Photo by Kathy Lam, from Tunnel Vision, by and performed by Elizabeth Ferns

2021 IGNITE Festival of Emerging Artists - Call for Project Submissions

Every year in June, Sage Theatre presents the IGNITE! Festival of Emerging Artists - a multi-disciplinary, 4-day festival of emerging art and artists. It’s big, it’s bold, it’s beautiful! With about 100 artists programmed each year, IGNITE! is a fantastic development, networking, and presentation opportunity for Calgary’s artists. The 2021 festival runs June 16 - 19, 2021.

Deadline to apply is midnight, April 9, 2021.

IGNITE! is a festival dedicated to supporting, mentoring and presenting early career artists of all disciplines. IGNITE! allows artists to embrace risks in a supportive environment while providing resources, a bridge to the professional arts community, and meaningful opportunities for collaboration and community building with their peers.

The IGNITE! Festival is accepting project proposals and scripts as part of the Performance series, as well as looking for individual emerging theatre and performance artists who can be matched with these proposals.

Projects by IBPOC artists, artists who identify as living with a disability, LGBQTIA2S+, and artists who identify as being part of a minority are specifically encouraged.

Here's the application for individual artists.

(Here are some important definitions we use for the festival.)

This Year’s Format

As we are still anticipating COVID-19 to be impacting public gathering and arts presentations this spring, we are planning an adaptive festival format that allows us to weather a changing pandemic landscape.

Specifically, the festival will be presented digitally, and each project will be shown in a 10 minute segment scheduled across the four days of the festival.

We are also open to presenting a physically distanced project, but we recognize that a changing pandemic landscape may affect our ability to support and present this work.

When making your submission to the festival, you will be asked to select a category of performance: Distanced OR Digital.

Digital

We are looking for 10-minute original works, either created for the festival or as an excerpt from a longer work. We will pair scripts/project proposals with other applicant directors and designers, and allow for a collective audition process. (If you have any colleagues who are also applying for the festival, we are happy to hear suggestions for collaborators, but can’t confirm those connections.)

These 10-minute works will go through development and then be recorded with pandemic safety in a controlled venue. We will also support finding videographers and editors to help craft the festival creation.

The Performance Series is curated by the Artistic Team of Sage Theatre, including the Artistic Associates: Zach Running Coyote, Griffin Cork, Cheryl Hutton, and Javier Vilalta, and Artistic Producer, Jason Mehmel.

Dance and Improv/Comedy curation to be announced as soon as possible!

Distanced

We are also interested in proposals for distanced original performance work! Although we cannot provide a physical artistic venue, we will work to support physically distanced work over the course of the festival! As outdoor performances have proven to be resilient when COVID numbers prohibit indoor gatherings, we encourage you to think about our friends at containR, where we can support some outdoor physical performances. Or maybe a new kind of physical “performance” type altogether?

Let us know what kind of distanced physical performance you would like to create!

We require the artists to submit, along with their project, a COVID plan that engages with the current guidelines, and also how you might adapt if the restrictions are increased. This will be a short summary of the plan, so don’t worry if you don’t have all the answers! Working with containR means we can draw on their experience producing pandemic-safe live events!

If you are intersted in more information about how containR can support your performance, check out this PDF of their normal rental guidelines.

If you choose the Distanced model, please note your work will not be streamed, but rather, will be presented physically (whatever that looks like for each project) during the festival dates. There is no digital technical support for this category. If COVID-19 numbers and restrictions are on the rise during the festival period, we will be responding in real-time to whether it is safe to present you and your work - and what that looks like. There is a worst-case scenario that we may not be able to present your work during the festival dates. If this happens, we will present your piece once it is safe to do so. This will be an ongoing conversation with the artists!

IMPORTANT NOTE:

The festival reserves the right to determine the definition of “safe performance conditions” and “acceptable COVID-19 protocols and precautions”, in reference to the most current Alberta Health Services guidelines and our own commitment to artist, staff, volunteer, and audience safety. We will be supporting artists in writing and executing the COVID-19 safety protocols of each individual performance.

Also as the pandemic situation continues to develop, our ability to support this section of the festival may be impacted entirely. In this case, we will work with the artists involved to support their project beyond the festival.

Other

If you are proposing work that does not fit within the 10 minute structure, we are still interested and would love to see your proposals. Please consider in these applications how we might help release or present your work outside of our current COVID-adapted structure.

Here's the link apply, but read below for more information about the timeline and festival support!
https://airtable.com/shrGIJVMS3u8MOlEf

Project Timeline (Distanced and Digital)

• March: Application and Curation

• April: Planning With the Festival and Project Development

• May: Project Development

• June: Festival

Festival Supports

Here’s what you can expect from an IGNITE! Festival experience:

• Support on ensuring safe work environments

• $100 honorarium for each artist in your project (including you!)

• ~$100 production budget. This is based on the production needs of the festival as a whole and the production needs of individual projects. We will confirm this number with you once all projects have been curated and we have a better understanding of each project’s needs.

• Festival production support (estimated value up to $7,000/project)

  • Stream production services (Digital) OR front of house services (Distanced)

    • Stream Production Services

      • Festival stream programmer/operator

      • Technical consultations and support

      • Box office and audience services

    • Front of House Services

      • Box office and audience services

      • On-site audience services

  • Marketing and PR

  • Invited festival guest list services, to help amplify your work in the professional arts community

  • Support hosting auditions or calls for collaborators, as needed (both from individual IGNITE! artist applications, and beyond if the project requires)

  • Mentor

    • All project leads are paired with a professional arts mentor who will provide a professional arts connection and support the artistic growth of the project and artist

  • Archival videography/photography (as appropriate for your project)

  • Networking and community-building with your fellow IGNITE! emerging artists

  • 2 months of project/artistic development time and space (pending COVID-19 restrictions, rehearsal space may be provided if artists do not have access to their own)

Project Lead Responsibilities

• Abide by the festival code of conduct and assume leadership to uphold the code of conduct within your project’s process. Reporting systems and festival supports will be provided.

• Provide a safe work environment physically and psychologically for your artistic team.

• Design and manage the artistic process and timeline of your project.

• Attendance and preparedness at festival tech and dress rehearsals.

• 10 min total original performance that is audience-ready to premiere at the festival

• Submit artist and show information (show image, show description and logistic information, team credits and headshots) by the assigned deadline.

• Regular check-ins with festival staff and your Series Curatorial Partner organization

• Responsible for the completion and submission of all requested forms (including those requested from your project team members) by the assigned deadline.

• Attendance of you and your team to all 3 Artist Meetings (mid and end of April, mid May)

• Have fun! Make art!

Artistic Series Specific Notes

Theatre/Performing Arts

The COVID-19 Pandemic had an incredible effect on the performing arts. We have pivoted, adapted, and modified our work for video, for podcasts, for livestreams. The lurking question the whole time has been; is this the future? Is this kind of work all we're moving into?

But now we're moving into a future where the pandemic has a vaccine, and protocols are helping us think about returning to see things in person again.

We're interested in projects that can engage with the digital or distanced experience, but also are thinking about the artistic future after the pandemic.

We are offering performance/recording space in a studio which we will then stream later during the festival, and the recording length is 10 minutes. While keeping within the current protocols to keep us safe, what can you do in that space? What does distanced but in-person staging look like? In what way could your story or project benefit from thinking about this presentation as a transition moment, between only streaming virtually from our homes, to returning to some kind of collective physical experience.

Improv/Comedy

The IGNITE! Festival is accepting project proposals as part of the Comedy Stream, as well as looking for individual emerging artists who can be matched with these proposals as required. "What's comedy?" you say! (If you're asking that, maybe you should apply for one of the other categories. If you're determined to go forward...) Good question! Are you an improv team? Great. Sketch writers and performers looking to be the next Baroness Von Sketch? Sweet. Working on your ten minute stand up set or comedic monologue? (What's the deal with Stand Up Comedy anyway? What if you wanted to sit down? Would they call it Sit Down Comedy?) Maybe you are a Tom Lehrer/Weird Al/Rachel Bloom type and write funny songs. Love it! Mime-prov Duo? Puppeteer clowns? Clownish puppets? Absurdist rappers? Slapstick magicians? Bring it. If it makes you laugh, we want it. Don't feel you have to stick to the punchline-every-ten-seconds rule either. If your piece has us doubling over with laughter at the beginning, and sobbing with heartfelt emotion at the end, that's just the umami of comedy. We'd love to discover the next Hannah Gaddsby or Maria Bamford.

Some other stuff to help flesh out your proposal:

Elevator pitch/log line - Tell me your idea in under a minute, and why we're going to love it. Feel free to use comparisons.

Rationale - Flesh out the above. Who are you? What is your piece? What stage of development is it in? What do you hope to accomplish as part of Ignite!

What you need - Are you the writers and performers, or are you a writer in search of performers?

Supporting material - At least 1, but up to 3 pieces that show us what you're about. If it's a draft of your proposed monologue, great! If you don't have one yet, but you have 3 two minute videos from other pieces you'd like to share, also great! PDF script excerpts, audio files, or videos shared through a platform like YouTube, Vimeo, Google Drive, or Dropbox, are all acceptable.

Dance

More information coming soon!

Interdisciplinary

More information coming soon!