Scenes From Convocation: Sparking Our Imaginations

Welcome!

There’s nothing like the energy of students arriving for the new school year, from the bustle in the hallways to the flurry of orientation activities. And then the whole school gets back, and things really start humming. This year’s convocation, President Damian Woetzel’s first, unleashed even more excitement.

Bookended by performances—by, among others, faculty and Juilliard String Quartet member (and alum) Areta Zhulla, MAP artistic director and faculty member Anthony McGill, the first-year dancers, and a jazz-classical octet—convocation featured Woetzel’s welcoming remarks. The day marked, Woetzel said, “a transformational moment—for me, as I take on the presidency. For many of you, new students. It’s a transformation though, at every moment, for every one of us. If you’ve been in this building for two days, two years, two decades—there’s always a moment of transformation to be had.”

During the past year, which he spent on campus getting to know the community, Woetzel said he repeatedly heard that people want “more opportunities for collaboration across disciplines” and for Juilliard “to lead the performing arts field to be ever more inclusive and to embody that principle in everything that we do here” while maintaining and enhancing Juilliard’s standards of excellence. Toward that end, he announced a series of new initiatives including inviting a group of visionary Creative Associates—dancer Lil Buck, composer Caroline Shaw, actor and clown Bill Irwin, tap dancer and choreographer Michelle Dorrance, bandleader Jon Batiste—to help foster creative synergy in the school. (Buck, Shaw, Irwin, and Dorrance took part in the convocation festivities, performing and inspiring other performers and the audience.) Also new is a multiyear initiative on “equity, diversity, inclusion, and belonging in the arts here at Juilliard and more broadly in the cultural sector.” And to help foster a spirit of inclusion and artistic collaboration, Woetzel announced JuilliART, which you can read more about here.

“We spark and re-spark our imaginations and refresh our artistic expression every day here.”—President Damian Woetzel

“In so many ways, this year will be marked with the same things that have gone on in this building and in the building uptown before it for over a hundred years,” Woetzel said in his speech. And at the same time, “We spark and re-spark our imaginations and refresh our artistic expression every day here.”

Susan Jackson is editorial director at Juilliard

Couldn't join us for convocation? Check out highlights from convocation in this video and watch a video of President's Woetzel's entire address to the community.