Page 27 - BusinessWest July 24, 2023

“We’re trying to live together with an understanding, with certain agreements, about how we want to leave the world after we’ve stepped through it.”
And then: “Our dedication is to face iso- lation and erasure, to face despair and pain that can translate into personal incapacity and political paralysis. To uplift. We call this ‘art justice.’”
It’s a mouthful, and Bright knows it. But at its core is a reflection of life that many people in this modern world — especially post-pandemic — have gotten away from.
“I think we’ve isolated ourselves
more and more. Even in neighborhoods that seem great, everyone goes to their little boxes, and then they’re isolated,” he explained. “I think what we’re creating here — or recreating, let’s say — is some- thing closer to a village, and that feels healthy. On any given day, there will be 70 people working here, ages 18 to 70-some- thing, from all over the world: different lan- guages, different cultures, different music, all of these things in this little place.”
As part of that philosophy, Double
Edge has taken a keen interest over the
years in the Indigenous history of Ashfield
and its environs, specifically the Nipmuc
Tribal Nation, which traces its lineage in
the region back 12,000 years. The the-
ater company has partnered with the Ohketeau Cultural Center in efforts to bring awareness to this heritage and support Native priori- ties today.
“Our interactions introduced us to the Indigenous peoples who still inhabit this land after millennia, even though their presence has been rendered invisible on the land we now occupy,” Double Edge notes in its literature. “Ashfield may never be ‘diverse’ within the cur- rently circumscribed and restrictive use of the term. However, the mission, values, vision, and work of Double Edge will always reflect the larger population of our region, our state, and our country.”
Adam Bright says Double Edge is an arts organization first, but one that is always considering how it interacts with and impacts its community and its world.
Making a Spectacle of Themselves
Amid its cultural passions, this is, as Bright noted, primarily an arts organization, and its performances — both on site and touring — have become widely noted for their unique, eclectic, and interac- tive nature.
let’s eat.
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