Join us for the third annual Porch Plays festival featuring performances and activations by Women’s Playwright Collective, James Scruggs, Sparrow, Staten Island Urban Center, Mayah Burke, The (G)eneration Project: Immigrants are Us, and more!

WHEN: October 1 | 2:00 PM – 6:00 PM
WHERE: ***Update: This event will be held indoors at the Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art in Buildings C & G.***
ADMISSION: Free | Registration requested here

Porch Plays Festival (Porch Plays) is a free outdoor showcase of original work by socially engaged and diverse artists working in theater, dance, music, and storytelling on the porches of Snug Harbor’s historic Cottage Row. This festival centers the work of artists from historically marginalized communities, including local and emerging artists and grassroots community groups.

Porch Plays celebrates the role of porches and stoops as unique transitional spaces that encapsulate both public and private life. As such, they are informal meeting grounds for families, neighbors, and friends. The porch played an essential role as a communal space in American society dating back to the 19th-century and has seen a renaissance in the age of COVID-19.

This year’s festival, curated by Lina Montoya (La Isla Bonita Festival), Shawnakay Salmon, and Melissa West, explores the complex and layered notion of migration. Migration is defined as the process of movement from one country, place, locality or geography to another. Many species of animals, including humans, migrate as an act of survival in response to changing environments and other conditions. The act of relocation can be temporary and recurring—such as the annual migration of Monarch butterfly—or it can be permanent. There are many cultural, social, environmental factors that shape the experience of a community impacted by migration.

Through performances and art activations, Porch Plays artists will investigate these ideas, utilizing the symbol of the butterfly, to inspire new works in theater, dance, music, and spoken word that activate the porch as a space for contemplation, celebration, and civic dialogue.

Event vendors include: Intuitive Insight, Michelle Swiney Hair, TrippinOutfitters, Captain Dude’s Emporium, SidePony Jewelry, Hart Candles, Zence, The G(eneration) Project: Immigrants Are Us

Porch Plays is made possible with the generous support of Con Edison’s Arts al Fresco initiative and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, with additional support from the Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation.