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CAATA Conversations: Legacy Leaders is a gathering honoring the Consortium of Asian American Theaters and Artists (CAATA)’s origin story and evolution. This conversation brings together a few of the foundational leaders whose vision, labor, and imagination helped shape CAATA and our Asian American and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (AANHPI), Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA), Middle Eastern and North African (MENA), and mixed race theatre ecosystem in the United States.
Together, we will reflect on the early conditions that made CAATA necessary, the leadership choices that sustained it, and how legacy is carried. This is a space to honor lineage, share institutional memory, and explore how today’s artists inherit, question, and build upon the work that came before.
This conversation is not only about history. It is about continuity, accountability, and responsibility. We gather to listen deeply, name what has endured and what has shifted, and imagine how legacy leadership can guide us forward in this moment.
Host: Leslie Ishii, CAATA board president
Panelists: Andrea Assaf, Rick Shiomi, Stefanie Lau, and Tim Dang
Read more about CAATA’s other twentieth anniversary celebrations and events.
As we celebrate this historic moment, we invite you to join us in supporting CAATA’s future. We are aiming to raise $20,000 to support our continued work and ensure that CAATA remains a lifeline for artists in the years to come.
Join the movement by sharing or donating to our fundraising campaign: donate to CAATA’s Twentieth Anniversary Campaign.
If you’re curious and would like to learn more, here are a few articles and archives to explore:
2001 White Oak Retreat - American Theatre
2016 Art and Activism - American Theatre
2018 Come Together Right Now - American Theatre
2018 Talking Back - American Theatre
2018 ConFest The A(PI) List - American Theatre
ConFest archive - CAATA website
Online series - CAATA website
Return to the Source - HowlRound
2024 Hawai’i ConFest - HowlRound
2018 Chicago ConFest - HowlRound
2016 Oregon ConFest - HowlRound
2014 article by Gayle Isa - HowlRound
2014 article by Rick on Philly - HowlRound
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