Happiest in the new year Swim Pony friends.

Can I share some stuff I realized in 2013?

I spent a ton of time this fall teaching. In so doing I realized I’ve been rather taken with many of the young women that I’ve worked with.

I also met a bunch of young female artists who are trying to get their feet wet in the Philly scene. In doing so I realized that I wanted them to get their artistic voices out there and that it’s possible I could make that easier.

And as you likely know if you’ve landed here, I’ve been writing over the past year about women in theater and what I see happening and how it’s been making me feel and think.

And the previous two combined with this last thing has brought me to reflect in this, a newly formed 2014, back on my own early career. It occurred to me that all of my mentors were men. That one of the things that it took me a really long time to find was other female art makers a bit further along in their career. That it wasn’t until I made a show that was an explicitly all female undertaking that I really felt like I’d found a cadre of female voices to share the female art-making experience with. It made me think about the fact that while I appreciate the necessity of talking and discussing and highlighting inequity, I’m really most interesting in figuring out how to actually do something about it.

Many of you who read this blog have had smart insightful things to say. And in writing so much lately about women in the arts I’ve wanted a way to pool thinking about this topic, especially with those just coming into the field.

I don’t know what form yet this will take – drop in sessions where young female creators can meet and ask questions, round tables on topics that I’ve been discussing, a small talk from a female artist each month or all of the above – but it feels like something on the once a month scale would be a project I’d be interested in and have the life space for.

So as a resolution for the new year, I’m starting by collecting some female folks on Tuesday Jan 7th at 10am at the Arts Parlor (1170 S Broad) from a variety of career stages, to ask what they wish they’d had then or what they wish they could have now as a female artist, things they’d like to see different and what might be useful to explore in an open source format. So feel free to pass this along to folks of any variety of career stage, I’m interested in getting a variety of perspective. I’d especially love to get any students, young creators, newer female artists, to hear their perspectives on entering the artistic workforce now.

Y’all know I slant towards the generative side of the arts but I’m interested in a solving a variety of problems, so come with whatever you want to talk about.

If you’re interested and want in, come, and if you can  hit me up first so I have a sense for numbers: swimponypa@gmail.com

If you can’t come, but want to throw a few cents in, post your thoughts below on topics for this or future discussions…

I’ll be in touch about this again soon.

Thanks,
A