Storytelling and Self-Advocacy Series. Photo: Jenni Klauder (Lincoln Center).
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts today announced a series of artistic performances and workshops that center and celebrate disabled identity.
As part of Lincoln Center’s mission to champion inclusive excellence in the arts and provide access to the arts for the widest possible audience, the institution shines a light on the work of disabled artists with select in-person performances as well as virtual offerings that allow for increased accessibility for audiences with disabilities.
Summer programs complement year-round initiatives that center disability and the arts, including Lincoln Center Moments, disabled artistry programming, and the upcoming fall edition of Lincoln Center’s groundbreaking Big Umbrella Festival, details to be announced in the coming weeks.
In-person offerings include:
—Disability Pride Silent Disco featuring DJ Nico DiMarco (July 24), a fourth-generation Deaf person, marking Lincoln Center’s first ever performance by a deaf DJ
—Dark Disabled Storiesby Ryan Haddad (August 5), and
—An Evening of Short Plays presented by Queens Theatre’s Theatre for All (August 25).
Virtual programs include:
—Omnium: A Bold New Circus (July 10 & 11), which celebrates diversity in the circus arts
—The kickoff event for Storytelling and Self-Advocacy Series (July 18), a multi-session series open to teenagers and young adults with disabilities to learn about disability history, disability culture, and storytelling.
All in-person programs are free and presented as part of Restart Stages, the outdoor performing arts center constructed on Lincoln Center’s campus to champion the revival of New York City. Omnium: A Bold New Circus is presented as part of Passport to the Arts, designed for families with children, teens, or adults with disabilities.
Restart Stages is a program of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation-Lincoln Center Agora Initiative with the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF), which activates outdoor space through artistic and community initiatives that speak to our current moment, and reimagines cultural engagement in public space for a new era. The transatlantic exhibition, Faces of the Hero, a partnership with the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center (SNFCC) will be on view beginning in July.
Since the pandemic began, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts has driven efforts to bring the power of the arts to New Yorkers outdoors and digitally—from Love From Lincoln Center concerts for individual essential workers to works of art that elevate the voices and lived experiences of people of color in America, such as Carrie Mae Weems’ installation Resist COVID/Take 6!, Davóne Tines’ Vigil, and digital commissions like The Baptism by Carl Hancock Rux. Future Stavros Niarchos Foundation-Lincoln Center Agora Initiative international collaborations with the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center in Athens (SNFCC) will bring new approaches to cultural engagement in both cities. These are just the beginning of a reorientation towards prioritizing openness, access, and inclusive excellence – elevating talent from every corner of the globe and fostering a sense of radical welcome on the campus.
Schedule of Events
July 10, 1:00 – 4:00 p.m.
July 11, 1:00 – 1:45 p.m.
Omnium: A Bold New Circus
Virtual Event
Join Omnium Circus for a virtual two-part Passport Program for Children, Teens & Adults with Disabilities and their Families.
Saturday, July 10th: One-hour pre-recorded performance will be viewable online anytime between 1:00 – 4:00 p.m. ET. Experience the magic of the circus with this performance watching stars perform from around the world. Then join a live virtual workshop to learn mime artistry with Deaf artist Maxim Fomitchev (Max) from Omnium, on Sunday, July 11th from 1:00 – 1:45 p.m. ET on Zoom. Max will be joined by American Sign Language Interpreter Brandon Kazen-Maddox.
Visit lincolncenter.org/Passport for more.
July 18, 3:00 – 4:00 p.m.
Kick-off event for Storytelling and Self-Advocacy Series
Virtual Event
As we reflect on the disabled activists who fought for the passage of the ADA, we know there is still a great deal of work to do to have the disabled experience represented in the arts, both in the content and as artists. This multi-session series, taking place throughout the year, is open to teenagers and young adults with disabilities to learn about disability history, disability culture, and storytelling. During this virtual kick-off event, Jermaine Greaves, a Lincoln Center Intern and disability advocate, will present disability rights history, moderate a panel of artists and designers with disabilities, and host an activity on storytelling. As the group meets periodically throughout the year, participants will explore aspects of disability culture, hear from disabled leaders in the arts, and continue to hone their own storytelling, as a foundation to their artistic and advocacy practice.
Register here.
July 24, 9:00 – 11:00 p.m.
Disability Pride Silent Disco, featuring Nico DiMarco
The GREEN
In celebration of Disability Pride Month, join the disability community and allies with special guest DJ Nico DiMarco on July 24. DiMarco is a fourth-generation Deaf person whose physical relationship with sound provides him a uniquely haptic understanding of music. His bass-heavy sets give hearing audiences the opportunity to share dance tracks the same way DiMarco experiences them. His tens of thousands of social media followers can confirm: you’ll truly be feeling the beat.
August 5, 7:00 p.m.
Dark Disabled Stories by Ryan Haddad
The Isabel and Peter Malkin Stage at Hearst Plaza
Comedian and monologist Ryan Haddad’s COVID year left him in a state that was not much different from most of the rest of us: frightened, deeply desirous of wanting to do better, isolated and lonely, painfully horny. Haddad’s opportunities for connection are complicated by his cerebral palsy, his accompanying walker and the damnable difficulty he encounters daily while navigating a city that is actively hostile to his sex life. Haddad’s newest autobiographical theatre work, Dark Disabled Stories, is a portrait of the artist as a gay Disabled man, looking for love in all the wrong places. By turns raunchy, hilarious, and thought-provoking, Dark Disabled Stories provides cutting insight into a New York dating world that is presumably more complicated than yours.
August 25, 7:00 p.m.
An Evening of Short Plays
The Isabel and Peter Malkin Stage at Hearst Plaza
Presented by Queens Theatre’s Theatre for All
Reflecting Queens Theatre’s commitment to new play development and support for disabled artists, this evening of readings of three short plays that center new perspectives and disabled identity. In 2001, Queens Theatre began its new play development program, New American Voices. In 2018, Queens Theatre launched the Theatre for All initiative—an umbrella program created to provide services for disabled audiences, and to offer financial support, training, and opportunities for disabled artists. Building upon a virtual collaboration between Queens Theatre and Lincoln Center in July 2020, a team of disabled writers chosen from submissions to QT’s New American Voices, featuring artists from its Theatre for All Training Program, will integrate audio description, and with American Sign Language, captioning.
Free tickets for each in-person event will be made available through the TodayTix Lottery, the Official Ticketing Partner of Restart Stages. The TodayTix Lottery will open for entries two weeks before the performance and close three days prior to the performance at 12:59pm EDT. Attendees who secure tickets will be required to follow safety protocols. For more information visit TodayTix.com or download the TodayTix app. For those without access to the app, please call Lincoln Center Guest Services at 212-875-5456 to reserve.*
*No purchase is necessary to enter the TodayTix Lottery and reserve free tickets for these performances. The prize value of tickets is $0. The odds of winning tickets depend on the number of eligible entries received. The TodayTix Lottery is open to residents of the 50 United States and D.C., age 18 or over. Complete official rules, prize description, and giveaway entry information will be available on the TodayTix website.
Major support for Lincoln Center accessibility programming is provided by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The Taft Foundation, The FAR Fund, Kenneth Goldman Donor Fund and The Megara Foundation.
Restart Stages is made possible by Stavros Niarchos Foundation-Lincoln Center Agora Initiative.
Major support provided by First Republic Bank.
Additional support provided by BNY Mellon, Cleary Gottlieb, Warburg Pincus, Mitsui & Co. (U.S.A.) Inc., the Scully Peretsman Foundation, Shari and Jeff Aronson, and Lincoln Center’s 20/21 Donors and Members
Endowment support is provided by Oak Foundation, PepsiCo Foundation, The Marie-Josée and Henry R. Kravis Foundation, and Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
In-kind support is provided by United Staging and Rigging, Worldstage, Inc., Audio, Inc., Hudson Scenic Studio, and TGIF Event Services.
Lincoln Center’s artistic excellence is made possible by the dedication and generosity of our board members.
Operation of Lincoln Center’s public plazas is supported in part with public funds provided by the City of New York.
Public support for Lincoln Center is provided by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, Gonzalo Casals, Commissioner, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
NewYork-Presbyterian is the Official Hospital of Lincoln Center.
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