International Festival of Arts & Ideas weathers management shakeup by diving deeper into community

Yahoo

25-05-2025

This has been a year of change for New Haven's International Festival of Arts & Ideas, resulting in a burst of fresh energy at the decades-old summertime institution. This year's festival is already in full swing through June 28.
Shelley Quiala, the festival's executive director for the past four years, announced in August 2024 that she was stepping down so she could take care of her mother in Minnesota. Quiala is staying with the festival in the role of senior artistic and development strategist to smooth the transition to new leadership. For now, longtime board member Rev. Kevin Ewing has stepped in as interim executive director. Melissa Huber, who has been with the festival in various roles since 2003, has assumed a managing director role.
'We are using our collective knowledge of how the festival goes together,' Huber said, to strengthen the festival during the transition.
The festival also experienced a tragic loss. Denise Santisteban, who had been with the event since the beginning and was the curator of the Ideas programming as well as tours and storytelling, passed away in April. Ewing said the festival is honoring her memory by basing this year's programming on events she had outlined or already had in place.
The International Festival of Arts & Ideas began in 1996 with a goal of not just bringing major performers, thinkers and artists from around the world to New Haven but to do it at a time of year when the city most needed not just the entertainment and enlightenment that the festival would provide but tourists who would eat and shop in the city. The festival was deliberately planned for the barren weeks in June after college students left and before the summer concert and festival season kicked in.
Over time, the International Festival of Arts & Ideas expanded its footprint in New Haven,. A dozen years ago, a series of neighborhood festivals were created and scheduled for the weeks leading up to the main downtown festival. Local artists had always been a part of the programming, but instead of being relegated mainly to free concerts on New Haven Green, they started being incorporated into other events. If certain artists became available outside of June, the festival could accommodate them by hosting events at other times of year.
'One of the shifts for the artists was to now have local participation in more ways, including as opening artists,' Huber said.
To Ewing, the increased community focus helps with perception problem. 'There was this impression that the festival was for the elites, the Yalies, the East Rockers … but anyone can participate,' he said.
In some years, a sizeable percentage of the program was arranged years in advance due to commissioned works, longterm development of projects or established relationships with some artists or companies. This year, Ewing and Huber said the only event planned well in advance was A Broken Umbrella Theatre's production of 'Family Business: (A)Pizza Play,' running June 13-28, which uses original research and interviews about the development of pizza restaurants by immigrant families in New Haven to create the dramatic story of the fictional Carbonizatto family.
Huber noted that the festival's legacy and its importance to the New Haven arts community leads to some unexpected connections. This year's keynote speaker is playwright Martyna Majok, whose Broadway drama 'Cost of Living' won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2018. Majok is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama. While she was a student, she worked at Arts & Ideas.
Huber added that Majok was recently commissioned to write a new musical based on the classic Ray Bradbury novel 'Farenheit 451,' which the festival has designated as its Big Read title this year and has also based events around in previous years. 'It's a nice nod to previous festival programming,' Huber said.
There's an extra impetus, and obstacle, to pushing ahead with a cutting edge, envelope pushing arts festival in 2025, Ewing said.
'The energy we're running off this year is resistance,' he said, citing the current politicization of the arts community, changes in federal funding for the arts, increased scrutiny of artistic content and other issues. Arts & Ideas is one of numerous Connecticut arts organizations that had grant money from the National Endowment for the Arts — in this case $65,000 — rescinded after it had already been awarded.
It is 30 years since Arts & Ideas was conceived in part due to the New Haven's successful hosting of the Special Olympics World Games in 1995. Huber said the financial setback has only strengthened the impetus and opportunity to foster partnerships with sponsors and other organizations.
'We're gonna make it,' Ewing said.
The International Festival of Arts & Ideas is already in the midst of its main multi-week run of performances, talks, concerts, tours, food events and more. All the locations are in downtown New Haven. Here are some highlights:
'Copenhagen': A presentation of Michael Frayn's play based on an historic meeting between the famed physicists Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg in 1941. In 1998, the same year the play had its world premiere in London, Arts & Ideas arranged for the original cast to perform it at the festival. May 29 at 7:30 p.m. at the Yale Schwarzman Center. Free.
An Evening with Monique Martin: The New York artist, producer and activist will be interviewed onstage while she is in town to receive Arts & Idea's 2025 Visionary Leadership Award. June 11 at 6:30 p.m. at Cooperative Arts & Humanities High School. $75.
Martyna Majok: The Pulitzer winning playwright and Yale School of Drama graduate delivers the festival's keynote address on June 14 at 2:15 p.m. in the Humanities Quadrangle on York Street. Free; reservations required.
'Family Business: (A)Pizza Play': A new theater piece by New Haven's A Broken Umbrella Theatre, whose previous associations with the festival include the premiere of another original work based on New Haven history, 'Freewheelers' in 2013. June 13-28 with performances on Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at 3 and 8 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m. plus a Thursday performance on June 26 at 8 p.m. $44.86-$52.42.
Traces: An interactive exhibit of photos by Bill Graustein. June 14 and 15 from 10 a.m to 4 p.m. at the Connecticut Center for Arts & Technology (ConnCAT) in New Haven's Science Park neighborhood. Free.
Theater as Resistance: Godfrey L. Simmons Jr., leader of Hartford's HartBeat Ensemble and a frequent actor in shows at Hartford Stage, joins Dexter Singleton of New Haven's Collective Consciousness Theatre and playwright Majok in this discussion of theater and social change. June 14 at 1 p.m. Free.
Minty Fresh Circus: This Black circus troupe conceived by producer Monique Martin uses circus routines to inform about African American history and culture. June 14 at 8 p.m. and June 15 at 2 p.m. at the Yale University Theater. $68.89.
New Haven Hip Hop Conference — Visions of Truth: The seventh annual gathering of hip-hop scholars, performers and others. June 19 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Neighborhood Music School on Audubon Street. Free.
Jacques Pépin: The renowned chef and cookbook author shares stories from his life and kitchen. June 19 at 5 p.m. at the Yale University Theater. $84.32.
Autumn Peltier: The First Nation member (Anishinaabe and Wikwemikong) and Canadian environmental activist speaks about the need for clean water. June 21 at 4 p.m. at the Humanities Quadrangle. Free; reservations required.
City of Floating Sounds: A two-part night-long collaboration among the New Haven Symphony Orchestra, Yale's Schwarzman Center and Arts & Ideas on June 21. The event begins with a 6 p.m. guided walking tour that involves recorded sounds by composer Huang Ruo that will grow in clarity and intensity as the walkers approach New Haven Green for a live 7 p.m. concert. Free.
Sons of Mystro: A free show on New Haven Green from the eclectic Black violin ensemble that plays everything from pop to hip-hop to jazz and yes, classical. DJ Kasey Cortez opens the night of free music at 5:45 p.m.; Sons of Mystro goes on at 6:30 p.m. Free.
Mireya Ramos: The Latin vocalist performs her concert act 'Guerrera,' a tribute to strong women, on June 24 at 8 p.m. at the Yale University Theater. $68.89.
Squonk: The experimental musical entertainers perform their latest concert, 'Brouhaha,' featuring their signature instrument the Squonkcordion. Free on New Haven Green with performances June 26 at 5 p.m., June 27 at 1, 3 and 5 p.m. and June 28 at noon and 2 p.m.
Hang Him to the Scales and Christine Tassanet et les Imposteurs: A double bill of free bands on New Haven Green on June 26. Hang Him to the Scales, which goes on first at 6 p.m., is an Asian shoegaze act based in Brooklyn while Christine Tassanet et les Imposteurs, performing at 7 p.m., are purveyors of the jazz genre manouche.
Joshua Redman: The great jazz saxophonist and his quartet perform June 26 at 8 p.m. at the Yale University Theater. $68.69.
Seny Tatchol Camara and Sol and the Tribu: The final night of free concerts on New Haven Green features West African drummer and dancer Seny Tatchoil Camara at 6 p.m. and the Cuban rhythms of Sol and the Tribu at 7 p.m. Free.
The festival also features film screenings, storytelling shows, walking tours of everything from local LGBTQ+ history to a botanical garden and the oyster industry in Fair Haven, food events such as 'Black Table: Afro-Culinary Futurism,' panel discussions on such topics as 'Making Memories: Neurons, Quantum Computing and Art' and special events that tie in to Juneteenth celebrations as well as the iconic New Haven community Freddy Fixer Parade and New Haven Caribbean Heritage Festival.
The full calendar of events for the International Festival of Arts & Ideas is available at artidea.org.