Hill Dance Academy Theatre is beyond excited to co-host the Conference and Festival with IABD. In full transparency, IABD's presence in Pittsburgh, for HDAT, supports our mission, uplifts Black dance artists and their artistry and it is a profound testimony for Black artists to show, as August Wilson stated in his 1996 speech referenced below, The Ground on Which I Stand, The 35th Annual International Conference and Festival of Blacks in Dance, an institution created, For Us, By Us that would celebrate our cultural identity and the importance of Black dance, a dramatic art form, in American culture.
I find myself daily thinking about August Wilson and his deep understanding of Black life, and Black art. I am an August Wilson Fanatic. The minute I was asked to write this, I thought there must be something that August has written or a speech that speaks to the conference and festival theme. I was inspired to create this article around August Wilson's vision, one of the world’s most prolific and reflective Black writers on the Black experience, a native Pittsburgher and for me Black Wisdom personified. When Wilson spoke he was passionate about theatre but when you read his works his passion is that of telling the story of the many varied experiences of Black people, their contributions to the world, and the uplift of their humanity. The context of my thoughts, in this article, are from the speech given by August Wilson, The Ground on Which I Stand at the 11th biennial Theatre Communications Group conference at Princeton University in June 1996. The speech was a passionate call for African American artists to establish institutions that would celebrate their cultural identity and the importance of their dramatic art in American culture.
Time does not permit me to do an exegesis of Wilson's speech, but I would like to highlight lines or sections of the speech and relate them to the theme as I prepare to attend the Conference and Festival in Pittsburgh. I want to encourage you, the membership to read the full text and be empowered to show up in Pittsburgh with a Holy Boldness and Bodacious AT-TI-TUDE for support of Black Dance.
The theme, The Bridges We Build: From Revolution to Legacy says the following to me and I want Pittsburgh to experience...
If you do not know, I/WE will tell you that Black dance throughout the world is alive … it is vibrant … it is vital … It Just Isn’t Funded; this is not a complaint; it is an advertisement...
The theme, The Bridges We Build: From Revolution to Legacy says the following to me and I want Pittsburgh to experience...
We cannot share a single value system if that value system consists of the values of white Americans based on their European ancestors. We reject that as Cultural Imperialism. We need a value system that includes our contributions as Africans in America. Our agendas are as valid as yours. We may disagree, we may forever be on opposite sides of aesthetics, but We can only share a value system that is inclusive of all Americans and recognizes their unique and valuable contributions. In IABD, WE intentionally intend to be authentic, to uplift Black dance and Black dance artists and Boldly and Bodaciously tell our stories in our organizations, companies, academies, programs and services and at The IABD Annual International Conference & Festivals...
The theme, The Bridges We Build: From Revolution to Legacy says the following to me and I want Pittsburgh to experience...
We reject any attempt to blot us out, to reinvent history and ignore our presence or to maim our spiritual product. We will not deny our history, and we will not allow it to be made to be of little consequence, to be ignored or misinterpreted. "Oh, I don’t see color. We want you to see us. We are black and beautiful. We are not patrons of the linguistic environment that had us as unqualified, and violators of public regulations. We are not a menace to society. We are not ashamed. We have an honorable history in the world. We come from a long line of honorable people with complex codes of ethnicities and social discourse, people who devised myths and systems of cosmology and systems of economics. We are not ashamed, we do not need the recognition of our blackness to be couched in abstract phrases like “artist of color". Who are you talking about?" We are unique... "We have only one life to develop our talent, to fulfill our potential as artists. One life, and it is short, and the lack of the means to develop our talent is an encumbrance on that life. So much of what makes this country rich in art and all manners of spiritual life is the contributions that we as African and Black Americans have made. We cannot allow others to have authority over our cultural and spiritual products. We reject, without reservation, any attempts by anyone to rewrite our history so as to deny us the rewards of our spiritual labors, and to become the culture custodians of our art, our literature and our lives. To give expression to the spirit that has been shaped and fashioned by our history is of necessity to give voice and vent to the history itself. We reserve the right to amend, to explore, to add our African consciousness and our African aesthetic to the art we produce".
August Wilson describes the experience of the Blues in his works as “our sacred book”. The stories personified and passed down through song and sound. To borrow the reference of the "Sacred Book" . The 35th Conference and Festival theme, The Bridges WE Build: from Revolution to Legacy is for us an invitation to Pittsburgh to read our "Sacred Book".