Kelly Strayhorn turns 10

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

East Liberty has seen sweeping changes in the past decade, and like any community partner worth its salt, the Kelly Strayhorn Theater has adapted to its cultural and social needs.

The theater is a performance venue named for two Pittsburgh luminaries — Gene Kelly and Billy Strayhorn — of 20th-century entertainment. But that’s just the story of a structure and not the creative hub that KST has become.

KST enters its 10th season, all with Janera Solomon at the helm, as host of Wednesday’s Thrival Festival’s Future of Work Symposium, with topics such as workers displaced by automation in the heart of Google country.

It was important to Ms. Solomon that Thrival hold its symposium at KST.

“East Liberty is at the intersection of immigration, technology, climate change, old vs. new, queer, not queer … all the things that people are wrestling with and thinking about, East Liberty is at the heart of those conversations through the people living and working here, and in some cases, leading the way,” she said.

Being part of that conversation is a key to advancing the KST mission of nurturing inclusive, creative expression through the arts. Having that opportunity “is vital,” she said.

“It’s not incidental and it’s not a privilege,” she said. “We think it’s something everybody deserves … to be inspired.”

While remaining grounded locally, KST also has become entrenched in the national and global arts community, with recognition from an array of foundations that allow most performances to be “Pay What Makes You Happy,” and to further the careers of established and emerging artists.

As an example, she notes a co-commissioned work by award-winning choreographer and performance artist Cynthia Oliver that is part of this 10th-anniversary season. Her work “is exquisitely beautiful,” Ms. Solomon said. It will appear on the same season that includes a Fresh Works residency for emerging artists such as multidisciplinary artist Kelsey Robinson, a Pittsburgh native, working with collaborators Asia Lae Bey and Di-ay Battad on a response to the Heinz History Center exhibition “From Slavery to Freedom.”

The season also brings excitement from far and wide in December, when KST hosts “Pittsburgh Live & Onstage,” as part of the National Performance Network annual conference. Ms. Solomon notes the theater will be a part of 400plus visitors getting to know more about the Pittsburgh arts and cultural scene, one they may have heard about on best-of lists but now will see for themselves.

“Being recognized nationally as an organization that’s a part of that, in the really small footprint of East Liberty, it feels good.”