Wingspace is an organization of theater artists that fosters conversations on design, strengthens our community, and furthers activism in the field.
With a membership composed of designers, directors, and dramaturgs, Wingspace looks at the theater landscape from a design point of view. We are interested in demystifying and highlighting design through conversation, advocacy, and community-building. By sponsoring public events and workshops focused on the theory and practice of theatrical design, fostering early career designers in our Mentorship Program, and staging events for the design community as whole, Wingspace creates opportunities for theater makers passionate about design to come together, learn from one another, and grow together as a community.
Wingspace is built around a community of committed members. The organization was started in 2005 when a group of MFA graduates missed the studio culture of academia, and created a similar structure for themselves in the professional world, in a shared Brooklyn studio. Wingspace has since grown to a membership of fifty, concentrated in New York, but with members scattered across the United States. Inside a freelance culture that can sometimes feel isolating, Wingspace membership offers support, connection, and a larger purpose. Our Salon Series features free, public events each month that dig deeper into issues theater makers face, including the practical and artistic issues of our craft as well as social issues within the industry. No longer a studio-based group of designers, we have become a community outreach organization. We believe that in reaching outward we create a group more dynamic and beneficial than a concentrated core.
Wingspace is committed to the cause of equity in the field. There are significant barriers to accessing a career in theatrical design. As an organization and as individuals, we are asking ourselves hard questions about how to expand our work to reach people outside the traditional theatrical establishment. Our Mentorship Program is a free, learner-centered community empowering curious and passionate mentees to connect to career opportunities, build connections in the design community, and hone their skills. If you've experienced barriers to mentorship and access to a career in the performing arts this program may be right for you. Wingspace members are active in United Scenic Artists 829, the union for theatrical designers. Our members have worked closely with the Union on issues such as contract agreements, diversity, and education. On a larger scale, Wingspace and its members are committed to breaking down barriers in pursuit of a more diverse and equitable community.
In 2006, Lee Savage gathered together a group of designers, directors and dramaturges who had worked together in the MFA program at the Yale School of Drama. During their time in graduate school, they developed exciting collaborative relationships both in the studio and in production. Returning to the professional world, where designers often work in isolation for the greater part of their process with little or no control over their choice of collaborators, they created the Wingspace collective to provide community and a continuing aesthetic conversation for its members.
The original members of the collective were Alixa Englund, Bryan Keller, Cat Tate, Chloe Chapin, Christine Mok, Erin Chainani, Gia Forakis, Gina Scherr, Jen Moeller, Kate Cusack, Lee Savage, Miriam Nilofa Crowe, Scott Bolman, Thom Weaver and Zane Pihlstrom.
In 2009, Wingspace moved into its first design studio at the Old American Can Factory, a historic industrial complex in Gowanus, Brooklyn that houses a curated community of more than 300 artisans, visual/performing artists, poets/writers, filmmakers, architects/designers, publishers, non-profit organizations and others working in the creative industries. It was the beginning of a relationship that has lasted up to the present day, with the OACF continuing to lend support by donating space for the Wingspace Salon series and serving as the location of our annual Holiday Party.
Over the years, Wingspace has gradually evolved from a small inward-facing group of people with a shared background to a much more expansive organization that engages and supports the larger theatrical design community. In 2009, Wingspace began the Salon Series in order to provide occasions for designers to gather as a community in an informal setting with food, drinks and engaged conversation. The first event was a discussion with the creative team from Soho Rep’s production of BLASTED by Sarah Kane.
In 2015, Wingspace launched its Mentorship Program with three design mentees and the mentorship team of Burke Brown, Caite Hevner, Elisheba Ittoop, Jen Moeller, Patrick Rizzotti and Scott Bolman. The goal of the program was to provide young designers with connections and information that would help them navigate the professional world of live performance in New York and beyond. The program expanded to five mentees in design and a director and came to focus on working with people from groups that face significant barriers in our industry, such as Black people, Indigenous people, persons of color and people with disabilities.
In 2020, Wingspace undertook its first fundraising drive with the Designer Relief Fund, a collaboration with Notch Theater Company to provide unrestricted rapid relief microgrants to freelance designers and dramaturges experiencing acute financial strain related to COVID-19.
Wingspace just received our 501c3 non-profit status in September 2020. We hope to use our new non-profit status to strengthen our existing programming and expand the scope of our future work.