Alas, my UTR Blogging is tardy. But blog I shall. For I saw many an amazing show
and have had plenty of time to think about them.
After walking into the Public lobby bleary-eeyed from an all night flight, I headed up to the symposium "Future Aesthetics/Hip Hop Theater - the next generation. Who's got next?" Let by Marc Bamuthi Joseph and Kamillah Forbes, the discussion was collegial and more roundtably than didactic. Which was refreshing and invigorating to hear every one contribute.
A good chunk of the discussion revolved around not only who the next voices are and what will they say but also--and equally important--how do you, as a presenter/curator, help communicate that work to a broader audience. One wants to diversify audiences and market to both a theatre audience or a ballet audience, but what works for an older generation doesn't always translate for a younger.
One participant brought up the production of "Raisin In The Sun" with Puff Daddy. Was that hip hop? Was it just marketing? Was it good?
This brought up discussion again about reaching younger artists and audiences and what mechanism works best. Given that you want to hear something new but also want to expose audiences to something they're not expecting, a general consensus was built around the idea of contextualization. Context is everything.
And with that, we broke up to add greater context to the rest of UTR.
Posted by Brian Costello
PICA
UTR Press Corps
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