Students in Amy’s art classes have been collaborating with writer-director Jana Segal on a virtual play that premiered on Friday, February 26th! Sky Islands art students were asked to create the sets for the play ReGeneration: The Tucson Story, in which a diverse group of teens looks past their cultural differences and brings their communities together to save Tucson as climate change progresses.
Here is the play’s synopsis, taken from their website: “In Tucson’s not-so-distant future where climate change takes a turn for the worst, where even native Sonoran plants can’t stand the desert heat, a blackout causes a disruption in the already diminished water and food supply. It’s up to the youth to find a way to escape their scorching hot fate. Can Rogelio, a barrio teen grappling with family issues, alongside of Ha:san, a Tohono O’Odham teen struggling to balance traditional ways with city life, and Alex, a runaway non-binary science whiz, bring their communities together to fix this mess before it’s too late”?
Jana presented her idea to her Visual Art and Art/Design students, explaining her reasons for wanting to do the play- how she had observed that there wasn’t as much rain as when her boys were little, and how she had become concerned about the water crisis we were leaving for them. In her pursuit for a sustainable solution, she found out that there was enough water for everyone in Tucson if everyone harvested the rain. The only problem was that hardly anyone knew about it. So, she wrote this play to reach out to the young people who would be most affected. Together, they went through the list of set descriptions needed for each scene: a desert scene, a dilapidated house in the wash, a community garden, an ambulance outside of a house in the barrio, an oasis in the desert… They selected the projects that spoke to them and then worked diligently to get them completed before the virtual premiere.
Here is the website with the link to the Youtube live premiere!
Click on Team ReGeneration to see a post about the art classes.
View the trailer for the play here! Also, recording artist R3D performed during intermission
