Is Dearth a Little or a Lot?

In the format of an interpolated Zoom transcript, former SummerWorks Curators Amelia Ehrhardt, Jenn Goodwin, and Cathy Gordon discuss the disciplining and undisciplining of SummerWorks Performance Festival between 2015 and 2019. The authors came to SummerWorks as specific curators of the dance and live-art streams and watched the festival grow from being a theatre-focused festival known to invite other art forms to a performance festival focused on a multidisciplinary perspective. Ehrhardt, Goodwin, and Gordon discuss the festival’s transition and specific works that exemplified their curatorial lenses-Ehrhardt and Goodwin from dance and Gordon from live art. "Is Dearth a Little or a Lot?" reads conversationally with an editorial voice interrogating the transcript, checking facts, or chiming in with context like a pop-up-video-style literary device. The authors question the function and outcome of creating discipline-specific streams for artists, audiences, and the structure of the festival and discuss hopes for the future of an undisciplined festival.