 We wanted to move outside of the room. Once we do that, I'm going to take all your things with you. That would be awesome. We're here. Yeah. We still have a closing party and this wonderful ceremony. So when we started this event, we started with thinking about what we are here to learn and what we're here to give. And we're going to take some time to think about that now. So I'm sure over these past three days, we've all met some new people. We've also connected with people that we've known before coming into this space. So we just want to take some time to really think about what that means and what we're doing with that. So looking around the room, I just want to invite everyone to just really take a moment and look around and see who's in the room. Just really notice everybody that's here. And think about someone that you're looking at that you feel you know more about as a result of these past three days. And place your hand on the shoulder of that person. Feel free to stand up. Place your hand on the shoulder of someone that you feel you know more. Assumptions you came into this festival meaning with about that next to I. What did you come in assuming about the work? What did you learn? Talk about what that mean person like you just said. I learned from Joel, who I barely knew. I had to be back. Anyway, I learned from Joel. And as we were talking, we realized that in theater for young people, you see different ways. And we learned from the different ways in which the work is done. And we learned from how it is done in this place and how they do it in this other place. And so we started to learn from different ways of doing the work. Can we say that one more time? Yes. Thank you. We learned how it's done in different ways, how the theater for young artists looks in this place and how it looks in this other place. And so we learned from that. So learning how it can be done in different ways. Got it. Thank you. Who else? Yeah, me? Yeah. I learned from Maria here that she came not knowing kind of what to expect, not having been in theater for a little bit. And she's leaving knowing the strength and the power of the creative energy and how positive it can be. So learning about the strength and the creative energy and how positive it can be. Thank you. Who else? Who else would you like to share? Yeah. Yeah, I learned from all of you guys that we as Mexicans and come here and receive love. This is here against fucking fascism. Well, I'm from Chile. I learned a lot these days from all of you, seeing the work. But it seems to me that this experience of a Latin American festival for young audiences shows me how necessary this instance is, how urgent it is, how subversive this instance is. And I've seen the courage and the resistance of the Latin community and the Latin people in this new center. The good news is that I didn't know what to say. So everything was new for me. And I discovered this great group that's really amazing, wonderful. The bad news is that we have to keep on going. We have to keep on going. And we're planning to do something in Mexico. Maybe starting with playwright, Bob, try to do some more things. Yeah. Thank you. The assumptions that books come in with about the work or whatever the assumptions that you talked about that you'd like to share. OK. Then at the beginning, we also talked about things that we've learned and things that we are willing to give. So I would love for you to place your hand on the shoulder of someone that you've learned from or someone that you felt really gave something during these past three days. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. The work can stay in time. Yeah, yeah. Awesome. Thank you all. I'm going to pass it over to Mario. I'm excited. Those who don't know know that I'm a man of few words. So I've heard it used up rather than just talking, talking, talking, talking, talking. So I apologize if I'm a little loud. What's the word? Jesus. Jesus? Yeah. But I do want to say thank you. I can never say enough, thank you to anybody. In this particular moment, I will say thank you to the Mexican Red and Cultural Center, and I have Arthur joining us right here throughout this morning as well. Thank you, Arthur, for all of our funders and all that. City of Austin puts a large division and Texas Commission on the Arts, the National Endowment of the Arts. There's a lot. You guys have all the lists of them in the program. Thank you so much. And I definitely want to say thank you against Abigail to the Latinx here, comments, and all of them. And the University of Texas as well, because people or myself could have done this, could have made this happen. And I have received so much love, so much support. The rest of Catherine was well, who's here in the house. I see a lot of you. Raise your hand, please. We're a small group. But obviously, we have a really big heart. All of you have felt thousands and thousands of times that you're ready to quit. And then this happens. This is a camera. My brothers and sisters, I'm going to talk to you again. We're just going to stay over hosting you guys here, but these guys actually do the work. If you have not met them yet, please go talk to them. Take them with you. Take them to Mexico, to Colombia, wherever you want to take them with you. What's our work? No? You will learn a lot from them. Seriously, you will learn a lot from their seven-year-olds. Have taught me so much. They're incredible. So thank you, guys. And then I kind of want to remind us that this really was a week and not about us. We've been talking about how we write our plays. How do we decide how to write a story? How do you get started? When in the end, I think the question that we have to remember is, who are we doing this for? And in this case, it's all about the young people. It doesn't matter what your reasons are. You just have to look at them first and always put them first. So we were writing their stories. We have to make sure that we're writing what they want us to say. And if we want to talk for them, we have to be absolutely sure that it's their voice that's actually being reflected. So let's just remember that. Do it. We talked earlier about intentions. We make promises, especially at the beginning of the convening. We had those questions that Emily presented. What do you have to teach? What do you have to learn? And what are you most excited about? I do want to remind you guys, at the panel a couple of days ago, Rupert Veyes, the founding director of Teatro Vivo, mentioned that Teatro Vivo was not a T-Way theater company. And we're still not. We don't do theater-framed audiences normally. We just do bilingual theater. But we started with a mariachi girl a couple of years ago. Mariachi girl was a story that came out of Teatro Vivo's Austin Latino New Play Festival. And it was developed. And thanks to people like Matt Miller from Zach Theater and, of course, Roxanne and all of UT, it turned into Teatro Vivo's first production of that sort. And since then, we've made more of a commitment to providing services of Teatro for the young people that lost it. So I just want to make sure that we make a promise to ourselves, to each other, that we're going to start somewhere and then see where that takes us. So right now, what I want to do is just we're sharing a lot today. So please turn to the person around you and just kind of remind yourselves and just talk to each other just for a little bit about what your intentions are now. After what you learned this week, what you realize that you still don't know crap about, whatever your intentions are, and you need to tell each other what you're promising to do. So this is taking maybe half a minute. Go. Let's hear some of those things. What promises do you make to the young people of your community of our world? So just toss some things out. To listen. Absolutely. Anybody else? Sorry? To trust them. To trust them, yes. Yeah. Yes. Remember how smart they are. Remember how smart they are. Opportunities for them. Provide the resources. Be opportunities and provide resources. To learn from them. Learn from them. Yeah. They might be small, but they are mighty. They might be small, but they are mighty. Receive their hope. Receive their hope. Sí, sí. Acer como quieran ser. Give them our best. Acknowledge all engagements. Yes. Thank you. Values will now, not just in the future. Sueña con neyos. Sueña con neyos. Well, these are all excellent guys. And guess what? It's on video. It's been reported. I don't think any of us do. We started this session hearing from the young artists. And I'd like to welcome them back onto the stage to share some words with us. And I sure, I know some of you experienced some of their work at the Black Box, at the Precio Teatro, which was awesome. And I'd like to welcome them up here. Yashua? Estás aquí? Sí. Yashua Ivalería. I've seen from Tadas Festival. And well, in Precio Teatro we have a saying, life is too short to not to do theater. This is from all the way from Chile to a one man show bringing the gods of Mexico to Austin, both in between. In this conference we learned more about our Latin culture, learned of the stories of so many people, and learned of the many ways to show and spread our culture to the next generation. Well, at least that's what I hope that we learned in last week. No. Even speeches and so on. Look to the next scene from Tadas Festival. When everyone goes back home, I want you to continue giving us youth theater, even when it gets hard, even when no one is looking. Just keep on doing it, and show us the power of Tietlo. Thank you very much on behalf of everyone in youth theater, on behalf of Tietlo, and on behalf of me. Thank you very much. What a beautiful weekend we have all had together. For the first time in this country, we have made time to celebrate the work of artist creating, artist creating work for young people, seeing aesthetically diverse and really excellent work and produces all over the country and Latin America who are actually doing the work. At the beginning of the conference, when they learned something, and when they taught something, this exemplifies a principle in the LTC we call horizontal mentorship. This is our way of acknowledging that we all have something to offer this movement and this work, and that without all these individuals offering up their expertise, the LTC would not be able to do what they do. What we do. The moments this weekend where individuals gave of themselves so that the experience could be better for others. For me, those are the moments that make a convener. The most common question I got this weekend was not where is the lab theater. Sometimes from people I was meeting in real life for the very first time. Wow, our culture not be changed when we have so many willing spirits in one room. I'm going to shout out a couple groups of folks and if you have participated in any of the things I'm about to name, raise your hand and gesture as you are able and keep it up so we can kind of see who's out there. We had folks who volunteered to serve as post-show facilitators. I want to build the dramaturgy. Taylor Jane Cooper, who is an angel for 1,500 young people to the shows, set up our food and snacks and generally was there whenever we needed her. So give all these folks a round of applause. The LTC will be gathering at the 2019 LTC Miami Regional Convening over the weekend of the 12th of July. This event will focus on issues relevant to the Miami and South Florida region but you are all invited to come learn, offer teaching and run from air conditioned building to air conditioned building. In the work at the International Hispanic Theater Festival which is running concurrently with our convening. The LTC steering committee with this idea in 2016. After she pitched the project there was very little conversation about it because the need was so real and apparent. The gap and the connection between the TYA world and the Latinx theater world was so big we knew we had to do this. The only question anyone asked was how can we do it right? I hope we looked up to it. When Emily came on board as a co-champion in 2018 she brought a grounding quality to the team. Yesterday she said, you know every champion or co-champion team for an LTC event needs the branches that reach out and the roots that ground you. I'm sure that any of you, all of you who've been with us for the past two days know which one of them is the apprentice as well as leaving the LTC at the end of July. And as Gabriel Bareda pointed out to me moments before Kaleidoscopio and I'm not still forgiving him for this, this is my last LTC convening I'll produce on my own. While I will be with you in Miami in the air conditioning in July, I will be there helping to train our next producer and co-producing the event with them. It has meant a lot to me personally to produce this convening less than 70 miles from where I grew up in San Antonio, Texas. To have this event in Texas, a state that many write off but in reality it's a diverse makes my heart sing. It has also meant a lot to me to work on this with my friend Roxanne Froder Arce. Who cast me in my first ever Latino play 10 years ago. My first experience at Latinx TYA, I thought about it and realized my first experience was with Roxanne. Public and charter high schools doing workshops with students after the shows. That experience taught me what can happen when people are given a chance to engage with culture that reflect their reality. And from that moment on I didn't want to do anything else. Latinx TYA changed my life and set me on this course and I didn't even remember that show yesterday. Hopefully, with your new friends, by yourself, we'll come back here at 6.30 for our closing night party hosted by our Austin host committee and planned by Joanne and Rupert Reyes. There will be some yummy eats and drinks from our sponsor who I was not allowed to mention on the UT campus. Our liquor sponsor is Tito's homemade vodka. And Richard's school for young women leaders alumni. This power trio delivers an eclectic sound and an anthemic lyrics. Challenging and celebrating a message of unity and empowerment both in English and Spanish. They are archived in the Austin History Center as the youngest Latina band in Austin. Rupert and Roxanne Schroederer. I don't have as much applause as Tito's vodka. Okay, well, the last three days, I really can't, it's just incredible. There's just so many moments where my heart was literally leaping out of my chest and I'm just so grateful. It's just been absolutely incredible. So the dialogue, the workshop, the connections, the beautiful, meaningful art in many, many languages, the questions, the hugs and the kisses that I received and observed, the tears. And of course, those incredible, incredible moments of watching theater with young people alongside of all of you, what else is there? Moments where I literally, yeah, like moments like now. So thank you. And it truly is a dream come true. So thank you. To watch you with intention, observing young people, seeing this incredible work. That's just truly a dream come true. So, yeah, when I was scripted, yeah. I don't know what to say. So, but I'm tired, so energized by all of the energy that you have all brought here. So, gracias. And you wanna say thank you to everyone who made this happen, especially the LTC Steering Committee who said yes. And lots of people say yes and hand you a couple dollars. And the LTC Steering Committee said yes and then said yes. And came forward and kept doing it. And I'm so, so grateful. U.T. Austin, Teatro Vivo, of course, the Mac. Every individual who gave of your time and spirit. Gracias, gracias. We also want to honor and lift up the companies who shared their incredible work, La Negra, Maria Teatro, etc. Teatro Vivo and Clash Huffle from Chicago and Tempe. The journey is not over. And not only are we going to follow through on the commitments that you made with Mario that are recorded, but there are still more opportunities to engage with the LTC and with the communities we have formed the last few days. We will be meeting again this summer, as Abigail said, in Miami to meet and grow as artists in Miami and South Florida. And we want everyone to be there. The LTC also makes stuff happen. So if you know people who need to be there, reach out and have some drinks as well. And get them there, right? I want to take this moment to acknowledge my friend, Adriana, Gabiria, we're, yeah, Adriana is the champion of that event. And Emily and I are so ready to hand over the moment to thank and honor the absolutely tireless. And I mean tireless, I don't even know how she does it. I really don't. I really don't, I really don't, because I see it all day and then I'm like, they're still moving, so. And around that tirelessness is also an incredible intentionality, thoughtfulness that I appreciate so much. So we all do, and Abigail, you're just so incredibly grateful to you. Thank you. Thanks to you a moment ago. She actually is done with you people. She's gonna be around in yoga, and she'll always be part of LTC, and we're gonna keep her, but we also want to really put out there that perhaps the next producer is here. Perhaps the next producer is your neighbor, someone you work with, someone that you know, someone you don't know yet that you should know. So please get the word out. Still, applications are going to be extended, the deadline is extended until February 10th. So we do encourage you to apply, and I mean, you've got some big shoes to fill, but we hope you will apply. And again, thank you, Abigail. Thank you guys so much, thank you. And she has to keep going back and forth to between Emily and myself, and I'm like, how do you know what to talk to her, because we're both, yeah. In a moment, we're going to stand, and we're gonna walk out the doors of the theater. And maybe our incredible impromptu band would guide us, that'd be incredible. And we're going to go form a circle, oh, actually, before we do that, we're going to go with Erika, and we're going to go have a photo of all of us together, because the lighting is perfect right now. Anybody beyond me always needs a photo, so it didn't happen, it's not easy. So we're going to come up, we're going to take a photo, and then we're going to create a circle. What? Is that really what you said? Yes. Incredible, incredible, Mito, Eatsley, yeah, you don't need, Danza, a second company from Dallas, Texas, you already met Katya and Mario, they have the rest of the crew with them, and we're just incredibly excited about that. Planned by Avello Torres, and Avello is here. So, as we, when we're out there, they're gonna dance for about 20 minutes. I will be in the circle for 20 minutes, if you feel like you want to sit down. Actually, if someone could grab a few chairs, okay, for our elders, that'd be great. And then we're going to be in a circle, and there's some grass as you know, so don't, it's not, it's okay if you move away from the circle and just take care of yourself, that's fine, but we dance for about 20 minutes. And then we're gonna see a final blessing from the incredible Maria Rocha and Dr. Mario Garza. We'll end it with us, and then we'll be grateful for that. And that's how we're going to end it. And then, okay, as we walk outside and follow you, she asks that you have another chat, talk some more, we've talked a little more, we've eared all into the reflection. And I, again, just so, so I'm looking for, for all of the energy that you have put into this, so, thank you.