Veronica Garrubbo ’21
Talent exists in infinite forms: academic, athletic, artistic. Yet the Episcopal Academy as a community, in line with the rest of society, fails to recognize the artists of the school as equals of others.
A brief disclaimer: I ask that the audience recognizes that I am calling out the community as a whole, not individuals within it. At Episcopal, most of the faculty and a number of students and parents are extremely supportive of the artists. They, however, are a small core of people whose value of the arts has yet to infiltrate the greater community. Additionally, this is not meant to call for the replacement of the recognition of the immense and abundant athletic talent at Episcopal. Rather, I am simply addressing the need for the same support of athletics to be applied to the arts.
An honors chapel or varsity award assembly at Episcopal demonstrates the relative negligence shown to artists by the school. Consider an award ceremony from an artist’s point of view. Award after award is presented to the most accomplished athletes, students with the best academic tracks, and the most accomplished athletes WITH the best academic tracks. What do the artists receive? Maybe three awards, if that. Additionally, these subordinate awards are divided between different types of arts, one being reserved for visual arts, one for music, and one for theatre and dance. Are awards at these ceremonies divided by sports? From an artist’s perspective, all we can do is be supportive of our athletic and academic friends, which of course we do happily, but while eliminating ourselves from the running with the introduction of each award.
I challenge you to imagine a major sports game with no student attendance. Imagine EA/HAV/AIS Day or any home football game with no student attendance. This is almost impossible to imagine, as it has never happened and never will. There is a student body section called the Thunderdome and its SOLE purpose is to support the athletes at Episcopal and gather all the students at big games. Artists attend these games, and games like these seem to be the only time when the whole school is united. Yet the athletes do not reciprocate this support for the artists.
The Ridgway Blackbox is an amazing and intimate space that we as artists are lucky to use for our fall play production. It only seats about a hundred people, but on our opening night of Walk Two Moons this year, there were empty rows. The saddest part about this is that the cast was not surprised, simply disappointed. The same is the case at our open mic nights. We promote the events to no end and the turnout is never satisfactory. We still have fun of course. We have learned not to rely on the attendance of others to enjoy ourselves. In the unlikely event that a group of athletes comes to a show or event, we talk about it backstage because it is so monumental.
In a recent Domino Board meeting, as we debriefed the fall play, I listened to other members suggest ways to increase our student attendance for future events. We talked about linking ticket sales to student accounts, (more) posters, chapel announcements, bulletin announcements, student previews, anything we could think of. I had to be the realist of the group in this situation and point out the fact that if students want something, they will get it. As a member of the student council, I have sold homecoming tickets and EA/HAV/AIS T-Shirts. They were sold for prices more than 50% higher than fall play tickets, for a shorter period as well, and still, almost every student bought them. It comes down to what students want, which unfortunately does not include supporting the artists. Everyone in the meeting agreed in the end.
Another fact I would like to point out is that I have theatre friends from outside of school that attend Villa Maria Academy and Malvern Prep on vocal scholarships. I know that I will never receive a scholarship based on merit like many of my athletic friends or artistic ones from other schools.
I do believe that at the Episcopal Academy, in particular, this comes down to the element of tradition. Many administrators and teachers have children among the most committed to the arts program and therefore are incredibly supportive. However, EA’s tradition and culture have not and most likely will not change until a group of athletes gets involved in the arts. Unfortunately, that is the sad truth.