Professional Development

“Logic only gives a man what he needs. Magic gives a man what he wants.”

I spent four days last week back in my old stomping grounds. It was a desperately needed, perfectly timed adventure. And while I had meetings and presentations and networked diligently, the real education came in the cracks and margins, in hallway meetings, in the midst of mess and chaos, over drinks and standing in the rain.

One part of the trip I was particularly looking forward to was meeting with my mentor. I really had a lot of things that I wanted to bounce off him, get his advice, some perspective. When I finally rolled into his office about an hour before my presentation we sat down and talked but later I realized it went nothing like I had expected. I vented. He said “Oh my god!” He vented. I said “Oh my god!” We commiserated. Lesson learned? Shit is shitty everywhere.

I wasn’t dissatisfied though. Not at all. Cumulatively I learned a lot about myself and what I wanted and what I was doing and what I needed.  And perhaps most importantly, what I didn’t need.

Walking through the halls of the theatre there was major buzz going on about Urinetown. It was up for its second weekend starting that night. Everyone that I stopped to talked to brought it into the conversation. They lifted each other up. “Be sure to check out Carol’s costumes, they are fabulous.” “Mark’s set is beautiful.” It was a climate of artists who have learned how to feed one another making the collective whole much stronger. It was a pattern of behavior that I had forgotten about. There comes a time when the show is up and we all support it, because someone gave themselves for it, good or bad, it is there and is love’s great labor for someone.

The director’s notes from the production read “All of our shows come from our commitment to our mission statement and the purpose of the program to education not just performers and designers but audiences as well.”  And I read “mission statement” and thought to myself. When did we get a mission statement? But there it was printed very prominently in the program.

“The mission of the Department of Theatre is to create theatre which excites, and which illuminates the human condition in ways that are relevant to students, audiences, community members, teachers, and guest artists. To this end, the department offers coursework and productions that are diverse, creative, and participatory, serving students who want to prepare for a life in the theatre and also students who want to prepare a place for theatre in their lives. We create theatre and, in this process, educate.”

Illuminating not just students, not just community members, but the artists as well. And out of that came perhaps the most important discovery of the trip. That the artistic community is a self-sustaining one. That artists and in my belief, teachers as well, are never done being students. Unfortunately artists who are teachers are often isolated from their artistic community. Frustration and stagnation and apathy are a real hazard. It often feels like we do our work for other people. There is danger in that. Art only works if we do it for ourselves first. Allowing it to become integrated too deeply with other people’s opinions or the identity of the institutions we work for have detrimental and damaging consequences over time. Art loses the identity that we meant to instill. It comes from us, alone.

So the grown up artist is the student and the teacher. Simply. Completely.

“Real courage is risking something that you have to keep on living with, real courage is risking something that might force you to rethink your thoughts and suffer change and stretch consciousness. Real courage is risking one’s cliches.”  -both quotes are from Tom Robbin’s Another Roadside Attraction

Tags: professional development, theatre, urinetown