NYC Performing Arts Leaders To Gather for Ping Chong and Company Event
The event will probe the complexities of artistic legacy and the future of new leadership in the New York City performance scene.
By: Chloe Rabinowitz Jun. 05, 2023
Ping Chong and Company will present An Extra Ordinary Afternoon with Ping Chong and Company, organized by the Artistic Leadership Team charting the future of the organization following the recent retirement of Ping Chong as Artistic Director and Bruce Allardice as Executive Director: Nile Harris, Jane Jung, Talvin Wilks, and Sara Zatz. They will host an afternoon soirée featuring performances, food, and conversation. The event will probe the complexities of artistic legacy and the future of new leadership in the New York City performance scene. It takes place Saturday, June 24, from 4-7pm at the newly renovated La MaMa (74A East 4th Street), Ping Chong and Company’s longtime home. Tickets, $10-25, are available here.
PCC’s Artistic Leadership Team is rigorously exploring a vision of their organization’s future as new directors are taking over the reins of various beloved New York City cultural institutions and arts organizations. For An Extra Ordinary Afternoon with Ping Chong and Company, they have brought together peers who are managing similar transitions for a generative conversation about the opportunities and challenges of their situations. Panelists will include Jonathan McCrory (National Black Theatre), Mia Yoo (La MaMa), Carl Hancock Rux (Mabou Mines/Harlem Stage), Mame Diarra Speis and Chanon Judson (Urban Bush Women); and Ain Gordon (Pick Up Performance Co.).
The event will feature performances by Johnnie Cruise Mercer; Grace Galu; and Nile Harris with Crackhead Barney, Malcolm-X Betts, and Geng PTP. Food will be provided by DeVonn Francis, Chef and Founding Director of Yardy World, a culinary studio that specializes in creating immersive food experiences and reimagining Caribbean cuisine. Francis is also creating an installation for the space.
Performer and director Nile Harris and playwright, director, and dramaturg Talvin Wilks—visionaries of different generations, both with multifaceted skill sets as artists, producers, and strategic thinkers—joined PCC Managing Director Jane Jung and Associate Director Sara Zatz to form the organization’s new Artistic Leadership Team in February. Together, they are stewarding the Company through a three-year transition surrounding the retirement of Ping Chong and Bruce Allardice at the end of 2022.
The formation of the Team represents a pivotal moment in PCC’s multi-year transition from a company identified with a single artist into one that supports a new generation of interdisciplinary artists. The transitional leadership structure is a reflection of this shift, and gives central roles to four individuals with deep connections to the Company. Wilks has been a longtime collaborator of Ping Chong and Company since 1994. He has worked on multiple Undesirable Elements productions and co-wrote and directed the Collidescope series with Ping Chong. Nile Harris is the recipient of a 2022 PCC Creative Fellowship, through which he was in residence with the Company, engaging with the PCC archive and developing new work. Jane Jung is Managing Director of Ping Chong and Company and has been affiliated with the Company since 2010. She launched the Creative Fellowship program and led the generation of the Strategic and Transition Plan for the Organization. Sara Zatz joined Ping Chong and Company in 2002. As Associate Director, she leads the company’s community engagement and training programs, and is the lead creative producer of PCC’s Undesirable Elements series.
About Ping Chong and Company
Ping Chong and Company (PCC) creates theater and art that reveal beauty, invention, precision, and a commitment to social justice. Founded in New York City in 1975 by leading theatrical innovator and National Medal of Arts recipient Ping Chong, the company engages multigenerational interdisciplinary artists to build and expand upon the legacy of Ping Chong, who recently retired from his position as Artistic Director. PCC’s work centers innovation, collaboration, community engagement, and amplifies underrepresented voices. Across nearly five decades, the New York City-based company has now created over 110 original theater productions, ranging from intimate interview-based works to large-scale multidisciplinary projects featuring puppets, performers, and full sound and projection scores. Reaching audiences throughout New York, the United States, and the world, PCC transcends boundaries, exploring interconnectedness of cultures and how intersectional identities are addressed in society.
About La MaMa
La MaMa is dedicated to the artist and all aspects of the theatre. La MaMa’s 61st “Remake A World” Season believes in the power of art to bring sustainable change over time and transform our cultural narrative. At La MaMa, new work is created from a multiplicity of perspectives, experiences, and disciplines, influencing how we think about and experience art. The flexibility of our spaces, specifically the newly reimagined building at 74 East 4th Street (La MaMa’s original permanent home), gives our local and remote communities access to expanded daytime programming. The digital tools embedded in the space allows artists to collaborate remotely, and audiences worldwide to participate in La MaMa’s programming.
A recipient of the 2018 Regional Theater Tony Award, more than 30 Obie Awards and dozens of Drama Desk, Bessie, and Villager Awards, La MaMa has been a creative home for thousands of artists, and resident companies, many of whom have made lasting contributions to the arts, including Blue Man Group, Bette Midler, Ed Bullins, Ping Chong, Jackie Curtis, André De Shields, Adrienne Kennedy, Harvey Fierstein, Diane Lane, Playhouse of the Ridiculous, Tom Eyen, Pan Asian Rep, Spiderwoman Theater, Tadeusz Kantor, Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, Mabou Mines, Meredith Monk, Peter Brook, David and Amy Sedaris, Julie Taymor, Kazuo Ohno, Tom O'Horgan, and Andy Warhol. La MaMa's vision of nurturing new artists and new work from all nations, cultures, races and identities remains as strong today as it was when Ellen Stewart first opened the doors in 1961.
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