The Brooklyn Commune’s Cultural Democracy and Representation Team, led by Kyoung H. Park, has created a series of interviews with artists and arts leaders to address issues of diversity and social inclusion in contemporary performing arts. Over the course of the next few months, we will highlight interviews with artists who are in conversation with our team to ask ourselves how we can insure that people from all points on the age, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion and cultural spectra have a place in the conversation. We invite members of our community to help us gather more information by completing our artist surveys here, and stay tuned as we synthesize our findings and share them online.
1. How do you identify yourself? How does your identity influence or inform your work?
A friend of mine introduces himself, his culture, his identity with a poem. The poem is about where his is from, who his mom is and where she is from, what she does; who his father is and where he is from, what he has done. It places him. It gives us context for knowing him, his identity, and for knowing why we need to know it. It’s one of his many important poems.
Read the rest of the interview at brooklyncomune.org