Porch Plays Festival (Porch Plays) is a free outdoor day-long showcase of new 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 community groups.
WHEN: Saturday, October 9 | 11:00 AM – 6:00 PM
Rain date: Saturday, October 16, 11:00 AM – 6:00 PM
WHERE: Performances take place at Cottage C on Cottage Row
Festival takes place along Cottage Row
ADMISSION: Free! | Registration requested here
ARTIST LINEUP:
OJ in the Yams, Mambembé NY, Women’s Playwright Collective, SKIN Dance Company, Kavia Lewis, HEGAZY, Simone Johnson, Maho Ogawa, Local Fish, Chèredyn, Marisa Tornello, Jenny Pisani, Amanda DeLalla, Carolyn Clark, Zach Rothman-Hicks, Honeychild Coleman, Amelia Dawe Sanders, Salvador Delgado, and Anjoli Chadha
Including community partners and vendors: Projectivity, LUG Clothing Swap, Freshkills Park, HONK NYC!, Let’s Get Weird Creations, Elysian Earth Jewelry, The Lobabox, Evergreen Artistry, Milknthingz, Nick Zomo Art
Porch Plays explores the “porch/front stoop” and its role in community building and storytelling. Porches and stoops are unique transitional spaces that encapsulate both public and private life. They are informal meeting grounds for families, neighbors, and friends. The porch has 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 festival emerges out of the upheaval of the pandemic and the urgency against racial and social injustice permeating across the country. At a time when we have been unable to be together, we’ve managed to experience the ingenuity and adaptability of the human spirit. This moment allows for the return to a different kind of community connection: through socially distant bonds on Zoom, and beyond on porches and stoops, in backyards and parks, and in protests. As we reopen our city, we come together in new and reimagined ways that demonstrate our community’s enduring resilience. This shift from reopening to resiliency is an opportunity to examine the creative ways we can be together and how these connections spark solace, laughter, and survival.
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.
