Students danced, marched, sang and delivered spoken-word poetry across the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) campus May 7 to respond to the mock Compton Cookout party and display of a noose and Klu Klux Klan-style hood in March that fanned racial tension and enraged students and staff. The Department of Theatre and Dance staged “Arts in Action Festival: Real Art for Real Change” to create a critical lens through which to view the racial incidents and to help create a sense of community so the university could move forward, said organizer and MFA candidate Aimee Zygmonski. The arts festival also aimed to challenge and “interrogate” the use of stereotypes in comedy. “Arts are very effective in creating social change,” Zygmonski said, pointing to the political plays the El Teatro Campesino staged to propel the farm workers movement in California. MFA candidate Kyle Sorensen choreographed a “flash mob” dance, which his troupe performed throughout the week at random spots on campus — including the middle of lunch at the cafeteria. Dancers moved through eras of protest from sister suffragettes doing the “mash potato” to James Brown pumping his fists in the air to proclaim “I’m black; I’m proud.” At the end, the dancers dispersed nonchalantly as though an organized crowd of people hadn’t been dancing in the middle of the cafeteria at all. Chicano muralist Mario Torero worked on an “Arts in Action” mural and students pieced together murals they had created during the week at each of the six colleges. At a forum, students and faculty discussed questions like, “Is a racially-themed party a performance?” and what it means to be “color blind.” Art is more effective when it’s created and displayed outdoors in the middle of people’s lives, Zygmonski said. “It’s much more of a visceral reaction when you’re in the middle of the UCSD campus doing a devised piece of theater as opposed to working with a traditional script and traditional costumes,” Zygmonski said.
