Interact Center for the Visual & Performing Arts 

About

Since 1996, Interact’s mission to create art that challenges perceptions of disability has opened doors for artists with disabilities and audiences eager to experience their work. Artists might never have seen the arts as a life choice, but now see the arts as essential to their humanity. With over 100 artists working in theater and studio arts, Interact is multi-cultural, intergenerational, and embraces the entire spectrum of disability labels.

Interact Theater produces original, fully staged theater productions each year in the Interact Gallery, along with more informal works-in-process designed for special events such as school shows, industry events, and conferences. Interact’s ensemble-generated creation and developmental process means that artists with disabilities fully participate in conceiving and performing new work, developing the original material, writing scripts/songs and incorporating everyone’s ideas through improvisation. Collaborating with acclaimed guest artists such as Kevin Kling, Shanan Custer, and others, Interact is an integral part of the Twin Cities and regional arts community. All artists are paid for their performance work.

Interact mounts profession public exhibitions each year in the Interact Gallery, along with special exhibition events in venues throughout the metro area. Because artists with disabilities face even greater economic and space/mobility challenges than most mainstream artists, Interact provides accessible studio space and all necessary art supplies to facilitate painting, drawing, sculpture, clay, textile work and other media. We provide a full roster of visual arts seminars guided by studio artists, department teaching artists, and local and nationally recognized contemporary guest artists in a variety of media. Artists are supported through the process of aesthetic maturation and evolution based on their individual artistic goals as they complete work for exhibition. Artist receive a commonly accepted standard commission on the sale of their artwork.