Connecting audiences with Diverse Perspectives
December 02, 2024
Celebrating 20 years as a fully-fledged festival and building on the legacy of founders Norman Armour and Katrina Dunn, PuSh remains artist-driven. Through our festival programming, our Club PuSh nights, the Industry Week, PuSh Dramaturgy Clinics, and long-standing partnerships, we’ve made great strides in amplifying the presence of those historically underrepresented. We remain deeply committed to connecting Canadian audiences with diverse perspectives.
As the performing arts sector continues to navigate the post-pandemic landscape, we applaud our staff for their tenacity and innovation during these times. At the Board level, we too have been navigating our own transformation, and we are grateful to have had the opportunity to learn from Dr. Margo Kane for several years. Under Margo’s guidance, and in collaboration with Lisa Cooke Ravensbergen, PuSh has started a process of building good relations with local Indigenous Host Nations. Margo and Lisa have brought PuSh staff and board together with elders, artists and knowledge keepers from a variety of Indigenous communities. During that process, one of the requests made of PuSh was that we step back from our Indigenous programming for this year’s festival and reflect on how we can better engage with Indigenous artists and communities in ways that are fuelled by practices of care and respect. We were advised to take the time to focus our efforts towards establishing more meaningful relationships. This is a request that we have honoured, and we are looking forward to growing our understanding of our role in reconciliation. We are deeply appreciative of Margo’s role with PuSh since 2021, and we are committed to the work that she has guided us towards.
Thank you also to you, our community, for your vital contributions. You are our audience members, our donors, our ambassadors, and our volunteers. We could not exist without your generosity. We share this 20th-year milestone with you all. We are dedicated to bringing you more invigorating performances from these lands and around the world.
PuSh Board of Directors