Executive & Artistic Director Elena Siyanko departing PS21

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 2024

Chatham, NY — Elena Siyanko, inaugural Executive and Artistic Director of PS21: Center for Contemporary Performance, will leave the organization in December 2024, after more than five years of groundbreaking leadership.

PS21 Board Co-Chairs Alice Kocis and Louis Hedgecock praised Siyanko’s achievements: “Over five seasons, Elena took PS21’s new state-of-the-art theater and transformed it into a year-round hive of innovative creation and performance of world-class music, dance, theater, contemporary circus, visual and multimedia arts, and community programming with 27 regional partner organizations.”

New York Times critic Jason Farago called PS21 under Siyanko’s direction “a country theater that outclasses most of Manhattan.”

Siyanko brought more than 80 productions to PS21, by artists representing 15 countries. She produced multidisciplinary projects and performances in public spaces, curated over 220 events, established collaborations with regional, national, and international organizations, and hosted over 30 artists residencies in dance, music, contemporary performance, and theater. PS21 is now recognized as a sought-after incubator for local and national artists developing new work free of distractions.

About her tenure at PS21, Siyanko said, “I have enjoyed the opportunity to revitalize the arts in the Hudson Valley with the spirit of new ideas that are enriching the cultural lives of people from many walks of life, and now it’s time for me to explore new opportunities.”

Under her leadership, between 2019 and 2024, PS21’s operating budget doubled. She secured crucial foundation, international and US government grants, including the theater’s first NEA grant and New York State Council on the Arts facility grants of $300,000 for improvements to the Pavilion Theater and renovation of the Artists Residence.

Siyanko also spearheaded a successful fundraising campaign, recruiting and cultivating new, engaged board members, creating a flourishing Producers Circle and significantly increasing individual donations, making it possible to expand programming to more than 20 productions per season, attract ever-larger audiences and dedicated supporters, and launch the year-round residency program, while continually reducing average ticket prices—which this year reached an historic low of $25.

Siyanko is proudest of PS21’s PATHWAYS initiative, which under her leadership expanded access to the arts through free programming in partnership with organizations throughout Columbia County and beyond. “Our collaborators include more than two dozen local and regional partners, ranging from organizations serving at-risk youth to environmental groups, town governments, and others, visionary artists who make intimate contact with audiences in schools, churches, libraries, city parks, village streets, farms, and parking lots. PATHWAYS is a counterweight to the restrictive, cost-prohibitive paradigm that is the rule throughout the country.”

Kocis credits Siyanko’s broad experience in the nonprofit arts sector for the rapid rise of the theater’s prestige and importance in the region. “Elena brilliantly handled all facets of the organization,” she noted. Hedgecock added, “Elena skillfully managed coproductions with BAM, Under the Radar, and New York Live Arts, with international organizations and presenters, including Festival TransAmériques and Festival d’Avignon, L’Alliance New York’s Crossing the Line Festival, among others. It’s why we’ve come so far.”

Among the distinguished works Siyanko brought to PS21’s stages are:

•  Catarina and the Beauty of Killing Fascists, the cautionary political drama by Festival d’Avignon artistic director Tiago Rodrigues, which folds a timely warning about threats to democracy inside an arresting theater piece.

•  The only North American staging of Noémie Goudal’s ANIMA, an immersive multimedia installation that imaginatively portrays the planet’s climate future.

•  L’Etang (The Pond), choreographer Gisèle Vienne’s scintillating adaptation of Robert Walser’s family drama, with Pina Bausch luminary Julie Shanahan and César winner Adèle Haenel.

•  New works from well-established companies, including Mark Morris Dance Group, Vertigo Dance, and Paul Taylor Dance Company, which in 2021 premiered its restoration of Kurt Jooss’s iconic The Green Table.

•  Performing artists and companies from Africa and the Global South, including re:Incarnation by QDance and Qudus Onikeku, from Lagos, Nigeria; the North American premiere of Amoukanama Circus’s FA, performed by nine Guinean dancers and musicians; and the US premiere of Le sacre de Lila, Ismaël Mouaraki’s distillation of the Moroccan nocturnal ritual of Lila.

PS21’s Board of Directors will initiate a search for Siyanko’s successor and is committed to building on her momentum, to ensure that her impact continues to grow and inspire others in artistic innovation and community collaboration.

For more information about PS21, its programming, and opportunities to support, visit www.ps21chatham.org or contact Zack Levine, Director of Development, at zack@ps21chatham.org. To contact Elena Siyanko, elenasiyanko@gmail.com, or +1 917 502 2012.

About PS21: A vibrant center for contemporary performance in the Hudson Valley, PS21 “presents work that challenges and invites” (The New York Times). Our adventurous productions by leading and emerging American and international artists showcase what’s new and thought-provoking in music, contemporary circus, dance, theater—and in entirely new genres. Largely supported by our generous donors, PS21 is a must-see, must-experience destination for performances not found anywhere else, at ticket prices that welcome all.