• Arts
  • Creative Work Fund

Jo Kreiter of Flyaway Productions is collaborating with The Jewish Community Center of San Francisco (the Center) to create MEET US QUICKLY WITH YOUR MERCY, the second in a series of works about criminal justice The artist and organization are examining the legacies of trauma that Jewish and African Americans share, and asking how Jews leverage privilege as they approach social justice and what a Jewish role might be in ending mass incarceration. The artist team for this project features composer Jewlia Eisenberg and apparatus designer Sean Riley along with Flyaway Productions’ professional dancers and riggers. They will engage in research, conduct an in-the-street residency, and present10 performances at CounterPulse in San Francisco’s Tenderloin in September 2020. For 22 years, aerial dancer and choreographer Jo Kreiter has cultivated a model in which dance works are built in full view of the public, making them part of the urban landscape. Passersby and intentional audiences witness the development of the work and return to see the free performances. Most of MEET US QUICKLY will be built on the streets near CounterPulse; one section will be built and rehearsed at the Jewish Community Center. Furthering the Center’s vast connections to Jewish history, Kreiter will seek out several women who survived the Holocaust to inform ideas for resistance strategies. The Center also will host dinners for groups affected by incarceration and present a panel discussion with Kreiter and changemakers in the Black and Jewish communities as part of its Arts and Ideas series.