ABOUT
PTW 2018
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The tenth Performing the World (PTW) conference was held in New York City, Friday, September 21 through Sunday, September 23, 2018.
Welcome statement from the Conference Chair
These are very uncertain days. So much is, or seems to be, falling apart – nations and government apparatus, norms of diplomacy and civil discourse, civil society, the glaciers of the Arctic, and much more. Is there anything we can count on? Hold on to?
Such uncertainty brings fear, anxiety and despair. But it also brings opportunity and possibility. When things fall apart, something new -something other – can be created. The question is not so much what can be created but how? What is needed in order for people to see possibility, to imagine the inconceivable, and to take action? Can humanity seize the day?
It is from these questions that we came to the theme of Performing the World 2018. In order to see, imagine and create new ways of living, we need to develop. We need to qualitatively transform how we relate, think, feel, live and die. Thus, our call to action is Let’s Develop!
Let’s develop our world. Let’s develop performance activism. Let’s develop PTW.
At PTW 2008, co-founder of PTW Fred Newman told the plenary audience what performance meant to him: “We have to perform the world again because – and we’re all involved in this – this one stinks.” Years earlier, Newman wrote a book entitled, Let’s Develop! in which he advocated for a developmental attitude toward life as “making what there is to make” rather than “making the best of it.” How is performance helping to develop our world? What is the role of performance in fostering a developmental attitude toward life as a key element in creating a better world?
Our theme addressed the need to develop performance activism as an essential tool in developing the world. Let’s develop, in both scale and depth, performance activism in community building, politics, institutional social change efforts, social justice and scholarship.
PTW’18 was the tenth PTW, a fitting moment to turn attention to the PTW conference and community itself. Since the first PTW in 2001, the conference has been a gathering place to explore and celebrate performance as a catalyst for human and community development and culture change. PTW is now a global community of hundreds who creatively engage social problems, educate, heal, organize and activate individuals, organizations and communities, and bring new social-cultural-psychological and political possibilities into existence. Let’s keep developing PTW with new voices, new countries, new structures.
