It looks like the recent street riots are behind us, and local artists and arts organizations need to ask themselves one key question: What can we do to help breathe life back into Cincinnati?
One inspiring answer comes from Contemporary Dance Theater (CDT) and its Strategic Collaboration Grant award for Inside/Outside. It’s a program that unites the resources of CDT, Intuition Theatre, Women Writing for (a) Change Foundation and the Women’s Project at the Prison Reform Advocacy Center (PRAC) to create biweekly workshops for incarcerated women at the River City Correctional Center. Inside/Outside is based on a similar workshop CDT sponsored at the correctional center earlier this year.
For those who insist that large budgets and large staffs are necessary when it comes to creating unique and inspirational outreach, it’s important to remember that CDT has a paid staff that consists solely of Executive Director Jefferson James. Inside/Outside is proof that a small organization can make a huge impact — all it requires is creativity and the inspiration to do what’s right for the community.
James has plenty of CDT business to keep her busy. Still, there was never any doubt on her behalf that Inside/Outside wasn’t something CDT should try to do.
“I don’t know if it (Inside/Outside) benefits the organization in a direct way,” James says, speaking recently at her College Hill Town Hall office. “But I do know that it will benefit that community in which we live.”
Inside/Outside is arts outreach at its best. It’s about bringing the freeing act of artistic expression to people who need it most.
The women inside River City Correctional Center don’t have the opportunity to experience Greater Cincinnati’s cultural riches. Inside/Outside will help reunite them with their own artistic spirit.
I don’t know if James and her Inside/Outside team will discuss teen-ager Timothy Thomas’ fatal shooting by Cincinnati Police when they head to the correctional center later this fall. But I think it’s safe to say the topic will emerge in their conversations as well as the artwork created by the inmates.
Far removed from the recent Over-the-Rhine turmoil, there is calm outside James’ College Hill office. But CDT felt the impact of the April riots. The citywide curfew cancelled all shows for the visiting dance troupe Pilobolus, which eliminated what looked to be the company’s most popular 2000-2001 season program. Losing Pilobolus also reminds James why Inside/Outside is so important.
“Especially in these trying times, I’m reminded about all the anger and frustration involved in the riots,” James says. “This program is about giving people another tool for expressing those feelings.”
Hopefully, tensions will have eased by the end of summer. There will be satisfactory answers behind the cause for Thomas’ fatal shooting. Broken windows will have been replaced.
Around the same time, the Inside/Outside team will have a retreat to finalize programming. They’ll hammer out details throughout September. Later that fall, they’ll meet with River City Correctional Center inmates. It’s safe to say that it will be an extraordinary event.
Some Cincinnati arts organizations have responded to the April riots with additional security. They insist that they’re already doing enough outreach.
James and her Inside/Outside volunteers show that there’s a better way. The company’s spirit of collaboration and inspiration is infectious, as James and her small group of volunteers prove that big ideas are possible even on the smallest of operational budgets.
More importantly, Inside/Outside makes a political impact at a time when the arts community needs to be more integrated with the city it calls home. Hope for a better community continues with inspiring projects like Inside/Outside.
This article appears in May 9-15, 2001.