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New York Live Arts presents LIVE IDEAS 2018: RADIAL VISION
By: A.A. Cristi Jan. 16, 2018
An annual interdisciplinary humanities festival, Live Ideas is a high point of the New York Live Arts season. This year's festival, Live Ideas 2018: Radical Vision, presented April 18-22, 2018, at New York Live Arts, will offer five days of activity designed to imagine the future and understand the past of an open and democratic society. Through public forums, performances, readings, and workshops, the festival will offer a forward-looking, critical appraisal of four key democratic institutions: the press, big tech, the criminal justice system, and our electoral process. Bringing together artists, activists, journalists, and scholars, Live Ideas 2018: Radical Vision is co-curated by culture creator Brian Tate, president of The Tate Group, and presented in partnership with the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College with curatorial input from Roger Berkowitz, the Center's director.
The festival kicks off on Monday, April 16 2018 with New York Live Arts' third annual Live Ideas Gala: Radical Vision co-chaired by Ruth and Stephen Hendel and Slobodan Randjelovic and Jon Stryker. The event featuring performances by Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company, and special guests will present Bryan Stevenson with the Live Ideas Award and will also honor Elizabeth A. Sackler, and Ed Zimmerman.
The festival's keynote is a conversation moderated by Bill T. Jones, followed by public conversations about the role of the press in an endangered democracy; reinvigorating or abandoning our electoral process; ways forward for democracy in the digital age; the current state and future vision of criminal justice in America; and more.
master storyteller and monologist Mike Daisey's The End of Journalism; a variety show hosted by Drag King Elizabeth (Macho) Marrero featuring Emel Mathlouthi, Joseph Keckler, Saul Williams, and others; a theatrical reading of The Secret Court written by members of the Plastic Theatre; and Prayers of the People, a secular liturgical performance inspired by Martin Luther King's writing, directed by Bill T. Jones. A special highlight is a hands-on workshop on how to participate in government, led by Fordham Law Professor, political activist, and former New York gubernatorial candidate, Zephyr Teachout. Opening each day, artists, activists, and thinkers will read seminal texts on democracy by such radical visionaries as Hannah Arendt, James Baldwin, Cesar Chavez, Frederick Douglass, Audre Lorde, Harriet Tubman, Yuri Kochiyama, Gloria Anzaldúa, Berta Cáceres, Grace Lee Boggs, Harvey Milk, Henry David Thoreau, Alexis de Tocqueville, and others. For details on the festival program, see festival schedule below:
Live Ideas 2018 | Radical Vision
April 18-22, 2018
Contents Under Pressure: Democracy in Crisis
Keynote conversation
April 18, 2018, 6:30 pm
New York Live Arts, Theater
Admission: Tickets start at $15 Join Sherrilyn Ifill, President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. and Professor Lawrence Lessig, Roy L. Furman Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and former director of the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University in conversation with Bill T. Jones discuss how our system of government is impacted by the postmodern pressures of relentless media, corporate ambitions, and a deeply divided electorate.
A performance by artist and puppeteer
Matt Acheson will open the keynote conversation.
Public Readings on Democracy
April 19 & 20, 2018, 4:00-5:00 pm
April 21, 2018, 11:30 am-12:30 pm
New York Live Arts, Lobby
Admission: Free, $10 Suggested donation An array of today's artists, activists, and thinkers will read seminal texts on democracy by such radical visionaries as Hannah Arendt, James Baldwin, Cesar Chavez, Frederick Douglass, Audre Lorde, Harriet Tubman, Yuri Kochiyama, Gloria Anzaldúa, Berta Cáceres, Grace Lee Boggs, Abraham Lincoln, Harvey Milk, Henry David Thoreau, Alexis de Tocqueville, and others.
Bending Towards Justice?
Panel discussion
April 19, 2018, 5:30-7:00 pm
New York Live Arts, Studio
Admission: Tickets start at $10 It is widely known that the United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world, and that people of color are disproportionately affected. Join us for a conversation on the current state and future vision of criminal justice in America, with Adam Foss (Director/Founder of Prosecutor Impact), Meg Reiss (Executive Director, the Institute for Innovation in Prosecution at John Jay College), Michelle Jones (scholar, activist, playwright and formerly incarcerated), Steven Teles and David Dagan (co-authors Prison Break: Why Conservatives Turned Against Mass Incarceration), and moderator Max Kenner (Founder/Director, Bard Prison Initiative).
Spiritrials
Primetime performance
April 19, 2018, 8:00-9:15 pm
New York Live Arts, Theater
Admission: Tickets start at $25
A timely exploration of the American criminal justice system, this multidimensional play blurs the line between hip-hop and dramatic performance. Writer/performer Dahlak Brathwaite weaves through the autobiographical and the fictional, music and soliloquy to examine his place in what appears to be a cultural rite of passage as a young black male. Written and performed by Dahlak Brathwaite, scored by Brathwaite and Dion Decibels, and directed by Marc Bamuthi Joseph and Sean San Jose.
Panel discussion
April 20, 2018, 5:30-7:00 pm
New York Live Arts, Studio
Admission: Tickets start at $10
A free press was so important to the Founding Fathers that they included its protection in the First Amendment, alongside free speech. With the three branches of our government now controlled by one party, does the Fourth Estate - the press - have a higher obligation to hold the government accountable? Farai Chideya (author, political reporter and analyst, and program officer for journalism at the Ford Foundation), Bret Stephens (The New York Times contributing columnist), Roger Berkowitz (Director of the Hannah Arendt Center), and moderator Rebecca Carroll (writer, editor and producer at WNYC, and host of the forthcoming podcast Black Folks) will discuss the role of the press in an endangered liberal democracy. The End of Journalism
Primetime performance
April 20, 2018, 8:00 pm
New York Live Arts, Theater
Admission: Tickets start at $25
A monologue by Mike Daisey The End of Journalism explores how journalism in America ended, peeling back layers of "real" and "fake" news to find the darkly hilarious truth about the world we've made. Daisey is hailed as the pre-eminent monologist in the American theater today.
Hands-on Politics
Workshop with Zephyr Teachout
April 21, 1:00-2:30 pm
New York Live Arts, Studio Admission: Tickets start at $10 or pay what you can Tocqueville argued in Democracy in America (1835-40) that Americans showed how democracy in the modern world might look: when they want something done, they form democratic associations to accomplish it. Just fifty or sixty years ago, one in four people held leadership positions in local politics. Fordham Law Professor, political activist, and former New York gubernatorial candidate Zephyr Teachout will share the fundamentals of working with, protesting against, and/or participating in local government. By the People?
Panel discussion
April 21, 3:15-4:45 pm
New York Live Arts, Studio
Admission: Tickets start at $10
In the face of gerrymandering, voter suppression, campaign finance abuse, election tampering, and a disillusioned electorate, is now the time to reinvigorate our electoral system or get rid of it? What are the alternatives? Alexander Guerrero (Associate Professor of Philosophy, Rutgers University) and Belgian writer David Van Reybrouck (author, Against Elections: The Case for Democracy) discuss if we should abandon the traditional methods of voting and use lotteries to select our officials. Roger Berkowitz (Director of the Hannah Arendt Center) will moderate this discussion. Has Democracy Been Hacked?
Panel discussion
April 21, 2018, 5:30-7:00 pm
New York Live Arts, Studio
Admission: Tickets start at $10
Tech companies that wield such tremendous influence over our lives are themselves subject to interference and manipulation. What is the way forward for democracy in the digital age? Gabriel Stricker (former Vice President of Policy and Communications, Google Fiber, a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc., and the former Chief Communications Officer, Twitter), journalist Noam Cohen (author, The Know-It-Alls: The Rise of Silicon Valley as a Political Powerhouse), and moderator Bianca Bosker (award-winning journalist, author, and co-founder of the Tech section of the Huffington Post) will discuss the topic. Resistance & Friends
Primetime performance
April 21, 2018, 8:00-9:15 pm
New York Live Arts, Theater
Admission: Tickets start at $25
An evening of cutting-edge performances hosted by Drag King Elizabeth (Macha) Marrero from the Bronx will feature the voice of "Tunisian Spring" Emel Mathlouthi, Portland-based extended technique vocalist, composer, and performer Like a Villain (Holland Andrews), multi-octave and multi-genre singer Joseph Keckler, poet and performer Saul Williams and others. Learn a Song of Resistance with Cynthia Hopkins
April 22, 2018, 11:00 am-12:00 pm
New York Live Arts, Lobby
Admission: Free, $10 Suggested donation Throughout human history, communal singing has served as a source of both solace and empowerment for societies in crisis. Voices raised together in song can energize and propel through uplifting expressions of solidarity and resistance. Drawing on legacies of protest songs that have fueled social justice movements of the past, singer/songwriter and performance artist Cynthia Hopkins invites everyone to learn a new song of resistance against current threats to human rights.
The Secret Court
Theatrical reading
April 22, 2018, 12:30-2:15 pm
New York Live Arts, Theater
Admission: Tickets start at $15
This staged reading is of a new play based on the 1920 ad hoc disciplinary tribunal of five administrators at Harvard University formed to investigate charges of homosexual activity among the student population that began with the suicide of a student. The affair went unreported until 2002. The Secret Court has been written by members of the Plastic Theatre and was conceived by Tony Speciale. Co-presented with the Abingdon Theatre. How Do We Prepare For President Trump's Second Term?
Panel discussion
April 22, 2018, 3:30-5:00 pm
New York Live Arts, Studio
Admission: Tickets start at $10
In a remarkably short span of time, President Donald J. Trump has transformed our culture. His achievement is not measured in his ability to build a border wall, heighten mass incarceration, impose a travel ban, or launch a military strike against North Korea. It is that these ideas are now seriously discussed and debated, when two years ago that would have been impossible. Do progressives have a viable and strategic response to his next presidential campaign? Are artists key to helping shape that response? Multimedia artist/activist Betty Yu and other artists will discuss these questions and others. Prayers of the People
Primetime performance
A secular liturgical performance inspired by Martin Luther King's words
April 22, 2018, 6:00-7:15 pm
New York Live Arts, Theater
Admission: Tickets start at $25
2018 marks the 50th Anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther
King Jr. This participatory performance appropriates the structure of an Episcopal liturgy and brings to life the words of Dr. King. Conceived by Kenyon Victor Adams (little ray) and directed by Bill T. Jones. Audience participation (chanting of text and following directions to stand, sit, kneel) is strongly encouraged.
Democrazy Ball April 22, 2018, 7:30-10:00 pm
Come celebrate your radical vision with an evening of dancing, drinks and performances on the New York Live Arts stage.
FUNDING SUPPORT
Support for New York Live Arts is provided by Con Edison, the Joseph and Joan
Cullman Foundation for the Arts, the Ford Foundation, the Howard Gilman Foundation,
the Harkness Foundation for Dance, The Harnisch Foundation, the Alice Lawrence
Foundation, the Samuel M. Levy Family Foundation, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation,
the Mertz Gilmore Foundation, Metropolitan Capital Bancorp, Mid Atlantic Arts
Foundation, the National Performance Network, the New England Foundation for the
Arts, New York Community Trust, The O'Donnell Green Music and Dance Foundation,
Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the Jerome Robbins Foundation, The Fan Fox & Leslie R.
Samuels Foundation, the Scherman Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, The Stavros Niarchos Foundation, the Theatre Development Fund, and the Wege Foundation. Public support for New York Live Arts is from the National Endowment for the Arts, the
New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and
the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo
and the New York State Legislature.
BRIAN TATE | THE TATE GROUP
Brian Tate is a culture creator and marketing strategist with deep experience in curating public programs that engage audiences across traditional divides of race, age, gender, and income. He has built forward-looking projects at the intersection of arts and ideas for more than 20 years, and he is expert at centering artists in the discussion of human justice. He is president of The Tate Group, a consulting firm that focuses on cultural initiatives, strategic marketing, partnership development, and community engagement. Narrative change around issues of equality is at the core of its practice.
THE HANNAH ARENDT CENTER
The Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities at Bard College is the world's most expansive home for bold and risky humanities thinking about our political world inspired by the spirit of Hannah Arendt, the leading thinker of politics and active citizenship in the modern era. NEW YORK LIVE ARTS
Located in the heart of Chelsea in New York City, New York Live Arts produces and presents dance, music and theater performances in its 20,000 square-foot home, which includes a 184-seat theater and two 1,200 square-foot studios. New York Live Arts offers an extensive range of participatory programs for adults and young people and supports the continuing professional development of performing artists. New York Live Arts serves as home base for the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company and is the company's sole producer, providing support and the environment to originate innovative and challenging new work for the Company and New York's creative community. NEW YORK LIVE ARTS
219 West 19th Street, NYC
(btw. 7th and 8th Avenue)
Tickets start at $15 and
may be purchased at 212 924 0077
or online at newyorklivearts.org
NEW YORK LIVE ARTS PRESS CONTACTS:
219 West 19th Street, NYC Heidi Riegler Tyler Ashley
Tickets 212 924 0077 RIEGLER MEDIA NEW YORK LIVE ARTS
Tickets start at $15 347 513 5047 212. 212-691-6500 x104
www.newyorklivearts.org heidi@rieglermedia.net tashley@newyorklivearts.org
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