the context of the Climate Emergency, and timed with the end of the financial year, FLOW is an exhibition exploring what a better future looks like.

As a medium of exchange, the word currency is derived from the word current, the origin of which was curraunt meaning flowing (c. 1300). Like thriving ecosystems, healthy economies depend on healthy flows of life sustaining resources.

Examining the flow between money, politics, information and power, artwork in FLOW poses critical questions about financial flows, reminds us of the vital interconnections and interdependencies between all life, and shows the profound possibilities of economic systems based on respect and reciprocity.

Participating artists Melissa Corbett, Rod Gray, Pam Kleemann-Passi, Linda Knight, Jo Lane, Carolyn Lewens, Jenny McCracken, Sarah Metzner, Paul Prato, Jen Rae, Bronwyn Razem, Louise Rippert, Adam Stone, Giselle Wilkinson. Creative Producer Deborah Hart.

Exhibition Details:
Where: CLIMARTE Gallery, 120 Bridge Rd, Richmond
When: 31 May – 1 July 2023

FLOW Artist Talks at CLIMARTE Gallery (more details to come):

Wednesday 14 June 2023, 6 – 7.30pm

Saturday 17 June 2023, 2 – 4pm

Image: Submerge: the coming community video still (2011)
Carolyn Lewens – direction, original concept and cyanotype photograms
Asmund Heimark – animation
Tim Catlin – sound design