SWAN Day Connects Us

In This Issue


Broadway Women Celebrate SWAN Day At Lincoln Center

We are thrilled to announce that leading Broadway theatre artists will be celebrating SWAN Day this year with a special panel presentation at the New York Public Library at Lincoln Center.  It is a sign that SWAN Day is becoming a bridge connecting women at all levels in the arts and opening up wonderful possibilities for partnerships that will advance us all

SWAN Day at Lincoln Center is presented by New York’s League of Professional Theatre Women in conjunction with Curtain Call, their stunning exhibit in the library’s gallery featuring the work of 110 women costume, set, and lighting designers from the 1890’s to 2009.


The Panelists
The Lincoln Center panel will feature:

  • Carrie Robbins, costume designer of over 30 Broadway shows including the original production of Grease;
  • Robyn Goodman, producer of In the Heights, winner of the 2008 Tony Award for Best Musical, founder of Second Stage Theatre;
  • Lisa Kron, playwright/ performer, 2 Tony nominations for her Broadway production of Well;
  • Leigh Silverman, director of Well, Beebo Brinker Chronicles;
  • Holly Hynes, costume designer for the New York City Ballet; and
  • Barbara Cohen-Stratyner, Director of Exhibitions for the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

From Sketch to Finished Design

Broadway designer Carrie Robbins and Barbara Cohen- Stratyner of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts worked for three years to assemble this exhibit which features many design sketches side-by-side with the completed costumes. Robbins says her goals were to show “the zigzagging paths designers take in the journey from early sketches to completed designs” and “to introduce young people to careers they may have never heard of.”
Exhibit Dates: Curtain Call runs until May 2 at the Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts in New York.  To learn more, please click here>>



Full List of SWAN Day Events

We have put together a list of SWAN Day 2009 events for the press at: www.WomenArts.org/swan/SWANDay2009Events.htm. We have events all over the U.S. and in cities as far flung as Shanghai, Nairobi, Berlin, Buenos Aires, and Jerusalem. Thanks so much to all of you who are organizing events. As you will see, you are in excellent company!


Over 20 New York SWAN Day Events

Over 20 other SWAN Day events are happening in New York City, including among others:

  • a showcase of women ’s short films organized by New York Women in Film and Television,
  • the Lady Got Chops jazz series in Brooklyn,
  • a discussion with playwrights Kia Corthron and Migdalia Cruz at Revolution Books,
  • premieres at Pan Asian Repertory Theatre,
  • a carnival at the Women’s Project,
  • Helen Benedicts, The Lonely Soldier, a play about women soldiers in Iraq,
  • Ballet International Africans in Queens,
  • the premiere of a dance piece about non-violent resistance by Jessica Danser in the Bronx,
  • and our staff favorite, the Brooklyn Smile-a-thon & Variety Show, a fundraiser to help pay the dental bills for spoken word artist/activist, Sini Anderson, the co-founder of Sister Spit.

You can find out more about these and other events all over the world on the SWAN Day Map. (Link no longer exists)

CURTAIN CALL

Exhibit Celebrates
Women Designers

Carrie Robbins Photo

Carrie Robbins

Costume Designer

Carrie Robbins describes Curtain Call as “a one time only, never seen before and probably never seen again exhibition.”

She adds, “Like the designer’s creations, this exhibition is temporal. The costumed figures will bask in the light, and then disappear.”

In the exhibit, she has focused on the artist’s process and has arranged the items so that visitors will see things they would not see from the stage.

Since Robbins wants to encourage others to be designers, we asked her what it takes to be successful. Her answer? “TENACITY – and you must like working with people.”


Meet Martha Richards
on SWAN Day!

Our Executive Director Martha Richards will be in New York for SWAN Day. If you would like to meet her, come to the Lincoln Center Library event!


Costume Sketches for
“Death in Venice”

Carrie Robbins Costume Sketch

    Carrie Robbins, Designer
    Click for larger image>>

 


Completed Costumes for “Death in Venice”Robbins_Venice_Photo2
Carrie Robbins, Designer
Photo by George Mott
 Click for larger image>>

Catalogue: A beautiful 112 page full-color catalogue is available for $25.

To order,please click here>>


The SWAN Day Panel at
Lincoln Center Library

Performance Collaboration:
How Women Theater
Artists Make It Happen
Place:
Bruno Walter Auditorium
NY Public Library
Lincoln Center
Time:
11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Date:
March 28, 2009
Price:
Admission is free.

Tour the ExhibitAfter the Panel!

To read about this
event on the SWAN Day Map,
please click here>>



New! Write A SWAN Day Letter to the Editor

It’s Easy With Our New Software!

We have just installed new software which will give you access to hundreds of newspaper editors around the U.S.  Just type in your zip code, and the program will take you to a page that lists the newspapers in your region and gives you the email addresses and phone numbers of the editors. We have included a letter about SWAN Day that you can just click and send or you can insert your own text.   To try it out, please click here>>

The Letters to the Editor section is one of the most widely read sections of most newspapers.  It’s a good place to make short statements (usually about 200 words) to express your opinions about current issues or events.  Our program will tell you the circulation number for each paper so that you can see how many readers you will be reaching.  If your letter gets published, please be sure to let us know!


Help With Your SWAN Day Press Releases

Where to Send Them – Most newspapers accept press releases by email, and so there is still a little time to publicize your event.  You can use our Letters to the Editor feature to find names of newspapers in your region, or you can look online for their websites.  If the paper has a reporter or editor assigned to the arts, send your release to that person.  Otherwise, just send it to the main editor or news room of the paper.

What to Say – If you need help figuring out what to say, check out our Publicity Tools section.  We have an article with advice about publicity basics at: www.womenarts.org/wa/swan-day/swan-publicity-tools/

and sample press releases at: www.womenarts.org/swan/publicity/press_releases.htm

You can also see the press releases that The Fund for Women Artists has sent out in recent weeks at: www.womenarts.org/press/PressReleases.htm


A Countdown to SWAN Day Checklist

BEFORE YOUR EVENT:

  • Post Your Event – Enter your event on the SWAN Day Map. If you know of other events featuring women artists during March, tell the organizers that they can post their events on the SWAN Day Map too.
  • Need a Poster Fast?  You can download free posters that you can customize for your event at: www.womenarts.org/swan/publicity/postersignup.htm (link no longer exists.)   Print them out on your printer or send them to a print shop for duplication.  You can also download our free logos at:
    www.WomenArts.org/swan/publicity/logosignup.htm
  • Print Statements about SWAN Day in Your Programs – On our Publicity Tools page you can find a special greeting from Martha Richards, a short statement that gives background information about SWAN Day, and a slightly longer background statement.  To check them out, please visit: www.WomenArts.org/swan/publicity/statements.htm

AT YOUR EVENT:

  • Make Announcements – Make an announcement at your event that women all over the world are celebrating with you on SWAN Day!
  • Take Lots of Pictures – Be sure to take lots of pictures and send us the best ones.  We love to see them, and we will publish the best ones on our website! If you make videos, be sure to upload them to YouTube and send us the links.
  • Help us get the word out!  Tell people they can sign up for our free newsletters at www.SwanDay.org so that we can keep them informed about issues related to women and the arts all year long.
  • Wear SWAN Stuff – Get people to wear SWAN Day buttons or shirts and talk up the importance of women artists with their friends. Shirts, mugs, buttons and hats are available at www.cafepress.com/swanday.
  • Blog about SWAN Day –  Please feel free to quote from our newsletters or website in your blog. Just be sure to credit Support Women Artists Now Day (www.SwanDay.org) as the source.  You can also send us an email or give us a call if you want information for a SWAN Day story.
  • Have Fun! – Don’t forget the most important part of SWAN Day!!!!!

About The Fund for Women Artists

SWAN Day is a project of The Fund for Women Artists, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping women artists get the resources they need to do their creative work. There is an overview of our goals and services in the About Us section of our website at www.WomenArts.org/share.SWAN Day 2009 is made possible by generous grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Starry Night Fund of the Tides Foundation, and the Leo S. Guthman Fund, and by gifts of time, energy and money from artists and arts supporters around the world.
The Fund for Women Artists is a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation. Federal Employer I.D. #04-3257661. All contributions are tax deductible to the full extent of the law.Please feel free to reprint any portion of this newsletter, but please give credit to The Fund for Women Artists. (©WomenArts.org 2009) This newsletter was originally published on March 23, 2009.