As participants affiliated with Davis Shakespeare Festival, we acknowledge the ways in which we as a creative team benefit from the violence of settler colonialism in the area we now refer to as “Davis, California.” As an institution DSF operates on the traditional, occupied, unceded lands of the Patwin people. Furthermore, we acknowledge the continued efforts of Patwin groups to reclaim, protect, and indigenize their ancestral lands, history, culture, and language. We affirm our solidarity with local groups fighting to decolonize their ancestral lands and implore our audience and peers to do the same. While these acknowledgements represent only a small step on the long road towards restoring Indigenous Sovereignty, we see this as a moment to spur ourselves and our peers towards greater action. As such, we, as a group of artists from various places, have looked into ways in which we can further act in Solidarity with Indigenous organizations in our various localities. We ask our audience to do the same; to both research and listen to regional Indigenous voices as well as affirm and act in solidarity with Indigenous groups as they fight to decolonize and restore their respective lands.
While this project is free to listen to, we are collecting donations for Black Lives Matter. Our goal is $500 in donations, of which we’ve already collected $365, but we’d love to surpass this goal! As a group of diverse artists, it is both a privilege to come together to present this project, and also a moment to reflect on the ways in which we can use our resources and platform to inspire greater social change. As we’ve embarked on this project, we have sought to decenter the traditional structures of power that have produced Doctor Faustus as a canonical work. We acknowledge the ways in which Black people have been left out of the construct of “the canon” and how this construct has in turn been used to dehumanize and disenfranchise Black Americans in particular. Collecting donations for Black Lives Matter is a chance for us to provide monetary aid to an organization fueling a national conversation about combating anti-Blackness. Our hope is to use this platform to further encourage our audience and peers to help fight White Supremacy and to promote justice, reform, and equality. Please consider donating to our fundraiser using the link below!
http://gf.me/u/ys6jgj
From the directing teams for Acts/Episodes I and II of FAUSTUS, Cade and Sara, as well as Camilla and Alyssa, respectively: biggest thanks to everyone who joined us tonight for the premiere of our Faustus Podcaustus! We are ecstatic to have been able to participate in the DSF Digital Internship Program and bring you the fruits of our (remote) labor.