NEW YORK CITY: Kristin Marting, the founding leader of the form-breaking performance space HERE, has announced a final 30th anniversary season and plans to step down in June 2024. Begun in 1993 by Marting and fellow artists Tim Maner, Barbara Busackino, and Randy Rollison, HERE (formerly known as HERE Arts Center) has built a strong reputation for producing new works that bridge performance disciplines, from Basil Twist’s Symphonie Fantastique to Young Jean Lee’s Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven, from Faye Driscoll’s 837 Venice Boulevard to Taylor Mac’s The Lily’s Revenge, from the Prototype Festival to the digital platform URHERE.

“HERE started with the simple idea that boundary-pushing hybrid artists could best realize their visions if they were invited into a creative home offering flexible resources to match their imaginations,” said Marting in a statement. “It has been my great honor to direct and creative produce the work of so many visionary artists and share it with our adventurous audiences through the years. I have continuously been inspired by and learned from our vibrant community of artists, and am so grateful to HERE’s board of directors (past and present), institutional funders, government agencies, and all of the individuals who have enabled HERE to serve our community of artists and audiences over the past 30 years.”

Said board chair Kevin Matthews in a statement, “HERE has thrived over the last 30 years because of Kristin’s passion and vision, despite the singular challenges of running a progressive nonprofit arts organization in New York City and in the face of challenges like 9/11 and COVID. We are grateful for her leadership and the solid foundation she leaves.”

In a statement, MacArthur Fellow and long-term HERE resident artist Taylor Mac called Marting “the most impressive human I’ve encountered in the American theatre. Hands down. She’s a visionary, dedicated to the experiment, who’s never really been given her due, due to the fact that she’s put thousands of artists first. She’s all the more impressive because she’s managed to run an ethical arts organization under a system of capitalism, while staying kind, inquisitive, and politically conscious. I love her madly.”

HERE’s women-led 30th anniversary season will include Normandy Sherwood’s Psychic Self Defense, one of two premieres this year that were developed through HARP, HERE’s $125,000 artist residency program; composer Heather Christian’s Terce: A Practical Breviary, and Nia Witherspoon’s new work, Priestess of Twerk, another HARP-developed work. The season will also include the 11th annual Prototype Festival in January 2024, co-curated and co-produced with Beth Morrison Projects, and the third annual edition of Puppetopia in March 2024.

HERE is a producer, presenter and venue for local and global ground-breaking artists. As of 2021, the theatre’s budget was approximately $1.9 million.