In March 2010, Threshold Theatre will launch the first annual Oakwood Village Theatre Festival. This project is exciting on many levels, combining ground breaking theatrical works with grassroots community-building. The Oakwood Village Theatre Festival will unite artist and audience in experiencing a village, both real and imagined, remembered and envisioned.
We see the Oakwood Village Theatre Festival as an annual event occurring in the first week of March at the Oakwood Village Library and Performing Arts Centre in the northwest part of Toronto. Proposals will be invited from theatre artists/groups based in the area bound by Eglinton West, Bathurst, Davenport and Lansdowne From these submissions, four will be selected. Two other artists/groups from outside the area will also be invited to participate. The festival will be curated with a view toward presenting works which reflect the cultural diversity of the area along with a dynamic range of theatrical approaches. As well, a few local artists from other disciplines will be invited to participate around the theatrical productions: for example, an exhibit or installation at the library during the festival, and musical performances as part of the opening and closing celebrations. The Saturday afternoon of the festival will feature a roundtable discussion with local politicians and concerned citizens, to share perspectives on some of the themes being raised in the plays presented. To engage local youth and showcase their talent, student groups from Vaughan Rd. Academy and Oakwood Collegiate Institute will be invited to perform during the weekend segment of the festival. Threshold will produce, administer, promote and publicize the festival as well as provide technical support. Participating groups will prepare their shows independently and collect 100% of their box office revenue.
What’s the big idea? Simply stated, it is to understand the importance of village, and then to help build one. This is a festival that brings together a community while exploring compelling socio-political ideas through theatre. For our first festival we have decided to ask artists to respond to the theme of VILLAGE. It is a concept rich in associations. A quick search on the internet reveals a few of these:
There was this mountain village in Russia where my music was getting in on some German radio station. I remember this because music used to get up to Saskatchewan from Texas. Late at night after the local station closed down.
Joni Mitchell
You understand something that many people here don’t recognize: the extraordinary power that is Africa at village level - at community level.
Stephen Lewis
The new electronic interdependence recreates the world in the image of a global village.
Marshall McLuhan
Many of our own people here in this country do not ask about computers, telephones and television sets. They ask - when will we get a road to our village.
Thabo Mbeki
You could perhaps better tell the story of a place by writing of a tiny village as a sort of prism into the bigger issues the culture was facing. Nicholas Kristof
It takes a whole village to raise a child.
African Proverb
While one artist/group may create a piece about an ancestral village, another may concentrate on the implications of the so-called global village. Yet another group may reflect on the phrase ‘village idiot’ and create a piece about outcasts and ostracism, about mental illness or homelessness. All the artists involved will be asking vital questions about how we belong, about community. By definition, the village community is regarded as the political unit out of which the modern state developed. The concept of village continues to define us in many different ways. The productions featured in the first annual Oakwood Village Theatre Festival will bring fresh perspectives to the theme and spark dialogue in a way that only theatre can!
