The New 1/52 Project Grant Program Encourages Early Career Theater Designers and Industry Diversity
The 1/52 Project is a newly launched financial grant program that will offer $15,000 grants to theater designers. The project hopes to encourage early career designers from historically excluded groups with the aim of diversifying and strengthening the Broadway design community. The 1/52 project is funded by designers with shows running on Broadway who are encouraged to donate one week every year of their weekly royalties to this fund, thus the name of 1/52 Project. It should be noted that although the 1/52 Project is primarily funded by donations from professional designers working on Broadway, the fund accepts donations from anyone. Everyone is welcome to make a tax-deductible contribution at: oneeveryfiftytwo.org/contribute.
Recipients of the grants will be chosen based on talent, creativity, innovation, and potential for future excellence in the professional theatrical field. Demonstrated financial need will be a determining factor. The 1/52 Project is now accepting applications through their website and will do so until May 15, 2022. Finalists will be notified by July 1, 2022, and interviewed in August 2022, by the selection committee. Grant recipients will be announced on Labor Day 2022.
Founded by Tony-Award winning Set Designer Beowulf Boritt, the 1/52 project grant criteria have been created, and will be adjudicated, by a world-class committee of BIPOC professional designers; Tony Award nominated Costume Designer Dede Ayite, Projection Designer David Bengali, Set Designer Wilson Chin, Lighting Designer Alan Edwards, Tony Award winning Sound Designer Kai Harada, Set Designer Kimie Nishikawa, Tony Award winning Costume Designer Paul Tazewell, Costume Designer Alejo Vietti, and Costume Designer Anita Yavich.
“I always understood how lucky I was to work on Broadway, how tough it is to get that opportunity,” Boritt said. “But the past few years made clear to me what should probably have already been obvious, that part of my ‘good luck’ was being born a white boy, that simple fact opened doors for me. I hope this project can do a little to help support the careers of a more diverse group of designers.”
The 1/52 Project has partnered with TheFrontOffice Foundation, created by Director Wendy C. Goldberg in 2020 to support the live theatrical community during the industry shutdown through direct artist relief, commissions and grants.
Learn more about the 1/52 Project at www.oneeveryfiftytwo.org .
On Our Team Launches New System for Establishing and Recognizing Pay Equity in Theater
On Our Team, which was founded in 2020 by Bob Kuhn, Christine Pascual, Elsa Hiltner, and Theresa Ham to address ongoing labor and pay equity issues in theatrical design, has developed a first of its kind tool to help theater companies establish pay equity within their organization and serve as a public recognition for equitably paid theater.
The Pay Equity Standards were developed out of hundreds of hours of interviews with producers and theater company executives, and feedback from artists, staff, and leaders of theater companies of all sizes across the country. Designed as a checklist, the Pay Equity Standards lay out a path to establishing equitable pay using a three-pronged approach to pay equity: Transparency, Working Conditions, and Accountability.
Inspired by the organic and fair-trade food labels, theater companies that opt in and meet all certification requirements will be granted use of the Pay Equity Standards badge. The recognizable badge will allow audience members to make informed consumption choices and support art that is made in a way that aligns with their values. Theater workers can make decisions on where to seek employment based on which organizations have become certified. Certification may also be used by foundations to ensure that their funds are going to organizations that center equity. “The Pay Equity Standards, is a pathway to both establish and recognize equitable pay, is a step toward livable wages, removing the economic barrier to a career in the arts, and a thriving arts community,” says On Our Team co-founder Theresa Ham.
Any theater company based in the U.S. can submit to be certified for the Pay Equity Standards at www.onourteam.org. The submission portal will be open for 2022 certification from January 17, 2022 through August 31, 2022. Certification for 2023 will begin September 1, 2022. Certification must happen each calendar year in order to retain use of the badge and remain in good standing with the Pay Equity Standards.
Based on a 2019 report from the NEA titled Artists and Other Cultural Workers: A Statistical Portrait, between 2012-2016 “roughly 34 percent of all artists were self-employed.” Theater workers often are not protected by the Fair Labor Standards Act as contract workers or freelance artists. The current precarity of arts workers is not conducive to a thriving arts sector. The arts and culture industry added $919.7 billion to the nation’s GDP in 2019 and the industry includes 5.2 million workers with a total compensation of $447 million, according to a report by the NEA released in 2021. Yet, as a UNESCO study from 2019 titled Culture & Working Conditions for Artists stated, “the largest subsidy for the arts comes not from governments, patrons or the private sector, but from artists themselves in the form of unpaid or underpaid labour.”
“Pay equity in theater will help recognize that all skills and artistic contributions are valuable in collaboratively made art,” says On Our Team co-founder Christine Pascual. “It will strengthen the artistic process, and through certification by the Pay Equity Standards, organizations can truly show their community that they value the work they create.”
Pay transparency is the first step of a larger multi-faceted movement by On Our Team to remove gender and racial based pay disparity and build pay equity in the theater and entertainment industry. To that end, after On Our Team’s work gained pay transparency on the job site of the League of Chicago Theatres in 2020, the organization partnered with Costume Professionals for Wage Equity in 2021 to successfully advocate for pay transparency on the job sites of Playbill, BroadwayWorld, Southeastern Theatre Conference (SETC), and Minnesota Playlist.
Learn more about the Pay Equity Standards and the work of On Our Team at www.onourteam.org
