Origin Studio House and Fusebox are excited to partner together to host the Fusebox Festival 2024 Artist Talks and Closing Party. This partnership amplifies our mutual visions to nurture community by centering artists of all disciplines in our programming.

Origin Studio House is the host site and programming partner for the Artist Talks and Closing Party.

Join Fusebox & Origin Studio House for the Fusebox Festival 2024 Artist Talks happening daily from 12:30pm -1:30pm starting Wednesday April 10th through Saturday April 13th.

Each day will bring new artists and creatives, both regionally based and international, who will sit down and share their projects, processes, and passions. Come take your lunch break with us at Origin Studio House where there will be beverages and food for sale as we dive into what makes our community of artists tick.

Artist Talks Lineup:

Wednesday April 10th: Taylor Davis + Jessy Wilson

Creating As A Multi-hyphenate: What does it mean to juggle, balance and integrate all the hats that we wear as artists and creators to not only support our practice but to also challenge our creative limits, increase representation and create a lasting legacy?

Taylor Davis (she/her) is an independent curator and landscape designer living in Austin, Texas. After receiving her masters in Landscape Architecture from the University of Texas at Austin she went on to work for a local Austin design firm, TBG partners where she works on projects such as parks, multifamily amenity courtyards, hospitals and trails. Her curatorial practice is interested in the nuance of artistic practice as it relates to unique life experiences. Working with different galleries she has curated group art shows in San Francisco and Austin. She serves as a board member of the Trail Conservancy in Austin and serves as the board chair for their Arts and Culture Committee and has worked with local Austin arts and culture groups such as AIPP and Future Front Texas.

Jessy Wilson-McFarlin is a recording artist, songwriter, and performer from Brooklyn, New York, who currently resides in Austin, Texas, with her husband, where she creates sculptures on canvas inspired by Scandinavian minimalism and Wabi-Sabi art. Using a mix of paint, plaster, and other materials to achieve artworks that flow and tell a story, Jessy incorporates the same experimental approach as when writing a song: instead of trying to force her pieces to be anything, she lets them take the lead and show her what they want to become. The result is a natural, elemental landscape of lines that enliven the walls of a room and change with light and shadow.

In reflecting on her process, Jessy says:  “As a songwriter it’s natural for me to step into the world of visual art because I already have a relationship with creative surrender.  I’m comfortable with making something and not knowing where it will lead or how it will to turn out.  It’s a freedom that allows for the deepest healing in my life, and so my work as a visual artist is more about self-discovery than it is about following specific rules.  As a self-taught intuitive artist, working with my hands is purely a way to have a conversation—with the muse, with myself, and with the world around me.”

Thursday April 11th: Lisa B. Thompson and Fanm Djanm founder Paola Mathe

What It Means To Be A Black Woman Artist Today: Conversation on the emotional and psychological cost of creating work focused on community healing and how we view aging and health in the Black community.

Lisa B. Thompson‘s satirical comedies, poignant dramas and engaging scholarship examines stereotypes about Black life in the US, particularly the experiences of the Black middle class. The artist/scholar is the author of four books: Beyond the Black Lady: Sexuality and the New African American Middle Class (University of Illinois Press, 2009), Single Black Female (Samuel French, 2012), Underground, Monroe, and The Mamalogues: Three Plays (Northwestern University Press, 2020), and The Mamalogues (Samuel French, 2021). She has published articles and reviews in Theatre Journal, Journal of American Drama, Theatre Survey, NPR, Criterion Collection, Clutch, Huffington Post and The Washington Post. Thompson’s plays have been produced Off-Broadway, throughout the US, and internationally by Crossroads Theatre, Theatre Rhinoceros, the Vortex, The Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, Soul Rep Theatre Company, Austin Playhouse, Ensemble Theatre, Chiswick Playhouse, and The National Black Theatre Festival among others.

Her work has been recognized with an Austin Critics Circle David Mark Cohen New Play Award, a Broadway World Regional Awards Best Writing of an Original Work, a LA Weekly Theatre Award for Best Comedy nomination, and an Irma P. Hall Black Theatre Best Play Award. Thompson’s work has been supported by a number of institutions including the American Council of Learned Societies, Hedgebrook, MacDowell, Millay Arts, National Performance Network, Michele R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research; the Five Colleges; the University of California’s Office of the President; Stanford University’s Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity, Center for the Study of Race and Democracy at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, and the W. E. B. DuBois Research Institute at the Hutchins Center. She co-hosts and co-produces Black Austin Matters, a podcast and radio segment on KUT: Austin’s NPR station that explores Black life, culture, and politics in Central Texas. Lisa B. Thompson is currently the Bobby and Sherri Patton Professor of African and African Diaspora Studies, Department of Theatre & Dance and the College of Liberal Arts’ Advisor to the Dean for Faculty Mentoring and Support at the University of Texas at Austin.

Paola Mathé is a social entrepreneur, creative director, and photographer who draws inspiration from her vibrant Haitian heritage to challenge and shift beauty ideals. In 2014, Paola founded Fanm Djanm out of her studio apartment in Harlem. Fanm Djanm, which directly translates to “strong woman” in Haitian Kreyol, is a hair accessories and hair solutions brand that encourages women to stand up tall and live boldly. The Haitian-born storyteller established her own lane and helped to revolutionize the industry with locally made headwraps and other zero-waste products that cater to and celebrate Afro-textured hair. Paola’s ability to tell rich, evocative stories through visual media earned the self-taught photographer features in many online and print publications such as The New York Times, Vogue, NY Magazine/The Cut, and Essence, among others. However, it is Mathé’s flair in shaping important narratives surrounding identity, culture, womanhood, and beauty that have primed her to be the center of campaigns for Bvlgari, GAP and L’Occitane as a champion of self love. The founder regularly credits the pride she has in her Haitian roots for kindling her love affair with color, which she details in her TEDx Talk aptly named “Sharing My Colors With the World” delivered at her alma mater, Drew University. This passion for color has since gone global, gracing editorial covers featuring the likes of Ciara, Teyana Taylor, and supermodel Halima Aden. Paola continues to weave stories with color from Austin, TX, where she resides with her husband, Tyler, and their two young children.

Friday April 12th: Avery-Jai Andrews, Coka Trevino, Joshua Banbury, and Kenyon Adams

Corridor of the Arts Between Cities: Conversation delving into the notion of an interdisciplinary cultural leadership network between the cities that leverages each region’s capacities for mutual national and global presence and initiatives.

Avery-Jai Andrews is a Dallas-based dance artist, arts entrepreneur and community organizer. She is deeply committed to developing the Dallas local arts community as evident in her service as Executive Director of Arts Mission Oak Cliff, Co-Founder of Agora Artists, and the Alumni Relations Coordinator for the Advisory Board of BTWHSPVA. A performer, producer, and creative, she is a versatile and potent leader with ambitious goals and a growing network. She is excited by the momentum in the Dallas arts scene and eager to see her hometown emerge as a destination for creatives. Avery-Jai earned her BFA in dance at NYU Tisch School of the Arts.

Coka Treviño is the Founder and Curator of The Projecto, an Austin based organization fostering cultural connections between Latin America and the US. She is the Curator and Director of Programming at Big Medium, an Austin based nonprofit art organization dedicated to advancing artists’ careers. Additionally, she does Arts Programming at Soho House Austin. Her curatorial practice focuses on uplifting diverse artistic communities with an innovative and respectful approach to culture and contemporary social issues. Her work attempts to intertwine art, music, and social perspectives as often as possible, always with diversity, equity, and inclusion at the forefront of the projects.

Joshua Banbury is a multi-dimensional vocalist and lyricist, gaining international attention for his work in jazz, folk, and opera. The rising star from Texas has made solo appearances with some of the most respected artistic organizations in the country, including The Apollo Theater, The New York Philharmonic, The National Black Theater, The Phillips Collection, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s All-Star Orchestra, Jazz at The Ballroom, The Kelly Strayhorn Theater, and The Alexandria Symphony Orchestra. In 2021, he was selected as a fellow for The American Lyric Theater, considered the country’s premier mentorship initiative for promising operatic writers.

Kenyon Adams is a multi-hyphenate creator, speaker, coach, and artistic director. Through ritual arts practices, he seeks to reclaim or expand embodied ways of knowing, towards imagining and constructing sustainable futures. His forthcoming book Joywerk: Affirmations for Creative Souls, motivates creative people of all kinds to discover and fulfill their core contribution.  Kenyon has contributed art and thought leadership to Live Ideas (New York Live Arts), Fusebox Festival, Open Society University Network, the Fisher Center at Bard College, Yale School of Drama, the Alpine Fellowship, the Langston Hughes Project, Armstrong NOW (Louis Armstrong House Museum), YoungARTS, National Arts Policy Roundtable, the Watermill Center, and the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. He studied Religion & Literature at Yale Divinity School, and Theology of Contemporary Performance at the Yale Institute of Sacred Music. He holds a BFA from Southern Methodist University, and an MAR from Yale University. Adams has performed nationally as a vocalist, songwriter, and blues harmonica player, making his feature film debut as Jason in Golden Globe Award-winning director Lee Isaac Chung’s narrative feature Lucky Life, which premiered at Tribeca Film Festival and Moscow International Film Festival. Kenyon is the founding principal at FUTURE SOLITUDE, a lifestyle brand that promotes rest and leisure time for all.

Saturday April 13th: Tania El Khoury, Abby Zbikowski, + Sanchita Sharma

Invisible Borders: Conversation about border and body politics in the work of artists Tania El Khoury and Abby Zbikowski

Sanchita Sharma is a performing artist, choreographer, and a dance scholar from New Delhi, India. She is trained as a jazz, modern, and contemporary dancer, and has performed extensively across India, China, Scotland, and the United States. She is a PhD Candidate at UCLA in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance, where she studies the politics of corporeal dissent in Indian contemporary dance. Currently based in Austin, Sanchita is teaching at the Austin Community College (ACC) as an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Dance and is dancing with the local community.

In her creative research, Sanchita envisions the construction of a performance as a shared experience between performers, objects, space, and the audience. Her choreographic work has been shown at ACC’s 7th Annual Faculty and Guest Artist Concert and First Street Studio (Austin), The Broad Art Center (UCLA), Natya Ballet Center and Gati Dance Forum (New Delhi), and Maya Dance Theatre (Singapore), among others. Her dance film, Engage, was awarded the “Best Dance Film” in Seoul International Short Film Festival (2021) and officially selected at several festivals across New York, Austin, and Germany.

Choreographer Abby Zbikowski created Abby Z and the New Utility in 2012 with dancers Fiona Lundie and Jennifer Meckley to experiment with the potential and choreographic possibility of the body being pushed beyond perceived limits, creating a new movement lexicon that triangulates dancing/moving bodies across multiple cultural value systems simultaneously. In 2016, Abby expanded to a group of nine performer/collaborators for Zbikowski’s first evening length commission. abandoned playground premiered to a sold-out run at the Abrons Arts Center in New York in April 2017, leading to Zbikowski being honored with the Juried Bessie Award. Abby Z and the New Utility have been presented at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, the Boston ICA, 92nd St Y, Movement Research at Danspace Project, Gibney Dance Center, The Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College, and the Fusebox Festival in Austin,TX, among others. From diverse training and cultural backgrounds, Abby Z and the New Utility works collaboratively to build a hybrid form that welcomes audiences from a range of understandings of dance/movement and reflects a wider contemporary cultural conversation.

Tania El Khoury is a live artist whose work focuses on audience interactivity and its political potential. She creates installations and performances in which the audience is a witness and an active collaborator. Tania’s work has been translated to multiple languages and shown in 32 countries across 6 continents in spaces ranging from museums to cable cars. She is the recipient of a Soros Art Fellowship, the Bessies Outstanding Production Award, the International Live Art Prize, the Total Theatre Innovation Award, and the Arches Brick Award.

Tania is the director of the OSUN Center for Human Rights & the Arts at Bard College in New York. She holds a PhD from Royal Holloway, University of London. She is associated with Forest Fringe collective of artists in the UK and is a co-founder of Dictaphone Group in Lebanon, a research and live art collective aiming at questioning our relationship to the city and its public spaces.

About Fusebox

Fusebox is a global non-profit arts organization based in Austin, TX. Fusebox was founded by a group of artists in 2005 who wanted to create a robust exchange of ideas across different art forms and geography, with a particular interest in the live experience. The founders were also especially interested in how festivals could live in a more meaningful relationship with place. Fusebox produces two festivals including The Fusebox Festival and Live in America, along with year-round programming and events.

About the 20th Anniversary Festival

The 2024 festival takes a look back and celebrates the past 20 years of Fusebox, while also looking ahead toward the future. For eight days, artists and audiences will gather from all over the world for unforgettable live performances, exhibitions, parties, and conversations at sites across Austin.

Underpinning all this is a big-hearted, free-flowing exchange of ideas across art forms and geography. The festival becomes a space for artists and audiences to explore, ask questions, and share bold ideas that expand our sense of possibility and connect us with each other.