Livestreaming the 2014 Literary Managers & Dramaturgs of the Americas International Conference

 

Literary Managers & Dramaturgs of the Americas will hold its 2014 annual international conference in Boston, USA and will livestream five events on the global, commons-based peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv from Thursday, June 26 to Saturday, June 28, 2014.

 

See the livestreaming schedule below. To participate in online conversation, use #LMDA14 and #newplay in Twitter and follow @LMDAmericas and @HowlRoundTV. 

 

The theme of the conference is “Building the Future.”  In 2013, our LMDA conference focused on adapting to change and the dramaturg’s role in stewarding organizational and cultural transformation.  Now, that we have discussed a changing landscape and how we can respond, we are looking ahead to our 2014 conference in Boston to begin “Building the Future;” creating a space for both vision and engagement in the kinds of experiences and sharing of resources that will help us create the future.  Attendees will immerse themselves in conversations, case studies, discussion panels, and hand-on workshops bringing together Boston-based artists and national and international artists to create exchanges both theoretical and practical. 

 

The conference will be located in Boston’s historic theatre district, near Boston Commons and Public Garden, and hosted by Emerson College and Suffolk University with events also taking place in various locations around the city. 

Conference Chair: Magda Romanska

Co-Chair: Vicki Stroich

Conference Coordinator: Emily Goodridge

LMDA Administrative Director: Danielle Carroll

 

Livestreaming Schedule:

 

 

5pm PDT/ 7pm CDT/ 8pm EDT

 

Pulitzer Prize winning film critic Wesley Morris speaks how the power of observer, the witness, the critical voice can shape the future of our culture.

 

Wesley Morris is a staff writer at Grantland, where he does criticism about movies, popular culture, race, gender, sexuality, and the role of style in professional sports. For 11 years, he was a film critic at the Boston Globe, and his writing has appeared in Slate, Bloomberg Business Week, Film Comment, and Ebony. At the Globe, he won the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for criticism.

 

 

 

7am PDT/ 9am CDT/ 10am EDT

 

Chair: Vicki Stroich (Alberta Theatre Projects)

 

Panelists: Edward Sobel (Temple U.), Mark Bly (Fordham U.); Ilana Brownstein (Boston U./Company One Theatre).

 

Leadership is the action of leading a group or organization towards fulfilling a shared vision or goal. In the basic terms of theatre employment and hierarchy, the roles that come to mind are those of Artistic Directorship, Executive Directorship and other management-level roles in organizations. Dramaturgs have inherent leadership skills. This discussion will explore how we can use them to make an impact on the organizations and communities we work in.

 

 

1:15pm PDT/ 3:15pm CDT/ 4:15pm EDT

 

Chairs: Ryan McKittrick (A.R.T.) and Charles Haugland (Huntington Theatre Company)

 

Panelists: Mara Isaacs (Octopus Theatricals), Shawn LaCount (Company One Theatre), Diane Borger (A.R.T.).

 

With the rise of the new information age, theatre-making has not been immune to the fast-paced global exchange of goods and ideas. Thanks to the Internet and the digital revolution, average theatregoers are now more aware than ever of their interconnected and interdependent relationships with people and places other than their own. Like cultural artefacts and memes, theatre artists move between countries, continents and neighborhoods with greater ease, creating works that must necessarily negotiate between specific local and global identities. In this new context, dramaturgy emerges as an essential interlink that translates and connects the vast and varied cultural paradigms, while developing complex inter-institutional collaborations.

 

 

 

10:30am PDT/ 12:30pm CDT/ 1:30pm EDT

 

Back by popular demand! Two leaders in our field join each other in conversation. Anne Cattaneo, Lincoln Center Theatre’s Dramaturg and Director of the Lincoln Center Director’s Lab and HowlRound’s director and editor, Polly Carl, discuss their work.

 

 

12:30pm PDT/ 2:30pm CDT/ 3:30pm EDT/ 19:30 GMT/ 9:30pm CEST

 

New collaborative technologies, peer-to-peer exchange platforms and user-driven feedback create new opportunities for digital networks that can change our outreach, dramaturgical research and season planning practices. In the U.S., the National New Play Network is leading the way in transforming the practice of literary office management. Other virtual networks such as New International Theatre Experience, Contemporary Performance Network, American Theatre Archive Project, IETM International Network for Contemporary Performing Arts, The Information Centre for Drama in Europe (ICDE), and The Playwrights’ Center provide additional tools for virtual office management, play exchange, archiving, and peer-to-peer collaborations. Join guests to discuss how these networks are formed and maintained.

 

Chair: Magda Romanska (Emerson/Harvard/BLO)

 

National New Play Network—Jojo Ruf and Gwydion Suilebhan

IETM International Network for Contemporary Performing Arts—Caden Manson and Jemma Nelson (by Skype)

Polish Theatre Institute—Anna Galas

American Theatre Archive Project—Ken Cerniglia (Disney Theatricals)

New International Theatre Experience—Beatriz Cabur (by Skype), Hanife Schulte (proxy)

 

More about the presenting networks:

The National New Play Network (NNPN) is the country’s alliance of non-profit professional theatres that champions the development, production, and continued life of new plays. Since its founding in 1998, NNPN has supported more than 150 productions nationwide. The New Play Exchange allow its members to launch new work across the country and around the world, and have helped to cement the Network’s vitality within the regional theatre landscape and its place as an invaluable incubator of the future of American theatre. www.nnpn.org

 

Contemporary Performance Network is a social media / community organizing network and blog with over 5800 members from 84 countries and 46,000 members on Facebook. The Network provides artists, presenters, scholars and festivals a focused digital space to meet, share work, and collaborate. The Network also publishes the crowd funded and open sourced Contemporary Performance Almanac, an overview of contemporary performance presented during the past season available for touring. As part of the project, the book is mailed to over 200 presenters around the world. www.contemporaryperformance.com

 

E-teatr.pl is the largest portal of Polish Theatre, sponsored by the Raszewski Theatre Institute in Warsaw. E-teatr.pl includes archival materials of plays performed in Poland since 1900, including programs, photographs and posters of the shows. It also includes news, reviews and opinion pieces on contemporary Polish theatre. www.e-teatr.pl

 

American Theatre Archive Project is an initiative of the American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR). ATAP is a network of archivists, dramaturgs, and scholars dedicated to preserving the legacy of the American theatre. ATAP is guided by the work of four Committees, which help develop partnerships, facilitate communication, create guidelines, seek funding, and disseminate best practices. Location-based Teams help individual theatre companies evaluate their records, develop an archiving plan, and secure funding to support long-term archive health. Once created and made accessible to theatre makers, scholars, patrons, and funders on premises online, and/or in a repository, a theatre's archives support institutional integrity and development. www.americantheatrearchiveproject.org

 

New International Theatre Experience is a global service organization that supports and empowers theatre makers by revolutionizing the way artists and administrators create, connect and cooperate in the twenty-first century. Founded in 2012 in Madrid & NYC by Beatriz Cabur and Douglas Howe, New International Theatre Experience transforms the theatrical landscape by providing physical and virtual platforms for investigation, innovation and interaction. NITEcorp is the parent company of three divisions that make up the organization: NITEnews, NITEnetwork and NITEnation. www.nitenews.org, www.nitecorp.com 

 

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