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Artistic & Curatorial Practices

Shifting Artistic BIPOC Power Dynamic

We demand that the majority of writers, directors and designers on stage for the foreseeable future be BIPOC artists.

  • Develop, commission, program and produce a majority of BIPOC artists.

  • Understand that you cannot tell stories about us without us. We must be centered in the telling of our own stories. Get out of the way so we can thrive.

  • Implement a deep interrogation as to where BIPOC artists are hired in the season. You must hire just as many BIPOC artists to work on period/canonical texts as to work on BIPOC-centered shows.

  • Include a diversity of BIPOC artists’ voices in your programming — BIPOC artists are not a monolith. There must be more variation in style, period and contexts. The only BIPOC plays in your season shouldn’t solely center on trauma and pain.

  • When producing/programming BIPOC stories, a full commitment to honoring the cultural specificity of those stories is required. Power must be in the rehearsal room and be yielded to those who share a cultural context with the work, especially when the director is white.

  • When producing/programming BIPOC stories to be directed by someone from outside of the cultural context of the story itself (especially if the director is white), a cultural consultant must be hired at the expense of the institution.

  • Implement mandatory hiring of credible cultural consultants for culturally specific shows.

  • Employ mandatory hiring of intimacy directors with BIPOC Training for every show.

ALREADY DOING
  • The new process of play selections for Sigworks, bringing in more staff voices into the selection process for the plays, has resulted in a more diverse set of stories chosen. We're telling more stories about people of color as of late.
MORE DISCUSSION NEEDED

  • Committee does not feel we should be bound to a quota or target percentage, however, we feel strongly that Signature needs to discuss and set their own goals and standards as an organization, what is our ultimate goal on this topic? What does a racially diverse version of Signature Theatre look like from the staff to the programming? What is standing in our way to get there?

  • Obviously, this is something our new Artistic Director will have an opinion on. While we feel it is important to start these discussions now, no long-term decisions should be made without their input.

SUB-COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION

  • The committee recommends that, with the leadership of the new Artistic Director, we make a commitment to bringing in more BIPOC writers, directors & designers to work at Signature for a variety of different projects.

  • Make sure we continue to support BIPOC creators from the beginning of the process with readings/workshops, when commissioning and supporting new plays they should be majority BIPOC artists. Continue to, and focus more on, marketing submission opportunities specifically to BIPOC communities.

  • In the shows where a white playwright has a main character who is BIPOC in the show or has storylines about cultural specificity from communities of color, strongly consider a director from that culture. It’s worth repeating, bring in directors of color to direct stories (i.e.: stories from the canon) are NOT specifically stories about people of color.

  • We should make a larger effort to tell BIPOC stories that focus on joy/positivity and not only ones that center around trauma and racism.

  • Consider expanding practices like the SigWorks play selections (mentioned in “already doing”) into other areas of our business. N/A

  • Don't necessarily feel that every show needs an intimacy coordinator - stories that don't feature any sexual content/ physical contact between actors. Use discretion.

Diversifying Design Teams

We demand that there be no homogenous design teams.

  • All design teams must be more than 50% BIPOC, and the principal designers (costumes, lighting, sound, scenic, projections) must be 50% BIPOC.

  • Individual directors must commit to hiring majority (not “half”) BIPOC design teams, and artistic directors need to commit to the same at the curatorial level.

MORE DISCUSSION NEEDED
  • We hope that the new Artistic Director will play a significant role in bringing in more diverse candidates for design teams.
SUB-COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION

  • We recommend expanding the rolodex of creatives of color (especially local designers) to have on hand to recommend to the show directors.

  • Begin serious research into seeing the work of BIPOC designers. Do the work to look for them. Ask directors who they know. Ask current designers who we work with a lot to recommend a person of color in their field they respect.

  • Continue to foster the next generation of talent by adding assistant designer positions to the budget and specifically hiring BIPOC artists for these positions. N/A

  • Once again, Committee does not feel we should be bound to a quota or target percentages.

Centering BIPOC Artistic Perspective

We demand the cessation of binary notes given between a white artistic director and a BIPOC artist.

  • Understand that the notes of a white artistic director/dramaturg will never be more important than the BIPOC creatives’ values and opinions. You will never understand our stories better than we do. Decenter yourself.

  • Center BIPOC cultural specificity in the creation of BIPOC art -- in pre-production, the rehearsal process, marketing, literary management and in-house dramaturgy, community engagement, audience development and audience engagement.

MORE DISCUSSION NEEDED
  • The subcommittee recognizes that we are still in the middle of the search for Signature’s new AD. We are under the impression that there are many qualified BIPOC candidates in the mix.
SUB-COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION
  • We agree with this point, especially about artistic directors decentering themselves in notes. ADs should carefully think about their notes around issues of cultural specificity if they are not from that culture. Defer to who the shows’ director is.

Keeping BIPOC Priorities in Artistic Visions

We demand a systematic setting and maintaining of production expectations around artistic vision and budgeting processes.

  • Protect, honor, properly compensate and insure the artistic continuance of BIPOC bodies and our creations in the development of new work and the reinterpretation of existing work.
ALREADY DOING
  • We are already doing this, BUT it’s important to keep in front of mind that we need to continue doing this.
MORE DISCUSSION NEEDED
  • As with the rest of this section, our expectation is that the new Artistic Director will have a significant say on all of this. That person will have the support of the rest of the Artistic department, as well as this subcommittee and the entire AR&E Working Group.
SUB-COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION

  • Keep in front of mind as a main part of the artistic process of choosing shows - continue to check ourselves to make sure we are not tokenizing, scrambling at the last minute to fill a box.

  • Make sure we are accountable for our decisions around these issues in our budgeting process.