Join a state-of-the-art conversation about how race matters in creative design for live performance in our current moment of creative, technological, and cultural unrest. Hosted by lighting designer Jane Cox, playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, set designer Mimi Lien, and sound designer and composer Mikaal Sulaiman, this interdisciplinary forum allows artists, intellectuals, and designers to explore lighting, sound, costume, and set design, as well as augmented reality, as sites of innovation, magic, and transformation.
Saturday, January 14
1:00pm–2:00pm
Opening Conversation
Veterans Room
Set designer Mimi Lien, lighting designer Jane Cox, and sound designer and composer Mikaal Sulaiman in conversation, moderated by playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins.
2:00pm–3:00pm
Creating a Collaborative Aesthetic Over Time
Veterans Room
Long-term collaborators costume designer Montana Blanco, set designer Adam Rigg, sound designer Palmer Hefferan, and puppet designer and fabricator James Ortiz discuss their collaborative history and work on The Skin of Our Teeth, moderated by director Lileana Blain-Cruz.
3:00pm–4:00pm
Presentation of Micro-Commissions
Presented in collaboration with Design Action
Second Floor Historic Company Rooms
Commissions by Barrymore-nominated scenic designer Marie Laster; designer and artisan Danielle DeLaFuente and sound designer Nina Field; queer, nonbinary interdisciplinary artist Gylanni Carrington; Mexican scenic and costume designer Rodrigo Hernandez Martinez; sound designer and composer Elliot Yokum; and lighting designers Christina Tang and Alex Vásquez Dheming.
Space for Informal Conversations
Second Floor Hallway
4:00pm–5:00pm
Conversations Between Generations
Veterans Room
Actor, playwright, and director Ruben Santiago-Hudson in conversation with lighting designer and educator Victor En Yu Tan sharing the experiences of working in culturally specific theaters with younger artists. Moderated by Puerto Rican scenic designer and Head of Scenic Design at DePaul University Regina García.
Teaching Design and Production through an Anti-Racist Lens
Board of Officers Room
Costume designer and Princeton faculty member Sarita Fellows and Head of Lighting Design Training at NYU Tisch Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew in conversation with University of Rhode Island Professor Christine Mok.
Sunday, January 15
1:00pm–2:00pm
Radical Realities: Infinite Possibilities at the Intersection of Theater and XR
Presented in collaboration with Oregon Shakespeare Festival
Board of Officers Room
Facilitated by Scarlett Kim and Mei Ann Teo, who lead Innovation & Strategy and New Work at Oregon Shakespeare Festival, this panel features multi-hyphenate theater artists Raja Feather Kelly, Ty Defoe, LaJuné McMillian, and Dede Ayite sharing their journeys into Extended Reality (XR). Trailblazers in envisioning the future of live performance, these artists offer provocations for the intersection of theater and XR.
Black Sound Artists Round Table
Veterans Room
Sound designer and composer Mikaal Sulaiman in conversation with composer, sound design artist, and musician Justin Ellington; Ghanaian interdisciplinary artist JOJO ABOT; vocalist, composer, and performance artist Holland Andrews; and duo Mendi + Keith Obadike.
2:00pm–3:00pm
Afrofuturism in Conversation with Design for Live Performance
Board of Officers Room
Park Avenue Armory Curator of Public Programming Tavia Nyong’o in conversation with director Shariffa Ali and Taiwanese scenic designer You-Shin Chen.
Culturally Specific Design
Veterans Room
New York City Center Encores! Producing Creative Director Clint Ramos in conversation with theatrical lighting, projection, and puppetry designer Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew. Moderated by Diep Tran, Editor-in-Chief of Playbill.
3:00pm–4:00pm
Presentation of Micro-Commissions
Presented in collaboration with Design Action
Second Floor Historic Company Rooms
Commissions by Barrymore-nominated scenic designer Marie Laster; designer and artisan Danielle DeLaFuente and sound designer Nina Field; queer, nonbinary interdisciplinary artist Gylanni Carrington; Mexican scenic and costume designer Rodrigo Hernandez Martinez; sound designer and composer Elliot Yokum; and lighting designers Christina Tang and Alex Vásquez Dheming.
Space for Informal Conversations
Second Floor Hallway
4:00pm–5:00pm
Darkness and Light: Lighting Design Onstage
Presented in collaboration with Princeton University’s CreativeX
Board of Officers Room
Lighting designers Itohan Edoloyi, Stacey Derosier, Alejandro Fajardo, and Alan C. Edwards in conversation, moderated by symposium host, Director of the Princeton University Theater program, and lighting designer Jane Cox.
Creating The Divine: Tools Of Storytelling
Veterans Room
Join designers Dominique Fawn Hill, Devario Simmons, and Qween Jean for a vivid conversation about creating characters, strategies for collaboration, and the ways we can all shape the future of this industry.
Ongoing Presentations
Movement Portraits by LaJuné McMillian
19K
The Black Movement Library’s Movement Portraits VR experience is an abstract documentary, diving into the movement histories and stories of five Black performance artists living and working in New York City.
Documentation of the performance work rasgos asiáticos
Field and Staff Room
An intimate story about the fluidity of borders and time, Virginia Grise‘s site-specific performance installation (documented here) rasgos asiáticos examines migration and displacement, and unearths hidden histories in the confluence of China, Mexico, and the United States. Created in collaboration with designer Tanya Orellana, rasgos asiáticos is a constructed space for personal and political excavation, revealed through inherited stories, fragmented memories, historical re-imaginings, and recurring dreams.
Quills Fest VR World Pop Up
Presented by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival
Colonel’s Room
The Oregon Shakespeare Festival mount a pop-up version of their Quills Fest VR World, a transmedia sandbox that radically expands access to the transformational power of storytelling and imagines a multimodal future of theater. Pop-up works include XR and AR projects in multiple phases of development—from prototypes and works-in-progress to fully completed projects—that boldly explore liveness, interactivity, and immersive storytelling.
#MakingSpaceArmory
#SoundAndColor
Making Space at the Armory is supported, in part, with public funds from the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional public support is provided by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature.
Photo: Installation view of Mendi + Keith Obadike’s Book of Light.
January 14–15, 2023
Saturday, January 14, 2023, 1:00pm–6:00pm
Sunday, January 15, 2023, 1:00pm–6:00pm
Tickets: $45 (plus fees) for a single Day Pass; $60 (plus fees) for both Day Passes
Various Spaces
Health and Safety Protocols
Masks are optional. To view additional COVID-19 Policies, please visit our FAQs page.
Sign up for our email list to get notifications and reminders about purchasing tickets for this and other upcoming events.
Commenting is not available in this channel entry.