A Message from the Congress Curator

When I was asked to curate the January 2005 annual conference by Michael Mushalla, I was intimidated and skeptical. I used to go to conferences, but for a range of professional reasons, do not attend now. So, I said I would do it if I could do it the way I wanted to do it. They said yes. And here is what I have begun to assemble.

I have thrown out the conventional and traditional way to open your conference. There is NO keynote address. There will be three distinct panels on THEATER, DANCE and MUSIC. Each panel will have four creative individuals on those panels who will discuss their relationship to the art form from their various perspectives. Why? Because I profoundly believe that you should hear what these professionals have to say about their art, the art-making process, and the reasons why they do what they do or why they continue to do what they do in the face of many obstacles and challenges in the USA. This will be day one.

During day two, you will be engaged by another series of panels that will deal with a range of visual material that is creating amazing new experiences in the visual and media arts for all of us globally. The range of points of views from colleagues from the museum and gallery world, plus individual artists assembled, will provide you with the facts about how the lines of demarcation between the performing and visual arts are liquefying. How new ideas and forms are here today and on our collective horizons. We need to begin to have access to the knowledge of where individual artists are going and how cultural institutions can play a role in their lives and respond to their needs. This conference will be an experience of the new, unchartered creative endeavors. It's about perception and our ever-evolving and ever mutating professional artistic universe.

Joseph V. Melillo (OBE) – Executive Producer: BAM