Champions for the Arts: Conversation With Voza Rivers & Donna Walker-Kuhne

Voza Rivers, executive producer and founding member of the New Heritage Theatre Group,  joins author Donna Walker-Kuhne for a conversation based on her latest book, Champions for the Arts; Successful Strategies for Engaging Dynamic Communities in conjunction with the Library for the Performing Arts' new exhibition, Syncopated Stages: Black Disruptions to the Great White Way. Ribers and Walker-Kuhne discuss the importance of archival work and exhibitions like Syncopated Stages, their distinguished career histories, and community-engaged theater-making practices to celebrate the publication of Champions for the Arts. 

Patrons are strongly encouraged to visit and explore our Syncopated Stages Exhibition prior to the program; the exhibition is free and open to the public, and will be on view at the library all day from when we open at 10:30AM! 

Read more about the exhibition

About the Book

Considered the nation's foremost expert in audience development, Donna Walker-Kuhne has spent her career developing successful strategies for increasing access to the arts. Over the past ten years, Walker-Kuhne has traveled to over 100 U.S. cities and 5 continents to give lectures, workshops, and keynotes specifically focused on community engagement. This guide synthesizes her findings from the last decade into an accessible text that provides sustainable, measurable community engagement strategies for leaders in the arts community—with a specific focus on ways to drill deeper into issues of diversity, inclusion, and equity. Including case studies from around the world that offer models for creating sustainable audiences and membership, Walker-Kuhne offers a practical yet visionary way of thinking about community engagement in the arts as a vehicle for social change.

SEATING POLICY | Programs are free and open to all, but registration is requested. Check-in line forms 45 minutes before the advertised start time. Registered guests are given priority check-in 15 to 30 minutes before start time. Five minutes before the advertised start time, all seats are released, regardless of registration, to our patrons in the stand-by line. If you arrive after the program starts, you will be seated at the discretion of our front-of-house staff.

STANDBY LINE | If registration is sold out or has ended, do not fret! We welcome you to come to the Library regardless of registration status and wait in our standby line, which forms 45 minutes before the advertised start time. Five minutes before the program starts, all remaining seats are released. While this is not guaranteed, we will do our best to get you into any of our programs.

ASSISTIVE LISTENING AND ASL | ASL interpretation and real-time (CART) captioning available upon request. Please submit your request at least two weeks in advance by emailing [email protected].

BRUNO WALTER POLICY | Please note that any unoccupied seat will be released five minutes before the show begins and holding seats for anyone beyond that is prohibited. There is no food or drink allowed inside the venue.

AUDIO/VIDEO RECORDING | Programs may be photographed and recorded by and at the discretion of the Library for the Performing Arts and will post signs indicating as such. If you would prefer your image not be captured, please let us know and we can seat you accordingly. Attending any program indicates your consent to being filmed/photographed and your consent to the use of your recorded image for any and all purposes of the New York Public Library.

PRESS | Please send all press inquiries to Alex Teplitzky at [email protected]. Please note that all recording, including professional video recordings, are prohibited without expressed consent from the Library.

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Host or Publisher New York Public Library for the Performing Arts