TCG Announces Inaugural Global Connections Recipients

Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national organization for theatre, is pleased to announce the first cycle recipients of Global Connections, the new international grant funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. At the core of Global Connections is the desire to build bridges between U.S. theatre professionals and counterparts abroad, to further the growth and advancement of the theatre community, and to create opportunities for the U.S. theatre community to engage in international conversations. The program encourages reciprocity and cultural exchange throughout the world - through ON the ROAD, grants to foster new relationships with international colleagues, and IN the LAB, grants to further pre-existing international collaborations.

ON the ROAD
The following six recipients were each awarded up to $6,000 for unrestricted travel support to foster new relationships with international colleagues that will inspire future collaborations:

Theater Three Collaborative, Inc.
Theater Three Collaborative, Inc. (Brooklyn, NY) will collaborate with National Theater of Kosovo (Pristina, Kosovo) on two new plays from two cultural perspectives on the 9/11 attacks and aftermath.

Tricklock Company
Tricklock Company (Albuquerque, NM) will travel to Dah Theatre (Belgrade, Serbia) and Teatr Figur Krakow (Krakow, Poland) to lay groundwork for future collaborations and seek companies to invite to Revolutions InterNational Theatre Festivals 2012 and 2013.

Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company
Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company (Washington, DC) will attend the Golden Mask Festival (Moscow, Russia). They will engage with and learn from Russian artists - and thus prototype a rehearsal and production model that incorporates those insights.

Seth Bockley and Devon de Mayo
Seth Bockley and Devon de Mayo (Chicago, IL) will begin performance research and develop an original performance exploring the topic of violence with clown artist Artus Chavez (Mexico City, Mexico).

Rebecca Gilman
Through interviews with Swedish Americans and Swedes, Rebecca Gilman (Chicago, IL) will create a documentary play with Sven Benidktusson (Gothenburg, Sweden) set during the celebrations of the Karl Oskar days in Minnesota and Växjö, Sweden.

Richard Nelson
Richard Nelson (Rhinebeck, NY) will collaborate with Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (Paris, France) on a series of new translations of major Russian plays.

IN the LAB
The following three recipients were each awarded $10,000 to further pre-existing international collaborations by supporting residencies that advance the development of a piece and/or explore elements leading up to a full production:

Interact Center for the Visual & Performing Arts
Interact Center for the Visual & Performing Arts (Minneapolis, MN) will continue to further research and develop "We Are All Africans" - an international, trans-media, multi-platform project by a team of American, British, Bantu and Pygmy artists (Pointe-Noire, Republic of Congo).

Out of Hand Theater
Out of Hand Theater (Atlanta, GA) will collaborate again with site-specific theatre The Lunatics (Utrecht, Netherlands) and bring the company to Atlanta to research and develop Group Intelligence, an interactive outdoor theatre event about origins of life chemistry and water sustainability.

Erik Ehn
Erik Ehn (Providence, RI) will present and expand the third annual Centre x Centre Theatre festival (Kigali, Rwanda), which will include workshops and performances from around the world, co-produced with local artists. Ehn's hope is to expand the festival to include Kampala, Uganda where he and his collaborators have a long-term relationship with the National Theater and Ugandan theatre professionals.

The Round One - Cycle A panelists included: John Bueche, executive artistic director, Bedlam Theatre (Minneapolis, MN); Aaron Davidman, artistic director, The Jewish Theatre San Francisco (San Francisco, CA); Criss Henderson, executive director, Chicago Shakespeare Theater (Chicago, IL); Chris Jennings, managing director, The Shakespeare Theatre Company (Washington, DC); Neel Keller, associate producer, Center Theatre Group (Los Angeles, CA); Dan O'Brien, playwright (Santa Monica, CA); Tanya Palmer, director of new play development, The Goodman Theatre (Chicago, IL); Sean San Jose, program director-theatre, Intersection for the Arts and Campo Santo (San Francisco, CA); Daniella Topol, director (Brooklyn, NY) and Justine Williams, co-artistic director/performer, The Glass Contraption (Brooklyn, NY).

The Round One - Cycle B award deadline is March 14, 2011. Applicants will be notified the week of May 2, 2011. Guidelines and applications are available: www.tcg.org/globalconnections.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is a private philanthropic institution that makes grants on a selective basis in five core program areas: higher education and scholarship; scholarly communications and information technology; museums and art conservation; conservation and the environment; and performing arts. The Foundation's Performing Arts program focuses on achieving long-term results by providing multi-year grants to leading organizations in the disciplines of music, theater, and dance. Annual giving in the area of the performing arts has averaged approximately $30 million per year since 2005. In 2004 The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation was awarded a National Medal of Arts, the highest award given to artists and arts patrons by the United States government. www.mellon.org

Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national organization for the American theatre, exists to strengthen, nurture and promote the professional not-for-profit American theatre. Founded in 1961, TCG's constituency has grown from a handful of groundbreaking theatres to nearly 700 member theatres and affiliate organizations and more than 12,000 individuals nationwide. TCG offers its members networking and knowledge-building opportunities through conferences, events, research and communications; grants approximately $2 million per year to theatre companies and individual artists; advocates on the federal level and serves as the US Center of the InterNational Theatre Institute, connecting its constituents to the global theatre community.

TCG is the nation's largest independent publisher of dramatic literature, with 11 Pulitzer Prizes for Best Play on our booklist; it also publishes the award-winning AMERICAN THEATRE magazine and ARTSEARCH®, the essential source for a career in the arts. In all of its endeavors, TCG seeks to increase the organizational efficiency of its member theatres, cultivate and celebrate the artistic talent and achievements of the field and promote a larger public understanding of, and appreciation for, the theatre. www.tcg.org