Defining “Small-Budget” Dance Makers in a Changing Dance Ecology
Connecting the Dots – #YesThisIsAnArtsStory Repost from Dance/NYC
The following letter from Executive Director Alejandra Duque Cifuentes can be found on page 11 of the report.
Acknowledgements for the report can be found on page 154.
LETTER FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
In 2016, Dance/NYC confirmed a long-standing theory in our field— the smallest organizations and groups represent the majority of the dance-making sector but have disproportionate access to resources.
We learned that the smallest organizations have incredible capacity to adapt to changing conditions over time and that they better reflect the diversity of our city than larger groups. So why is this segment of the field able to continue to create and adapt despite access to resources that differs so greatly from its larger counterparts? Why did this disparity exist and what would these members of our community need to move from survival to thriving? How could we as a sector ensure that there is a place for them in the future, where their experiences are grounded in justice? What actions would we need to take to ensure this happens?
These questions catalyzed this two-year initiative designed to complement Dance/NYC’s Dance Advancement Fund and to build on the State of NYC Dance & Workforce Demographics study (2016) (bit.ly/2016StateOfNYC), which first identified this area of inquiry, as well as other previous studies such as Advancing Fiscally Sponsored Dance Artists & Projects (2017) (Dance.NYC/DanceFiscalSponsors2017) and Advancing Immigrants. Dance. Arts (2019) (bit.ly/AdvancingImmigrantsDanceArts).
