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About Quest
Organizational History, Mission and Goals -
Founded in 1997 and based in Lanham, Maryland, Quest is a group of artists,
educators,
and dedicated volunteers representing a diverse ethnic, cultural, and
artistic panorama. All are committed to using the arts to: promote understanding
among all peoples, promote excellence, and enable individuals who have
been marginalized to realize their full potential. Quest’s 30 Affiliate
Artists represent a variety of ethnicities, cultures, and art forms.
Forty percent of the Affiliates are artists who are deaf or artists with
disabilities. Seventy percent of the Affiliates are artists of color.
The company’s three divisions reflect Quest’s multipronged,
multileveled approach to employing the arts to affect social, educational,
and employment change.
ArtsBridge – a local, state, and national
initiative on careers in the arts for people with disabilities;
Quest
Productions – creates,
produces, and presents theatre from a visual base and features casts
and production staffs of deaf, hard of hearing, and hearing people;
Education & Training – arts education in schools and professional
training in visual theatre
Current Programs, Activities, and Accomplishments
Accomplishments
- Coordinated
the first ever National
Forum on Careers in the Arts for People with Disabilities conducted
at the John F. Kennedy Center
for the Performing Arts.
- Prompted the establishment of the Maryland
Governor’s Committee
on Careers in the Arts for People with Disabilities.
- In cooperation
with the Publick Playhouse,
produced a three-production season featuring Quest Affiliate
Artists.
- Produced and directed staged
readings of deaf playwright, Willy
Conley’s
play The water falls. The readings took place at Gallaudet
University, Center Stage, and Round House Theatre.
- Produced and
directed the gala for Gallaudet University’s Deaf
President Now 10th Anniversary Celebration.
- Provided artistic
direction, faculty, staff, and grant writing support for
Gallaudet University’s Young
Scholars Program.
- In conjunction
with the Young Scholars Program, conducted performance and workshop
tours of South Africa, Mexico,
Romania, and India.
The tours featured deaf and hard of hearing students
and professional artists.
- Created a new theatre piece with
a mixed cast of deaf and hearing performers entitled White
Frost Falls and
featuring
Quest affiliate
artists Willy
Conley, Mark Jaster, and Shizumi Shigeto Manale.
The show appeared at the Deaf
Way II International Arts Festival.
- Through a contract from the Maryland
State Department of Education,
compiled research on theatre education and wrote
summaries
of these findings as
they relate to the Maryland Standards in Theatre
Education.
- Provided casting and technical support
to Arena Stage’s production
of The Miracle Worker.
Six Quest Affiliate Artists, staff members, and
volunteers were cast in the show.
- In cooperation
with award winning director, playwright, and actor Nick
Olcott and featuring actress
Shira Grabelsky,
who played Helen Keller
in Arena Stage’s production of The Miracle
Worker, directed A Celebration of the Senses,
a visual interpretation of poetry. The show
premiered
at the Corcoran
Gallery of Art and
was featured at the European
Deaf Theatre Festival in Vienna,
Austria and the Deaf Way II Arts Festival.
Quest Productions currently has four shows in it repertoire. Quest is
presenting these shows to the general public through self-produced
runs, special engagements,
and appearances at festivals. Quest is working in cooperation with Round House
Theatre for the creation of a new play based on Alice in Wonderland and featuring
a cast of Round House company members and deaf performers. The African Continuum
Theatre Company and Quest have agreed to workshop, showcase, and produce Black
and Deaf in America, a show to be developed based on the work of Fred Beam,
Michelle Banks, and Christopher Smith, three Black deaf performing
artists.
 Deaf
Way II International Arts Festival (2002)
New
Works
Artist
Representation
Education and Training activities include annual playwright
retreats to provide deaf and hard of hearing writers training in creating
visual theatre; workshops
and residencies; and the training of deaf and hard of hearing, and hearing
individuals in visual theatre. Quest’s production, Wings includes local
college students and recent graduates who receive training in visual theatre.
Quest and the National
Theatre of the Deaf will cooperate in conducting a three-week acting academy
this summer at Gallaudet University.
Arts
in Education
Workshops
ArtsBridge has formed a National Partners
Network bringing together disability membership organizations, disability
service providers, arts service organizations,
and national arts organizations to share information on careers in the arts
for people with disabilities. ArtsBridge has developed a guide to careers
in the
arts which has been distributed to rehabilitation counselors throughout the
United States and has been posted on the Quest website. ArtsBridge staff
is currently
gathering examples of best practices for employing people with disabilities.
Quest will share the results of this survey through the Partners Network
and on its website.
Advocacy
Careers
Partners
The company receives inquiries from the field nearly
every day. The Quest staff provides guidance to those individuals requesting
assistance. This
process
often leads to an ongoing dialogue and relationships develop. Inquiries have
come from rehabilitation counselors, artists with and without disabilities,
educators, government agency staff members, parents, and others.
Quest coordinated Gallaudet
University's Deaf Way II International Arts Festival. Deaf Way II brought
together 400 of the world’s top deaf, hard of hearing
and hearing performing, visual and literary artists and presented them to
enthusiastic audiences in the Washington, DC area. Deaf Way II presented
over 125 Deaf Way
II performances and 10 visual arts venues throughout the metropolitan area
in partnership with The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Smithsonian
Institution, Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, National Capital Park
and Planning Commission, National Arboretum, Millennium Arts Center,
Mexican Cultural
Center, and Swedish Embassy. Approximately 400,000 people attended Deaf Way
II
festival related events.
Quest's Organizational
Profile
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