Summerworks is marking their 33rd annual festival this year with a unique and diverse group of works for you to enjoy! This is my first time attending the festival and I’m hoping to make it an annual outing. I was able to ask ted witzel and Jivesh Parasram some questions about Summerworks and what you can look forward to in from this year’s festival. Jivesh’s answers are written below, and ted’s are in the audio link!

1. Tell me a bit about the Summerworks festival and your role with Summerworks

The SummerWorks festival has been going pretty strong since 1991, and it’s gone through some major changes in that time in my understanding. Originally, the stories I’ve heard is that it was kind of like a second Fringe Festival for folks who didn’t get into the Fringe Lottery. But over time it shifted from that system to a curated model. This was introduced in around 2000 when Franco Boni was leading the festival. After Franco established this aspect of the festival, the next leadership, Keira Loughran and Kimahli Powell helped to establish it as a bit more of an artist exchange, raising the profile, and then when Michael Rubenfeld came in it started to expand its scope to be more interdisciplinary. Michael also introduced larger scale presentations to the festival as well. When Laura Nanni took over the festival it started to put more of an emphasis on supporting the development of new works in addition to its regular presentation activity. Laura also really advanced the festival’s impact on Indie artists by eliminating a lot of barriers, trying to create more of a fee structure. Prior to this, it was, like a lot of Toronto festivals, a situation where you paid to be in the festival – which was still a good deal and way more affordable than producing on your own – but overall I would say Laura put a strong focus on sustainability both for the festival itself and the larger body of artists that benefit from it. 

I was brought on for this year’s festival because Laura was transitioning out. So myself and an excellent team of curators all collaborated on different streams of programming. I’m on the presentation stream along with ted witzel, and our charge was to support the programming and execution of some shows that were further along in development and ready to enter touring.

At this point, now that the new leadership team is in place (Michael Caldwell and Morgan Norwich) my main role is to just be around to support them as they and the SummerWorks staff have taken the programming from all of the curators and did the really hard work – which is making it all happen. 

2. Was there an overall theme to this year’s festival and how did you distill the entries down to these offerings?

The theme of the festival “Diverse Encounters and Curious Collaborations” is something that emerged more organically. Each of the curators were a little bit off on their own – partially because we were spread around quite a bit. Sue was I believe in Newfoundland for a lot of it, myself and Ralph were out in Vancouver, Aria and Allison were in Toronto but also shuttling around all over the place – ted was in Italy – so it was tricky to get everyone together. Emma Westray was really instrumental in helping wrangle us and keep it all on track. 

In some ways the theme reflects that process of curation – many of us didn’t know each other – and in fact Michael Caldwell and Morgan Norwich entering the leadership role – also had never met. So a lot of what’s happening is seeing what happens when we bring different artists together without much prior connection and allowing that to really take centre. 

3. There’s so much being offered at Summerworks! With 4 categories of programming, can you tell me a bit of what audiences can expect from each category?

The presentation stream is something more like “finished” work. “Finished” isn’t really the right word, because projects continue to develop – but that’s where you’ll see works that have either already premiered and are starting to tour, or that are using Summerworks itself as its premiere platform. But these are full productions. I’ve collaborated with ted witzel on this as well as the new SummeWorks leadership. 

The Public Works stream – is very much what it sounds like. The focus here is to bring the artistic offerings into public space and further artistic engagement working with the local community. Allison has been working with local farmer markets as partners on some of these projects, thinking a lot about food and its meaning in how we organize in society. I think it’s a great initiative personally, because it’s a way to reach audiences that might not engage with the festival in more traditional presentations. 

The Lab is all about development and process. This is where artists are using the time to either start to shape out new projects and have a chance to test some of it with a live audience, or where they’re looking at the creation process itself. I’ve personally really benefited from being in the Lab as an Artist in the past. It’s very dance and movement heavy this year, and has a good portion focussed on ballroom drag. This has been Aria and Ralph leading the charge.

And then the exchange is really conversation focussed. It’s about the larger conversation around the art, around its impact in culture. It’s very much a way to take advantage of the fact that we have all these artists coming in from around the country and the globe – so how can we get them in conversation with each other and with the larger public where appropriate to stimulate new ways of thinking about things. This program has been helmed by Sue for some time – and she always brings together some cool stuff. 

4. What was the process like having 6 Guest Curators for the festival this year?

It was actually quite great. At first I imagined it would be a lot of back and forth, and organizing, but because we had the support of the SummerWorks staff the whole process was facilitated quite well. It helps that all of us are curators, or programmers in our lives outside of this contract – so we all have networks to draw on – but also a general understanding of what needs to happen. A big thing that’s been a value for SummerWorks is the idea of care – because care, or heart, is also the same root word as curate from the latin. And so putting that at the centre of all decision making is a useful tool in determining what is an appropriate fit for the festival. But it can be hard to offer genuine care and support when you’re one programmer and there’s 25 things programmed! That said – Laura (and Sue too) always wowed me in how much they were able to really be there for the artists whenever they needed anything. But now that there’s 6 of us this year and a smaller festival – it’s been great that we can all put a lot of focus and support on our respective streams to make sure the artists are supported as they need. 

5. What are you looking forward to the most about this year’s festival?

All of it looks excellent and I really am looking forward to getting to know my colleagues programming style. Everyone does it a bit differently. But to be quite honest, for me it’s about being back in Toronto. I lived here for a long time, but particularly due to the COVID pandemic, I wasn’t able to be back that often. This year is based both in the East and West ends, and each of them have a certain vibe and culture that I love. I spent a lot of time working in the East End, and actually produced one of the first shows at the Aki Studio when Daniels Spectrum opened – so there’s some real nostalgia for me there. And then in the west – just getting to be back hanging out at the Theatre Centre cafe is something I really want to do. That place is such a major hub for artistic activity and plotting and scheming new projects. Toronto in the summer is probably one of my favourite places to be – so I’m glad to be able to be here – and also have an excuse to duck into some air conditioning here and there! 

Here are ted’s thoughtful answers:

I want to thank ted and Jivesh for taking the time to answer my questions! Make sure you get out to SummerWorks this weekend! For more information, visit: SummerWorks