Jan 17, Saturday: Kurdistan in Calart Shool of Theater

2009 AOW Agenda

Motherhood and Revolution: How women, and mothers in particular, are innovating in conflict and post conflict circumstances, and expanding the models for ways in which one is an artist/activist in the world.

January 14-18 2009, California Institute of the Arts

Valencia, California

*** Please note, this agenda will be updated regularly, and may change.

Jan 14, Wednesday Evening: Introductions and Orientation – Simplicity and Complexity

Each day will begin with a presentation that lays out some of the social and historical background undergirding the day’s various topics, in an effort to make clear that legitimate moral stands and elections need to take place (simply: this happened and must be witnessed to), and also that simplicity is beset with numerous challenges (on the one hand – we must avoid over simplification, or - for example – an orthodoxy of permanent victimhood; on the other hand we must avoid overcomplicating the record to the point where moral position is mooted).

Each day will also make space towards the end for open-space meetings and free discussion.

Guiding issues: The persistence of negationism; the patriarchy of form (an assumption of Western models of theater and performance); the marriage of artistic excellence and ethical efficacy.

Opening Remarks: Jean-Pierre Karegeye, Erik Ehn, Aileen Adams

Jan 15, Thursday: Rwanda

Facilitator: Jean-Pierre Karegeye

Also: Presentation: Eti! East Africa Speaks

Keynote Speech A

Keynote Performance: Hope Azeda

Jan 16, Friday: Palestine

8:30-9 Convening and conversation (A brief opening performance/presentation; coffee and food; a summary of the previous day, highlighting action items)

9-10:30 Introduction – an overview of issues and initiatives. Ed Mast.

10:45-12:30 Panel - Models of engagement. Moderator, Ed Mast. Beth Krensky – We Make the Road by Walking (gallery exhibition), Vivian Sansour, Jen Marlowe, Hanna Eady

12:30-1:30 Lunch

1:30-3 Roundtables, Session One: Motherhood and Sustaining Theater/Activism. Alana Macias, Annie Hamburger, Alison Narver, Kathy Randels

3:15-5:30 Roundtables, Session Two: Motherhood as a Class, Motherhood as a Movement: Roberto Varea – Grandmothers of Plaza De Mayo; Vali Forrister – Grrls/Actor’s Bridge; Celia Rodriguez

Concurrent Sessions

1:30-3:30 We Cry on the Inside: Theater and Trauma Counseling in Rwanda – Brent Blair

1:30-3:30 Mindfulness – Theo Koffler

3:45-5:30 In the Dark Times there will be Singing – Song Workshop. Kathy Randels

3:45-5:30 Healing Practices – Hector Aristizabal

6-7:30 Dinner

7-7:30 Review: An open sharing, highlighting issues, connections, questions from the day

Performances

7:30-8:30 The Human Writes Project – Nizar Wattad

8:30-10 Inner Mandala – Maja Mitic

Film

7:30-10:30 Massaker, dir. Nina Menkes

Flower in the Gun Barrel, dir Gabe Cowan (in attendance)

Jan 17, Saturday: Kurdistan

8:30-9 Convening and conversation.

9-10:30 Keynote Speech B – Choman Hardi: Genocide, Rape and Silence in Kurdistan/Artistic Practice in Response to the Anfal

10:45-11 A Tortured Cliché, A Fragmented Identity – Performance, Cklara Moradian

11-12:30 Overview – The contemporary Kurdish scene, locally and internationally. Nancy Buchanan, Soraya Fallah, Choman Hardi, Cklara Moradian

12:30-1:30 Lunch

1:30-2 Fiddle Lecture – Peter Schumann/Bread and Puppet

2-3:30 Roundtables, Session One: Theater and Peacebuilding – Cultural Diplomacy vs. Cultural Exchange: Roberta Levitow, Dijana Milosevic, Pauline Ross, Claudia Bernardi

3:45-5:30 Roundtables, Session Two: Esthetic Diversity in Arts Activism – Roberta Levitow, Roberto Varea, Dijana Milosevic, Teya Sepinuck, Rebecca Rugg, Claudia Bernardi

Concurrent Sessions

Dramaturgy

2-3:30 Iran: Niloufar Talebi/the Translation Project – ICARUS/RISE: giving voice to the contemporary hybrid-Iranian.

Based on “Naghali”, an age-old dramatic story-telling Iranian tradition, ICARUS/RISE draws from new Iranian poetry.

2-4 Reading: The Overwhelming, by JT Rogers – dir. Ron Cephas Jones

4:15-5:30 Speaking the Unspeakable: Writing on Genocide – JT Rogers, Ken Urban, Deborah Asiimwe, David Myers

Libraries

2-3:30 New Knowledge: Activism and Library Science. Kathy Carbone, Toni Samek

Curricula

3:45-4:30 A presentation from the CalArts Aesthetics and Politics MA

Performance/Presentation

3:45-5:30 Nightwind – Hector Aristizabal

Workshops

2-3:30 In the Dark Times there will be Singing – Song Workshop. Kathy Randels

2-5:30 Writing: Laurie Lathem

5:30-7 Communal Dinner – Please join us for a collective potluck

Performance

6:30-7 Cantastoria – Peter Schumann/Bread and Puppet

7-8 Part Two, Border TRIP(tych) – Roberto Varea

Performance/Presentation

8:15-10 “To Put Things Right Again” – La Fuerza Femenina in Times of Change

– Cherrie Moraga/Celia Herrera Rodriguez

Film

8:15-11 Pray the Devil Back to Hell; conversation with producer Abigail Disney

Jan 18, Sunday: One World Thinking

8:30-9 Convening and conversation

Presentations and Discussion: Models of Arts/Activism

9-10:15 Tijuana/Frontera, El Salvador, Cuba – Glenna Avila, Marissa Chibas, Evelyn Serrano, Lili Bernard, Peter Jensen, Carlos Saavedra

10:30-11:30 Cambodia, the Philippines – Bill Westerman, Orlando Pabotoy

11:45-1 Initiatives in Sub-Saharan Africa: Public Health: Paula Tavrow – UCLA, Kenyan Male Circumcision; Orena James: Child Trafficking

1-2 Lunch

2-4 Sum and plans