< The Theater of Needless Talents

During World War Two, the fortress town of Terezin, just outside of Prague, was a prison and ghetto where Jews were confined and guarded by SS and Czech gendarmes. A propaganda decoy, the "privileged Jewish settlement" of Terezin was in reality a thriving transit hub to extermination for all its detainees.

The Theater of Needless Talents is a series of music, dance, chamber opera, and cabaret performances created in, or inspired by the works of artists who were interned at, Terezin. Like those imprisoned, it seeks through the experience of art to create optimism and affirm life. Yet, it also strives to have us make connections between the horrors of The Holocaust and the present day suffering we see as a result of prejudice, oppression, and persecution.

“Theater gained a different, extraordinary dimension. Culture became the limit of our existence, the world of the highest freedom that we could ever reach.”

–Jan Fischer, actor in Terezin, theater director

< Interrupted Narrative/WAR

Continuing his series of dance theater pieces on the effects of violence on communities, Donald Byrd’s Interrupted Narrative/WAR, explores institutional violence (the first, Interrupted Narrative/No Consolation, examined the effects of violence on urban youth). Mr. Byrd’s passionate need, by way of his art, to process the psychological impact and emotional devastation of sudden, unexpected death caused by war, allows us to experience how the community grieves and memorializes those we are losing. This new work encourages a community-wide colloquy on our eternal resort to war and the need to explore alternative models for conflict resolution.

“…a physical incantation, an embodiment of individual lives lost. By the end of the dance, it was as if he had brought them home.”

–Seattle Post-Intelligencer

< Repertory Concerts

A curated evening of several pieces including And Their Souls Will Understand, Bhangra Fever, and Short Dances/Little Stories.