Arts Activities Support

With Audio Description and American Sign Language performances we feel that out outreach efforts resulted in real community diversity. There were 436 patrons for Finding Fish, with an average house size of 31. 104 were persons of color making up about 24% of the audience. 13 patrons identified as seniors and 59 as students. The major artistic goal of Finding Fish was to bring nature and weather into the theater as central characters and intricate parts of a narrative that explores our human relationship with the natural world. We wanted the audience to witness through the continued presence of weather, nature’s unfolding in a constantly changing and eternal flux both beautiful and terrifying, dominating and engulfing the powerless creatures within its grasp. We achieved this mostly through video design with a series of moving/living images rear projected on a scrim that spread across the stage of a Maine seascape framed by pines trees standing on the waters’ edge. These moving images changed from scene to scene from a gathering storm, to a sunrise with a pinkish cloudy sky to a fog and a starry night. This was accompanied by a sound design of water lapping on the shore, waves crashing, foghorns, bells and whistle buoys that gave it all a sense of place, presence and authenticity. Thanks to the talent, skill and imagination of our video/sound designer, who happens to run a small theater in Maine during summers, what we thought would be a major challenge came together quite smoothly and rendered the effect that we hoped to achieve. Somewhat more challenging, in a good way, was the character of Fiona, the fisherman’s wife who in the play is in fact a sea creature, somewhat in the order of a Selkie. The question for us was how does a human being play an animal, without mimicking the traits of that animal’s behavior? How would an animal behave if it had a human body? How can she communicate when she cannot speak? Moreover in all of Fiona’s entrances she is in the nude (clothes are just annoying for an animal), but is quickly covered up by one of the three fishermen. The play’s point about Fiona is that her nude flesh is not her real skin or her identity. Her real skin is a seal skin which she needs to survive in the natural world and has been taken away and hidden by her husband so that she can find fish for him. She is being exploited. Its’ difficult idea to convey, but the great work by the actress playing Fiona and our talented, vigilant director we succeeded in giving nature a voice. Artistically Finding Fish was a great success in our own estimation and a challenge and joy for all the artists who took part. We are most grateful for this experience. The principle community outreach goal around the production of Finding Fish was to raise awareness about the state of our oceans and our natural environment. We held a panel on October 16 titled The Future of Fish and the State of our Oceans. The featured panelist were Jeffery Bolster, historian and author of The Mortal Sea, a book that takes us through a millennium-long environmental history of our impact on one of the largest ecosystems in the world, and Julie Morris, a former commissioner of the Florida fish and wildlife agency and a member of the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council. On October 23 our feature speaker was Indigenous Nibiwalk Water Walker, Sharon Day who has led walks along the length of the Mississippi, Ohio and Minnesota rivers in extended ceremonies in prayer for our waters. Biology Professor Joshua Lallaman from Saint Mary’s University in Winona spoke about issues of sustainability in Minnesota fisheries. Playwright Carlyle Brown conducted audience talk-backs following every performance. Our program included an overview on Cod fish in the gulf of Maine, where the play is set. Resources for more information and ways for audiences to get involved such as The Ocean Conservancy and The Environmental Defense Fund, a short essay on how these issues of Ocean sustainability relate to Minnesota, and Governor Mark Dayton’s Water Stewardship Pledge with notes actions citizens can take from the local Alliance of Sustainability. Our opening night buffet was provided by Coastal Seafoods. We held a special matinee performance for junior and senior students from Patrick Henry High School in North Minneapolis an age and racial demographic we did not anticipate, as well as the Indigenous youth who attended the performance with Water Walker, Sharon Day. One night a Somali playwright talked about how the presence of the sea in the play reminded him of the desert. And on another night an African-American man who had just been fishing that day, caught a White Bass he could hardly wait to fillet, after seeing the play and hearing the talk back, wished he had thrown it back. With Audio Description and American Sign Language performances we feel that out outreach efforts resulted in real community diversity.