Ceremony. Spectacle. Flight.
The Jupiter Performance Studio (JPS) BDAC’s hub for the development, exploration, and production of diasporic Black performance traditions. In 2020, Ebony launched Jupiter Performance Studio, which houses all of her company’s creative and arts education endeavors.
Wash’d// by Ebony Noelle Golden featuring Audrey Hailes, Vesta Walker and Jaime Dzandu (left to right).
Since 2010, the BDAC arts accelerator has been amplifying the creative agency and capacity of artists, educators, activists, and others who want to activate arts praxis and creativity for social change. We run a community-based fellowship, train hundreds of people in arts-centered technologies, produce a number of independent performances, curate numerous events, and fund artists to create their own work.
As a newly integrated iteration of our arts accelerator and creative practice, the Jupiter Performance Studio (officially founded in 2020) is a hub for the study and production of diasporic black performance traditions, particularly womanist performance. We make art that unearths the beauty and the complexity of Black women’s lived experiences while centering our joy, legacy and liberation journey.
Womanist Performance is Power!
Think of as a stew, a gumbo if you will—a good hearty soup that heals and sustains you and your community. That is what womanist performance is and does. It takes all that diasporic African women have created to make this world go-around and places it in cultural arts context. The performance of gumbo mirrors the stew you eat.
It is most often experienced when a large group of people are together and multiple conversations happen simultaneously. People pop in and out of dialogue, criss-crossing conversations effortlessly. Everyone knows what is being said and everyone is heard. It is most often experienced when a large group of people are together and multiple conversations happen simultaneously. People pop in and out of dialogue, criss-crossing conversations effortlessly. Everyone knows what is being said and everyone is heard.
Building experimental womanist performance is democratic, chaotic, fulfilling, collective and generative in the same way. People on the outside may look at the process and have no idea what is happening. However, those of us dedicated to the process are inspired and plugged in to the electric energy generated when we engage gumbo yaya with fervor, rigor, fearlessness and creativity.
Current + Recent Projects
BDAC’s Jupiter Performance Studio is incubating several performance art projects in collaboration with cultural institutions city-wide.
SPECTER OF SUNLIGHT//: a performance and dance centering Black women’s constellations of joy and possibility.
black/water: a digital ceremony centering blackness and water as liberation technology.
In the Name Of… Core Collaborator: Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs. Commissioned by Apollo Theatre. Slated for a Summer 2023 Premier. Press release here.
Jubilee 11213. A multi-generational cultural organizing and community theatre collaboration that advances civic action and creativity practiced at the founding of the Weeksville community. Core Collaborator: Weeksville Heritage Center. Presented with generous support by Creative Capital.
