Photo: Collaboraction’s CRIME SCENE

Collaboraction Theatre Company announced today their next season, coordinated around a new vision for programming one critical social issue annually. The company will also launch a new online public interaction portal called The Hive, intended to encourage ongoing audience dialogue, submissions, and collaboration as the season is created.

The theme for Collaboraction’s 22nd season is “The Reality of Racism and Envisioning Racial Healing in Chicago” and will include year-long programming focused on race in Englewood, Austin, and Hermosa, as well as at Collaboraction Studios in the Flat Iron Arts Building in Wicker Park.

Collaboraction’s season starts with the return of the PEACEBOOK Festival launching at the Goodman Theatre on Saturday, August 26 with 21 world premiere short pieces of theater, dance, and spoken word before touring to Chicago’s Englewood, Austin and Hermosa communities in October and November.

In January, Collaboraction will debut ENCOUNTER: AN EXPLORATIVE EVENT SERIES, a mixed-medium festival of theater, dance, visual art, music, film and more at Collaboraction Studios.

The company will culminate next season in April with A BLUE ISLAND IN THE RED SEA, a devised world premiere about the history and impact of racism in Chicago. The piece will be created in collaboration with Chicagoans throughout the year led by Artistic Director Anthony Moseley and an ensemble of co-devisers.

“It was five years ago that Collaboraction changed our mission and began the creation of CRIME SCENE: A CHICAGO ANTHOLOGY as a way to create theater that incites dialogue and change around our city’s most critical social issues,” said Moseley. “Our 2017-18 theme, ‘Racism and Racial Healing in Chicago,’ will build off of our five years with Crime Scene to explore the root causes of racism, which we believe is the root cause of violence in our city.”

“In times of such economic and political divisions,” he added, “we believe it is essential that Chicagoans experience and participate in artistic work that brings the community together around important issues like violence, segregation, mental health and education. Our new single themed season model will allow us to expand and deepen our exploration of racism.”

Collaboraction’s new online portal, The Hive, will provide the general public with access to content creation and sharing around this theme as the company builds, writes, designs and rehearses the shows in real-time. Meanwhile, Collaboraction’s youth programs, the Teen Peacemakers and its After School Matters program, will also work on parallel tracks to Collaboraction’s mainstage artists in The Hive all year.

More info at the company’s revamped website, collaboraction.org.