At Gowanus Dredgers Community Boathouse. Photo by Steffany Poveda
I was the (Summer/Fall 2022) Artist in Residency for NYU’s FloodNet Center / Center for Integrated Design and Media! I co-created, wrote, and directed “Rainy Day Play.” Rainy Day Play is a public art project about flooding, climate change, and the communities we create after/because of/despite disasters. It’s free, comedic, immersive, so participatory it hurts, outdoors nestled in public venues, musical, improv-y, and even has a scene with an anthropomorphic flood sensor. It’s everything I love about theater and placemaking and creating art with the communities we perform in and if you’re reading this, help us bring this to other public spaces in NYC!! Together, with a group of six theatermakers and three production artists, we performed in two special spaces, the Gowanus Dredgers Boathouse, a waterfront community center that does climate education and outdoor arts programming, and Edgemere Farm, an urban farm in the Rockaways that was repurposed after Hurricane Sandy created vacant lots throughout residential neighborhoods. I’m honored by all of the climate organizers, artists, farmers, parents, scientists, surfers, disaster management professionals, resiliency planners, and community members in these neighborhoods who have talked to us about their vision for climate justice through the arts. After each performance was an interactive community talkback with nourishment cooked from produce from Edgemere Farm that engaged these community members and asked their visions for a more equitable and climate justice city. Each night brought over 100+ audience members, and we even performed in the rain one night. Also, we made a 40 page zine about community flood protection (click here to see it!) A month later, we were commissioned by the Columbia Climate School to perform at their Sandy+10 conference at the West Harlem Piers, and a journalist wrote about us!
