 Hello again, everybody, or for the first time if you're just tuning in today. My name is Sam Morielli, I use they them pronouns and I am one of the producers for the prelude 2020 festival sites of revolution. I'm super excited to get this live stream going for our fourth panel, which is called get rid of the gala. This panel, excuse me, I lost track of where I was going. This panel is hosted first and foremost, and we are hosted by the Martin E. Segal Center. This panel is going to explore the fact that most nonprofits host an annual fundraising gala, an event that seems to amplify every aspect of the feet of the fields in equity. This gala is one of the most important events of the festival. This gathering seeks to reimagine the gala and how it can reflect the shared values of everyone who makes the work on stage possible. I'm super excited about the folks that we have lined up to speak about this issue and imagine some revelatory practices for how our nonprofit industry does make money. Before we jump into the panel itself, I want to pay homage to the ancestral lands on which I am sitting. I am on the lands of the Lenape who have started this space for centuries and deserve to have their land back. And I encourage you to continue supporting the land back movement, knowing how you can get involved with the indigenous peoples on which on whose land you are residing as I will do the same. So without further ado, welcome again to the fourth panel, get rid of the gala and I'm going to turn it over to our lovely panelists. Hey y'all. And I think this is it. I think it's us in a room. Great. And then I think that is our cue to get started with brief intros right. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, go, go for it Cynthia. Let's do it. Hi, I am Cynthia flowers. I use she her hers pronouns. I am joining you from the unceded land of the Lenape and the canarsie peoples. And I'm going to explain just a little bit about my background and then start with my opener or would you all like to introduce yourselves first. That sounds perfect you take it. Okay, great. So, along with Sarah Benson and Merope Peppernitas, I am one of three directors of the theater company so ho rep. I joined so ho rep in 2012 initially in the role of the executive director. And I stayed at the company for the last eight years because I love the values of the company, the aesthetics of the work that we produce in the relationships that I have with my colleagues, the artists that we work with. And yes, even my board, believe it or not. In terms of my background, I am a white says heterosexual woman who was raised in a small extremely conservative town in East Texas. Early on I had some sense that theater could be my ticket out. I was lucky enough to get a scholarship to attend USC and Los Angeles where I quickly learned I was a terrible actor. After college I moved to New York City to direct and to start my own theater company. But I was pretty quickly overwhelmed by the financial instability of it all, and I started for looking for theater admin jobs in order to have a consistent paycheck. I was hired as the development assistant at Playwrights Horizons in 2006, where I thought I could convince them to transfer me out of the fundraising department and into the literary department within like six months. Now, how it works. And in 2010 I solidified my commitment to a career and professional fundraising when I accepted the role of director of development at the Atlantic Theater Company. So between all of that I have planned or overseen 15 galas that have probably netted about $7 million for three theaters in New York City. And hundreds of my administrative and artistic colleagues have devoted thousands and thousands of hours of collective effort towards those fundraising events. So when Miranda and David asked me to participate in this panel they asked me to consider the question, what could theater and performance institutions do instead of their annual gala. I'm excited to think about this question in part because I have developed a lot of feelings about galas over the last 15 years that I've been producing them, but also because their question overlaps with other questions that I've been obsessing over since every theater in New York City shut down in March of this year. And the first question, I guess, that I was thinking about a lot was, why doesn't anyone care about us. And by us, I mean the 750 or so often off Broadway theaters off off Broadway theaters that provide half a billion dollars of wages annually to thousands of war arts workers across the city. Nearly one third of TCG theater members reported that they would be forced to consider closure as early as 2021 without serious government intervention and creative worker unemployment as it is at an astonishing nearly 65%. It feels like the entire field as we know it might be on the precipice of extinction, and yet major foundations have told me that they are pausing grant making while they wait to see quote who sinks and who swims. Elected city officials have told off Broadway leaders that we produce quote super spreading events, and any meaningful federal relief for arts institutions or workers has indefinitely stalled. It would be easy to pin the blame for this entire sad state of affairs entirely on other people other institutions, other systems, but more and more a new and discomforting set of questions keeps me up at night. I wonder, how are we reaping what we have sound. Why are we so fragile to begin with. What is this moment revealing about existing illnesses within our institutions and how did they take hold. Why doesn't the great mass of citizens citizenry seem to care about whether we exist at all or not. So to return to this evening's prompt. What could theater and performance institutions do instead of their annual gala. I think my answer is that instead of spending hundreds of hours planning yet another gala. We should use that time to push our institutions out of the increasingly individualistic and scarcity based framework that we have inherited. And into a radically reimagined and collective way of building abundant resources. I know that was a lot. So I will say it again, instead of spending hundreds of hours planning yet another gala. We should use that time to push our institutions out of the increasingly individualistic and scarcity based framework that we have inherited and into a radically reimagined and collective way of building abundant resources. So, I'll explain. First of all, we live in a deeply capitalist country and is very difficult, if not impossible for a single performing arts institution to exist over time in a traditional market economy. I will not break all of this down but the reasons for this were clearly articulated in a classic 1966 text called performing arts the economic dilemma. And basically the author said that in a traditional manufacturing business, you get technology and other forms of innovation, which lead to increased productivity, which enables businesses to theoretically decrease prices and raise wages while still building up a surplus which can be used to produce and accompany. That is not possible in the performance arts, because the performers labor is the end product that the consumer is purchasing. So while there is technology we have developed to reduce the labor necessary to produce a toaster. We also get devised a way of reducing the amount of labor required to make a play a dance piece or a concert without compromising artistic quality. So it's argued that it's nearly impossible for arts organizations to be self sustaining and to break even without some kind of If you have ever been responsible for making sure that you have the cash on hand to make payroll, you will understand how acute the need to subsidize your arts organization can be. And consciously or unconsciously for decades arts institutions have generally relied on three forms of subsidy to reach a balanced budget. Reduced and capped labor costs, high ticket prices and an outsized reliance on fundraising. The problem or problems or a problem is that even if we avoid questions of whether or not these subsidies are right or wrong, or if they lead to art that's interesting or beautiful or important, or even if we are only considering the economics of these three so called solutions. They actually make the economic challenges of producing theater worse over time, which is again, what I think that instead of spending hundreds of hours planning yet to get to the gala, we should push our institutions out of increasingly individualistic and scarcity based frameworks which we've inherited and into a radically reimagined and collective way of building abundant resources. Anyone who's worked in the nonprofit theater for any length of time, who doesn't understand the inherent problem of each of these three subsidies, and I literally might write a book on this and I think I only have two minutes left. So I am briefly just going to touch on two of those subsidies, labor subsidy and fundraising subsidy, labor subsidy because I'm currently obsessed with it and fundraising subsidy because that's what I'm sensibly here to talk about. The labor cost subsidies are typically carried directly by theater workers through the underpayment of creative theater artists, and through the overworking of theater arts administrators. The undervaluing of labor and the distinct differences in which artistic and administrative labor is undervalued contributes greatly to the toxic work environment of many producing theaters, and I think it is one of the most prevalent and least differences of tension and othering among artists and administrative staffs, because a theater artist, knowingly or unknowingly has only agreed to be underpaid, because they are explicitly or implicitly promised the psychic income of creativity, to ensure personal satisfaction, and burnout arts administrators work 50 60 set of any hours a week in traditionally hierarchical organizations on increasingly mundane and niche five tasks, while making just enough to never escape the career they've chosen in arts administration. Economically, even economically, this practice places obvious limitations on how an institution can survive. It limits the talent that chooses to enter a particular workforce. It limits how long they stay in our industry before they are crushed by its financial realities, and it decreases worker engagement, which impacts the quality of the work, the creativity at our institutions, innovation within the field. Okay, that's labor subsidies as we all know institutions are also increasingly reliant on fundraising subsidies foundation grants corporate sponsorship individual giving and of course the annual gala. The racism and classism embedded in our current philanthropic system is at this point well documented and understood from broad statistics like the fact that 55% of arts funding is going to 2% of arts organizations with annual budgets over $5 million to specific stories like the fact that the Community Foundation of Atlanta directed exactly 0% of its first round of COVID related arts emergency funding to black led organizations. Gallas, in particular, with their tiered sponsorship level, social light appear appeal hundreds of hours of uncompensated intern staff and artists labor are short sided, highly competitive, reinforce money as a default measure of worth and distracts us from our larger missions. We are doomed if we keep going like this COVID or no the proof is in the pudding. Many of our arts institutions were already on the brink of collapse before the shutdown began. So what we are doing is clearly not working and doing the same thing over and over again despite the fact that's not working is the very definition of insanity. So what are we to do instead. Well, I would like to admit that the details of how we are to change not yet quite clear to me. This is the beginning of a thought exercise and an invitation to sit with a new understanding of a shared condition for which there is no immediate single solution. But I do believe that there is a collective way to build abundant resources within our reach. If we refocus the efforts of the institution and we collectively organize. For example, I wonder if we could say abandoned dissolve and reform new theatrical unions as unions and other performing arts industries have historically secured much more significant gains and wages and working conditions for their members. Or perhaps we could secure universal health care. If we had universal health care and institution like Soho rep could redirect as much as 10% of its entire budget into other labor costs or affordable tickets. It also might force those theatrical unions to make larger gains for its members and wages and working conditions in order to justify their existence. So I would encourage student loan debt and generate affordable housing to minimize the labor pressures on both institutions and individuals, increase access to arts education to enable more citizens to think of themselves as theater makers as audience members, as in fact citizen advocates for the arts. And this is just the beginning of some ideas I have and the response to this question of what should we do instead of the gala. I am looking forward to talking with the rest of the panel about all of this, and I also just want to acknowledge some other people who have really shaped my thinking who in this moment who everybody should check out. One is the actor Chris Myers who's hosting a series of free learning study groups called anti capitalism for artists. I'm Diane rag sales blog jumper is awesome and really diving into why an institution should exist or not in this time. In 2014, a group of artists made a report called the Brooklyn commune called the view from here, which I still read like twice a month. And then of course, you know, my colleagues at the theater Sarah and ropey who I'm in conversation with, like, every day. And that's it. That's my kickoff. Oh my God. Can we just take a moment I mean like I think that the three of us have to uplift each other that was phenomenal. Wow. Really, really inspiring thank you, Cynthia. Thank you just some things I'm thinking about. I mean but also like you didn't see us over here snapping. I don't know if the audience can see the chat but like we're chatting amongst ourselves just being like, yeah, what. Let's reinvent it everyone let's reinvent it. Sanjay you're up. Okay, great. Hi, I'm Sanjay Kim. Today I welcome any pronouns she he or they, or something else. I am in Seoul, South Korea, which is where I'm from. And it is the ancestral traditional land of my people, the Korean people soul was the ancient capital of many kingdoms. And most recently the Joe Sunday nasty. And it's one of the few places in the world I feel like where there is theater still. I've been seeing shows and, you know, sort of like watching how how it's possible why and how and why it's possible here and the answer has like it's it is about the government response like it is about the fact that like cove it is like way more under control but it's also it's actually I think more about the economics. It's in it's more about like unions and labor structures and sort of, and also about like who the audiences and like what they're willing to how they're willing to like shift their behavior or not. So that's been really interesting and you know I'm happy to talk more about that like later. But yeah, I mean, I had like a tiny thing but I'm sort of going to just like speak from the heart because I feel like I'm so like I was so moved by your remarks Cynthia and like thank you again. So, I think I was approached to do this by lovely Miranda and David, because I'm writing a piece for how around called abolish the fellowship industrial complex. It's like a like cheeky like title and I think the same like, in which I sort of am going to talk about like the term like industrial complex and like what that means and like the relationship of like, you know, like the creation of this thing is actually like the thing that I'm interested in it like serving like a purpose. And I think sort of like the same thing could be said to Dallas right like it's I feel like. So my the thing I'm writing about is like, like, our fellowships like genuine pushes and opportunities for to like support emerging artists young artists especially like BIPOC artists or like are they sort of like a performance and on its own to sort of like signal a kind of like value system, more so than like it actually being a sustainable like practice and I think the, I think we can say like similar things about like the practice of the gala. I don't know if I hate gala is actually personally. I'm like a fancy girl, so I like to dress up and I like to like, you know, like, kind of like be seen out on the town. I enjoy that. And I've actually been on both sides. I was Scorpio Sam, obviously. But torus moon Pisces rising, Scorpio Mars, I keep going. But I know like people from watching are probably like very confused about my detourges there. So I've been on like both sides of this actually like I've been the artists paraded around. I've been the artist sort of like put on stage and kind of like me like, look at this inspiring young Asian woman and then I've also been the I directed the kind of anti gala actually like Nova ball last year and and another gala for a group called the lobbyist. So I kind of like been on both sides and I think what I like enjoy about them. I think what I really loved about like doing Nova ball was like, you know, it was like, I got to see all my friends. Everyone was like in the same room. And it was, you know, we're honoring like Joe iconis and like all his collaborators sort of like came and like surprise him with this like big number and it really felt like communal it really felt powerful. It really felt like we were just like having fun. And I think when I was sort of like pondering this. And then the parts that I don't so that that's the part that I enjoy is like seeing my friends and being together and especially now like now that that's not a thing like I really, I miss that feeling. And then the parts that I don't like about it are, it's probably obvious but that's like performance of opulence and like the cast system the literal sort of like tiered cast system that it performs of like, okay, like if you pay this much you get to sit at like this table and like with this famous person and like and the literal and the very like huge gap between like the people who were financially dependent on and like and us and like what and that like really like intense dissonance between like, I don't think any of us is like, I am like making art for I am making theater for like this old white like man person. You know, like no one like like no one is like consciously thinking that but that it's sort of like in the financial reality of it like that's like our patron, and I don't know what to do with that and like artists have always had patrons like like land like all these like like historical artistic male geniuses I had like huge patrons and that's how you know we've always done our thing and it's nothing new but like I don't really I just don't know what to do with that sort of like intellectual dissonance so that's a part of it about it that I struggle with. And when I was like imagining, you know what else we could we do. I mean, I don't know like I feel like like one thing I was like so silly it seems so silly like what if we had like birthday parties, you know what if we had like like a birthday party for so whole rep or like birthday party for like ours Nova and like it and just be like because I don't think that there's in the in the like, like Cindy said like we live in a capitalist system like there's sort of like no inherent like shame and like we need money like that's just like a thing. But it's just that like how do we like, yeah, like how do we imagine a structure where like if it actually could feel more like mutual aid than this like cast system of like making the like a few wealth like wealthy people feel like really good and like really really special like what if it could feel like what if we could feel like an occasion where like we all love so whole right like we all love so whole right we all care about so whole right like we're all happy to be here for so whole right and we're all happy to like like kind of like the Bernie Sanders like $27 model and we're all happy to like chip in a little bit so like our friends so whole rep can keep doing its thing and like yeah it's mutual aid it's a it's a birthday party or like it's sort of like yeah it's sort of like a like what if these events could feel like something where the communities like making a collective decision to come together and like celebrate and invest sort of collectively invest in like the future of the organization, rather than it being like a performance of like opulence for just like the selected few so that's where I'm at right now that that's I think that's it and I'm really excited to like have this conversation actually I feel like super awake and jazzed up. Okay Brian. Well I love that I love that you're inspired and calling in from soul so we're half a world apart. So good morning. It's, you know, nighttime not here as you can see. My name is Brian Joseph Lee I use he him pronouns. I'm calling in from the unceded territory of the Lenape people in Washington Heights here in Manhattan. And what about me I'm a southern born queer black man who has dedicated my life to amplifying stories of my community my people. And so whether that's black folks queer folks trans folks by pop folks and people of color. I've done that work for quite some time I've done that work in a variety of disciplines, working in classical music, the museum field art galleries fine arts theater festivals. And theater companies, and I've often done that work in context of predominantly white institutions. And so I find myself sort of in this you know, very particular tension that most by pox working within white institution feel sort of the integrity that we hold of ourselves in our own communities and how that is a relationship to an inherently racist supremacist structure and that's both within the individual institutions in the fields at large. But throughout that you know my my personal mission is inspired by my family, it's inspired by, you know, my family are troublemakers and freedom fighters and row rum runners, you know they break rules they have fun. They gather together, and it's that spirit that I bring, hopefully into whatever space that I occupy so whether it was built with me in mind or not. I'm now the director of public forum at the public theater. And so most of my work sits at the intersection of arts and civic engagement. It's not about how we show up both as individuals, but as artists, activists and organizers in our community, hoping to make change. And so that actually is a good sort of foregrounding to how I'm entering into this conversation, which is you know two things that I kind of want to acknowledge here. One is that I'm many things I am not a fundraiser. And I appreciate fundraisers, I think you all do incredible work. Some of the best most brilliant dramaturgical minds I have met in the fundraising departments of places that I've worked. But I have always had a difficult time plugging into fundraising and philanthropy, and I think a lot of that has to do with my background and my identity that particularly as a young queer black man. It's felt impossible for me to ask for money traditionally from older wealthier cis white folks. That's been a psychological barrier that borders prostitution and it's something that's really difficult for me to wrap my head around. And I think you know obviously we all have our ways of negotiating that I go to work every day. I am part of a field that is you know at best 5050 split between earned and contributed revenue and I recognize that the nonprofit arts landscape depends on this kind of philanthropy but I think the closer I get to that flame. The more it burns and so I've never really had a positive relationship when it comes to fundraising. And I don't think I'm alone. I think that most black and BIPOC artists particularly who enter into the nonprofit world are negotiating a broken relationship and whether that relationship is between the artists and the institution. The fact that you know particularly artists and communities of color can be highlighted uplifted, you'll see a lot of diverse spaces come gala season on fundraising literature spoken about in your grant proposals, and very little that money goes to the communities on whose you know identity and reputation these institutions make their living. And let's not get it twisted right that these institutions are legitimized particularly by communities of color. We make them real they don't actually have a market position or value even within this broken system without us and so I do think that that relationship is inherently exploitative extractive and flawed. And we feel that most intimately in these moments like Sandra was pointing to, you know, when these gallows sort of encapsulate all of those flawed structures and one. And you know, on a personal level, I have had, I've been to many gallows across many institutions and there have been many, many moments where I've been, you know, exploited other eyes made to feel less than, you know, whether that's as a staff member who's told to defer older, wealthier white folks, or whether you know it's me or someone that I know, being called boy by an elder white person, whether it's me or someone I know, being mistaken for another person of color whether it's me or someone I know, who is told that you can eat at a table that you can't eat. It's all of that that's really embedded in the sort of like visceral experience of what it means to participate in these events so I'm bringing that layer into this that you know I haven't had the best sort of access point when it comes to this conversation. The second opinion I have however is that like any context any conversation about how we relate to gallows and fundraising has to be in sort of put in context of this present moment. We are seven months into a pandemic that is fundamentally stop the arts world in our tracks. No one has made a significant amount of earned revenue in seven months. And so for an industry that at best you know, most of our arts institutions, particularly the brick and mortars are 50607080% of their annual income is supported by earned revenue and ticket sales. It obviously depends on which institutions you're in but like I'm using that as a broad scope for the fiscal year that just ended FY 20. This pandemic was earth shattering. It ended a lot of plans. It made our financial picture really difficult, it caused a lot of people to go on furlough or lose their jobs to call institutions to tighten their belts. And you know those institutions, especially over the summer leaned on philanthropy and virtual gallows as a way to support that immediate stop gap. I think the challenge is that what was what felt like an insurmountable hurdle for FY 20 is all but you know, destructive for FY 21, there is no scenario in which a majority of our arts organizations and theater companies can sustain an entire production of producing programming and staffing without earned it revenue, just as fundamentally impossible in the business model that we have. That makes things like gala is really important, but a gala alone will not, you know, fill the major deficit the major stop gap between like what it takes to run these institutions and what we actually have and I think that Cynthia at that point, so beautifully that the system was already broken before this pandemic with how much sort of like, you know, deficits were carrying in our labor structures and in our relationships to artists and it's just going to be that much harder in the year to come, and in the years to come. And so to acknowledge at any opinion that I have about gallows, I think, requires us to admit that you know philanthropy is incredibly important. The meaning and building of those relationships, especially during a pandemic are important not only for what they bring us now but because those people will be the people that our institutions rely on to see us through this moment, right. And so I don't want to enter into this conversation about giving my full full appreciation and reverence to those folks who have navigated particularly our fundraising community who supported arts and art institutions through this time. They are really like there there is no other way for us to carry through this moment. And that brings me to sort of my opinion on where we go and how we move forward right that we are talking about moving chairs on the deck of the Titanic, I think that the ship is going down. And without some major shifts in both our fundraising and funding structures and our business models. I don't see a way that this particular conversation about gala, you know, can really correct a path that we're on. I'm driven to one particular resource. Edgar Villanueva who wrote a book called the colonizing wealth, which is a really powerful book that points to indigenous structures that we can, you know, understand as a way to write our relationship to a to philanthropy and that relationship being first of all not only inherently based off of the exploitation of land and the labor and exploitation of slavery, which is how many of our largest funders got their generation of wealth to begin with, but and also how that has sort of impacted the US tax code, which makes philanthropy as a tax deductible exploit, even possible. Right. I think that so much of the systems and structures upon which these art institutions have to navigate are inherently flawed so my, you know, thinking about what I would change thinking about how to dream. I point to those things I point to, you know, my international friends who really want to understand how we fundraise and I'm like I want to understand how y'all have federal support and like state support for the arts it's brilliant. So the first thing I would do is tax the rich, our understanding of philanthropy as sort of, you know, giving the most wealthy. The ability to choose how and where pennies to the dollar go, and that we're sort of like structurally dependent on this fundamental flaw would be right if we only taxed the wealth of individuals and corporations who would not exist but for the exploitation of people. It's incredibly important, you know, so call that what you want to call that I think that the Elizabeth Warren plan was the plan we should have had. Do you know what I mean that 2% on every dollar above X Y or Z can can can pay for so much. I think that there needs to be an expanded federal and state level support and nonprofit subsidies for the arts. I think that subsidy has to happen on the federal level and we've seen the sort of like difficult spot that we're in right now with the impact and utter incompetence at the federal level when it comes to how and when we support our artists and our arts institutions. I think that that would give us the opportunity, you know, and again like pointed to Cynthia, so much of the sort of an equity that's baked into this field would be righted if only we plug those inequities at a larger level so imagine what student debt relief and, you know, a fair for all and housing subsidies and a guaranteed, you know, universal basic income would do for a field in terms of allowing us to allow you attract the best and the brightest but to redirect so much of our institutional support directly to the art and the artists that we're working with. It would encourage us to support grassroots fundraising above major gifts, which I think is an incredibly important thing right now so much of the gala world is is is you know, a major gift fundraising model where we're actually not positioning ourselves to the thousands and thousands of audience members we have a year but we're really targeting those 2030 40 game changers who can write that one check. I think that system has to be upended if we're ever meant to change. Finally, I think we should decolonize our foundations or get rid of them all together. I think that there's so much about how and where money goes depends on who is at that side of the table. When 80 to 90% of your funding institutions are completely wiped when they create criteria that excludes 90% of institutions of color. When no one on your grant panel represents represents the greater communities that you're hoping to serve. These are fundamental and structural inequities that have a direct impact on the bottom line, and where that dollar goes. And so I do think that when we're talking about how to reimagine and gala gala is but you know one sort of expression of a larger system and series of systems that have to be corrected and upended and gratefully. I think what we're seeing is that so much of that instability so much of that structural inequity is exposed and laid bare and fundamentally breaking right now, which is painful and incredible and so much of that uncertainty. And so now is the time to have a conversation like this where we can imagine what comes next. Yes, yes. I don't know if we're preaching to acquire but let's talk about it. I know I'm like, so it was like yeah we can't see the, we can only see each other so we're preaching to each other. I just want to thank you for like bringing up decolonizing wealth because I think that is such an important, like piece of text and it also reminded me of, you know, there is a organization called community centric fundraising and they also have a podcast called the ethical rain maker, which is really making the case for kind of doing what you're talking about which is rethinking the kind of focus on like 20 people as the most important people in the room who then change the work who then, you know, again, I could go into like focusing on 20 people is also not even over the long term economically beneficial, even if, you know, regardless of the ethics of doing that or the way that it impacts the work aesthetically. But you know, one of the things that's so brilliant about what they're talking about doing in terms of what they call a community centric fundraising lens is that they argue that even the way that we've set up kind of major gifts fundraising is like worse for the individual donor than it has to be that it infantilizes the individual donor because they enter into relationships with us that are not real relationships where we're having authentic conversations with them or they understand what is actually going on in the industry in the field, because we feel like they can't somehow handle the truth or they have an expectation of us that we need to meet and, you know, I think about you know there's a conversation going on now, which is also like related to this where reasonably people are asking that for every kind of fundraising event where an artist is brought out to say how great the institution is or to perform at that gala that they need to be additionally compensated for their time or like, you know, have the right to refuse to be a part of that I do think in practice makes sense, but philosophically, I also wonder if that's like an even greater like commitment to this idea that donors and artists are separate that we're somehow not all in the same community together like we actually all care about the same. Like we do care about theater arts and it, you know that there's some other way to approach this relationship with Sorry, I've gone off on a tangent now but you know, major gift fundraising that is better for everyone involved, you know. Yeah, I'm, I feel, I feel like there's there's an assumption in there that I want to believe that we are all on the same side and that we do actually believe in the same value system and mission. And then there's a part of me that believes that you know, many people who opt into a system that is broken. They do so because the system actually benefits them or works well for them. You know, like I don't think that what I what I view is broken, it might actually be the way that the system is intended to work right in which case like, there are some people who are positioned with a sense of benevolence and are courted in order to give their funding and other people will have to ask for it. And so I do think that there is you know a contract there explicit or not that we all are required to buy into in order to participate in that change. And I fundamentally question whether or not that's the contract that we want or should we get a new one, you know, I think we need a new contract and people will opt in or opt out, you know, for all the reasons you're describing, you know. Yeah, I think, you know, like, as you both, I feel like it, like, I mean, everything's like so much like bigger picture than just like the gala or even just theater but it has to do with like our culture's attitude around wealth itself and like this year I finally understood what like neoliberal or I guess I was like able to kind of get I get what like neoliberal means now that was one of the terms like one of those terms like I just like I'm like I don't know like what you mean when you say that. But like, now I like kind of get it. I wish David was here because I feel like he would like define it really well because I'm like, like the beautiful like definition but like I think the closest I got to like understanding was like it's sort of like the putting the onus of like, like creating a positive change in like society on like the individual rather than my system and the collective and I was like okay I finally get that and like I think it like yeah I think that I'm the nonprofit sector. And the economic reality of that in general like we've sort of we sort of live in a culture where like I totally agree with you Cynthia is like that contract isn't like good for in the individual either. You know, because it shouldn't like the fundamental like like life of an institution shouldn't depend on like a few people, you know, like it shouldn't be it shouldn't like depend on that contract and yet. Like the larger system we live in sort of like creates that and it's not like, like I also feel like there's like a little bit of a side note but like yeah like there's theater in Korea and it's because it's because we have a lot of federal subsidy. We don't really have like a big theatrical nonprofit sector it's sort of like federal and then like commercial and then like totally indie. I feel a little bit like I now I feel like Korea is like a little bit like fetishized you're like oh look at these like magical people who are like still doing theater, but it's like you know there's different problems here like like in the like in the commercial sector there's a gender pay gap for example because most people who go see theater are young women and like the idea is that they want to go see like hot like cis men. And so like these these sort of like male actors get paid like a lot like they literally get paid like 10 times like their female colleagues. Yeah, it's really fucked and it's a it's a it's not the same. It's a very different sort of capitalistic problem but it's again like a, it's a different, it's like different contracts and depending on anyone, depending on any group of people creates this like flawed system, you know, so. And like as somebody who runs an institution, I think what you're talking about in terms of like what we're, what we're conditioned to think about in terms of focus on individualism is actually also it happens at the institutional level we spend all of our time, trying to desperately save our own institution and also like in these weird competitive relationships with other institutions within the ecology, because we somehow believe that within the institution the institution alone can like save itself and is responsible alone for whether it succeeds or fails. There are many factors outside of each individual institution that contribute to whether that institution is a success or not that have nothing to do with the work you produce, how great a staff you have. You know how good you are at, you know, marketing and fundraising or any of those things. And so it's like I'm just right now I'm like we got to get out of that individual mindset, you know. And that's the thing that I want to point to when we talk about contracts right is Sanjay, the idea you brought up of mutual aid, which to me mutual aid and community care are contracts that have existed particularly in communities of color for quite some time. That technology is actually indigenous technology that technology actually exists in the way that either you know artists of color. Arts institutions of color community driven, you know, networks have have existed for quite some time right it's the way that like black folks. United together to do the Chitlin circuit, it's the way that our nonprofit, you know, theaters right now particularly theaters of color, self organize and work with their local communities in order to like you know reflect the best of who they have and to get resources at the ground because they can't be, you know necessarily, they're not allowed access to resources from large institutions and so I do think and believe that there is an educated need for us to break down these silos. And because well so the silos like between institution institution like I think that New York theater should and can be and in some cases are working together and we should democratize that so that we understand that like a rising tide lifts all boats rather than crabs in a barrel one one person shall rule right but more broadly I think the silos between what we imagine white American theater to be what we imagine BIPOC theaters and theaters in communities of color. There's so much to be gained and learn from that emergent sort of process and the way of building relationship as a business. And that could thrive at a large level and I think the reason we haven't seen it thrive is because a there's one way to be a nonprofit and be, you know, 90% of our institutions of color are limited by budget size they don't even qualify for the larger capital investment in order to move into the next level so I do think that there's something there, like as we're having this conversation about what should we do. And I think within me says like there are people who probably are doing this right now, they're just not on a radar, particularly like this for us to like you know actually imply. Agree 1000% Absolutely like I feel like we need like political like more political education for us. I love Cynthia you brought up like an actor who's doing like anti capitalism specifically for artists and you know like maybe we need more avenues where like theater people specifically get together and like learn about the history of mutual aid, learn about the like history of community care and indigenous communities learn about like how people in other countries are doing it. Learn about what me break down what neoliberal means you know, and like sort of like, you know now we have this time and and yet like have the thing that we were always complaining that we never have right like we have like time and so it's like it's hard because in times of crisis is the hardest to like zoom out and sort of like look at everything from like really examine everything but it's it's so important and like it's work that needs to be done and like I wonder how we can create sort of like avenues of political education. You know what you're saying about like why haven't we like done this work together and you know have this education and you know organized community in part part of the reason for that is because like generally speaking creative people work six days a week. Because they have garbage. We have garbage unions. The panel I'd love to participate in. But so working conditions are you work six days a week and you're in an environment where even like the coworkers you have you have them and sort of like intense periods of collectivity together but mainly you're sort of isolated and competition like when it's like, oh my god it's so amazing that the NBA is like striking. I'm like you know what partially probably led to that strike the fact that they were all living together in community with one another and had nothing to do but talk about like what is going on in the climate of the country right now. And the employment environment of the theater actually keeps artists generally overworked and unable to organize together. Yeah. Wow. I agree with that. Mm hmm. I mean, I think that like, we would be remiss we're talking a lot about how institutions dock with this broken contract, but we be remiss not to bring artists into the conversation right that there's so much about like this exploitation that ends up on the individual, the the administrator who has to shoulder so much of this burden in order to participate in the system and I wonder like the same questions and mutual aid and organizing you're totally right. Exist on the artistic level exists like individually and how can we support that so that like more organizing at the grassroots can affect change in this way. Let's do it. Same time tomorrow. Yeah, we, I feel like our, our people are telling us that we probably have a couple minutes left are there any like closing hearts thoughts ideas. Back to Rich. Elizabeth Warren 2024, I shouldn't say that but I'm just like, we got it we got to find some way to make sure that we're absolutely like changing systems and structures because we're not, you know, in isolation. So I think that much of what we're talking about in terms of like systemic inequity if that was solved outside the theater would have such a tremendous effect inside of the theater with our artists in our community. Yep, and there's 1000 there's like 10s of 1000s of us within New York City so that is a powerful collective organizing force. Okay. That felt like a great time just to jump in to say that to let out this screen that I have. Yo, wow, I like I want to like slow clap for you, because that like my drops everywhere. Truly, I am leaving with so many abundance abolish fellowships I'm over them. So, health as a as a queer gender, whatever, like black, brown, poor person in the world, I feel seen by you all and held in this like, in what is such a crazy, like crazy endeavor, like not just the gala but the way as you all are pointing out the way that it truly the way that the gala forms is only resonant of a much larger problem with the way that our the nonprofit industrial complex functions I'm so grateful you all truly I like your articulation of the whole issue like really truly just like reaching into a mess. And also being willing to leave it messier. I think that's so important as we have these conversations and important to moving us towards some sort of liberation. So that that's it Brian Cynthia Sanjay. Thank you. I am in love with you all. And I am glad to be in an industry where you all have our throwing your weight around and making some of these changes and practicing some of these changes. Thank you for evoking emergent strategy many times I will also point people towards the lovely Adrian Marie Brown. And yeah, I will, I think that's that on the panel. Thank you. Do you have any, any, I love this, any other heart things you feel good. Leave it messy, I love it. Leave it messy. There you go. Alright, well to our folks at home thank you so much for joining us. This panel is still going to be available so if you for some reason did not catch it or you need to hear it again. Go to our website prelude NYC 2020.com it will still be streaming throughout the rest of the festival, maybe beyond who's to say the panel that happened before this black imagination if you all weren't able to catch that I highly encourage it was, I'm just buzzing with the brilliance I have gotten the opportunity to sit in today so I really encourage everybody at home. Go check out that the website for all of our panels, all like a lot of our artists content is still there, and there's still stuff happening tonight, come back at 8pm to see our concerts, come back at 10pm to meditate with man to come back tomorrow at 830am to meditate with it with man, and then continue the rest of your prelude festival. And that that's my pitch. I did my producerial job. And that's that on that will cue the waiting music and hope you all have good evenings.