Moderator: Cortney Knipp
Panelists: Deb Gottesman, Farrah Lawal Harris, Vaughn-Ryan Midder, & Elena Velasco

How can art be used as a form of advocacy and activism? What is theater's role in this current moment? This panel features four artists and activists from in and around Washington, D.C. Each will speak about how they are situated in the current moment, how their work is forwarding the local and national dialogue, and how they are individually or collectively speaking back to the system. Join us in community and conversation!

Cortney Knipp (she/her/hers) is entering her first year as Assistant Professor of Applied and Community-based Performance at Ohio Wesleyan University, where she is co-creating and co-researching the implementation of an undergraduate degree centered on the tenants of theatre for social justice. Cortney has been the inaugural Artistic Director & Program Manager of UVA Acts, an applied theatre program promoting equitable, vibrant spaces for working and learning among faculty at the University of Virginia. Before starting UVA Acts in 2018, she was the Director of Community Engagement at Milwaukee Repertory Theater. Knipp has facilitated artistic processes for professional theatres, nonprofit organizations, K-12 schools, government agencies, and universities. Her artistic practice centers on facilitating agentive, asset-based processes with and for communities, and her research critically reflects on grassroots theatre practices in predominantly white institutional settings. 

Deb Gottesman is a founder and co-director of The Theatre Lab School of the Dramatic Arts. She is also a professional actor who has performed at Woolly Mammoth, Arena Stage, Signature Theatre, and Theatre Alliance among others. She has directed more than thirty productions at The Theatre Lab—including My Soul Look Back in Wonder, which premiered at Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theater and is the subject of the feature-length documentary, “How I Got Over,” available on Amazon. Director of the Theatre Lab’s Life Stories programs, Deb is a 2003 recipient of the prestigious Linowes Leadership Award recognizing “unsung heroes” in the DC community. She has been a featured speaker on the TEDx stage and has co-authored three books on applied acting, all published by Penguin Putnam.

Farah Lawal Harris (she/her/hers) is a first-generation Nigerian theatre artist-plural, poet, mother, Artistic Director of Young Playwrights’ Theater, and Producing Playwright with The Welders. Farah believes deeply in the power of black women and their stories and aims to make people feel less alone through her art, which is her activism. She is a 2020 Kilroys List playwright and co-founded DC-based theatre companies, The Saartjie Project and Wild Women Theatre. Her writing has been produced at Arena Stage, The Kennedy Center, Round House Theatre, Rep Stage, Theater Alliance, and festivals along the East Coast. Learn more at farahlawalharris.com.

Vaughn-Ryan graduated in 2014 from the University of Maryland, College Park with a B.A. in Theatre; he’s worked as an actor and director in the DMV area ever since. Vaughn-Ryan performed at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History as a Museum Educator on the Greensboro Civil Rights sit-ins and antebellum ring shouts. Pre-Covid, Vaughn-Ryan was rehearsing with Mosaic Theatre Company to portray Emmett Till in The Till Trilogy. Over the course of the pandemic, Vaughn-Ryan co-founded an arts advocacy group called The Black Artist Coalition, and will end 2021 in two productions with The John F. Kennedy Center.

Elena Velasco (she/ella)is a theatre artist whose work encompasses performance, activism and education. Directing/choreography credits include Convergence Theatre (Founding Artistic Director), GALA Hispanic, Synetic Theater, Keegan Theatre, Mosaic Theater Company, Adventure Theater, Discovery Theater, and Kennedy Center’s New Visions New Voices. She is a theatre professor and production coordinator at Bowie State University. Ms. Velasco has provided EDIA consultation for Theatre Washington, Women’s Theatre Festival, Gandhi Brigade, and Southeastern Theatre Conference, and has served on panels for Boston Conservatory, Mosaic Theater Company and Montgomery College. MFA in Directing and BA in Drama, Catholic University: www.elenavelasco.net.