Civic Impact

"There are so many talented young people [in Toronto]; gems in different communities who, with just a little bit of a push and a little bit of direction and mentorship, could do spectacular things."

 

It's for that reason, explains Roshanak Jaberi, associate producer with Toronto's Expect Theatre, that the Toronto theatre company has taken on its newest endeavour -  training and mentoring Toronto's emerging artists.

 

For the past seven years Expect Theatre has partnered with Arts Etobicoke to host the annual urbanNOISE Festival in the Jamestown/Rexdale area. The festival, which every year features local and international artists, also provides training for up-and-coming artists from the community.

 

It was in part based on the experience of putting together urbanNOISE (only one of Expect Theatre's many projects), says Jaberi, that she and artistic directors Chris Tolley and Laura Mullin, saw the need for a pre-professional training program for young artists. 

 

"When we were working in Rexdale with UrbanNOISE we always had a training component and a mentorship and workshop component along with the festival. We got to see some of the needs and challenges in the community and we also saw so many young people from different communities who were so talented and who are interested in art not just in a recreational way, but who really wanted to make performing arts a career and who just needed a little help to get there."

 

"When we finished urbanNOISE [last year was the festival’s final year] we were looking to do something that still served young artists in various communities and we had this vision of creating a kind of training program and ensemble."

 

After securing funding for the project from the Ontario Trillium Foundation and the Ontario Arts Council, Expect Theatre officially launched its new program, the Emerging Inter-Arts Ensemble, in the beginning of 2014.  

 

The ensemble’s first project, Beats + Intentions, will start next month and has three years of funding support from the Ontario Trillium Foundation.

 

Beats + Intentions is an a two-week intensive that pairs emerging artists with skilled facilitators and gives participants the opportunity to work with other emerging artists from across the city. In order to reach a diverse set of participants, Expect is holding auditions for the program (details here) in many of the city’s priority neighbourhoods including Regent Park, Parkdale, Rexdale/Jamestown and Kingston Galloway/Orton Park. Once accepted, the participants--who could run the gauntlet from filmmakers, to dancers, to songwriters--will participate in a two-week intensive with facilitators and will perform in a collaborative final presentation.

Every emerging artist will also be compensated for TTC fare and will receive an honorarium for their contribution to the program.

 

"This is such a great opportunity for young people to take advantage of the professional artist facilitators we’ve got. These are people in high demand whose schedules are not always open. If young people had to pay for training with them it would cost thousands of dollars, so this is an amazing and unique opportunity because they don't have to worry about not having resources to take advantage of this program...Many of these emerging artists are right out of high school and in a transitional period  and looking for employment opportunities. The honorarium helps us  support them and also give a sense of accomplishment."

 

Writer: Katia Snukal