Big Green Theater
In Fall 2019, I had the enormous joy and pleasure of being an Eco-Theater Teaching Artist with Big Green Theater through Superhero Clubhouse and Bushwick Starr. This was a bi-weekly after school program at PS106 in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Teaching artists across multiple disciplines (writers, actors, directors and designers) worked with fourth and fifth graders to develop plays about air pollution and climate issues central to their neighbourhood. After the plays were written, students chose ways that they wanted to be involved with the show: acting, directing or production. I collaborated with a very enthusiastic and imaginative design team of fourth and fifth graders to make props, sets and costumes for the plays. We worked through the design process: research, sketching, prototyping and fabricating. Echoing the spirit of eco-conscious theater, we used all found and recycled materials to make their designs come to life. I loved this project because it was multidisciplinary, collaborative, environmentally-conscious and, perhaps most importantly, took the thoughts and creativity of youth very seriously.
View images below for more of the process. Thank you to Christian Alvarado for being an amazing co-teacher! Thank you to our brilliant, young design team (Ashley, Michael, Josue, Joseph and Josiah) for the joyful collaboration! Read more about Big Green Theater here and eco-conscious theater here.
I would love to create more environmentally-conscious props, costumes and puppets with young artists! There is such power in turning a drawing into a 3D object, sparking the idea: What else is possible?
