Dear Friends, Colleagues, and Supporters of MT Space,
I call on your help again as we make a final push to solidify the establishment of the Majdi Bou-Matar Bursary fund.
The past few years have been quite a journey for many of us. After a difficult and trying time, MT Space was finally able to come together and celebrate at our IMPACT 23 Festival. We couldn’t have made a week of groundbreaking theatre so meaningful without this community supporting us – Thank you <3
The inaugural recipient
A year ago, we brought our milestone piece The Last 15 Seconds back home for a ‘final’ performance to honour the legacy of the founder of MT Space and the IMPACT Festival, Majdi Bou-Matar. We announced the inaugural recipient of the bursary at IMPACT 23 this past September, and will be welcoming Abhimanyu Acharya to MT Space for a year-long mentorship in 2024.
Abhimanyu is a multilingual fiction writer, playwright, translator, and scholar who has received the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar, the Sanhita Manch Playwriting Award, and the Sahapedia-UNESCO Fellowship in the past. Longlisted thrice for the TOTO Awards for creative writing in English, his doctoral dissertation was nominated for the American Distinguished Dissertation Awards. His plays have been performed in different cities across India, the US, and Canada, and his works have appeared in or are forthcoming in Identity Theory, Out of Print, Hakara, Usawa Literary Magazine, Gulmohar Quarterly, Readingroom, and Karvaan India amongst others. Based out of Ontario, Canada, he currently serves as the Assistant Artistic Director at SAWITRI Theatre and as the creative writing specialist at Kings University College.
“I am super excited to receive this bursary! I want to thank the MT space for introducing it to artists of colour and new immigrants like myself who struggle to find avenues to develop as well as showcase their work in Canada. Every accolade is but a responsibility in disguise. I understand it for what it is, and am committed to developing my piece in the spirit in which the bursary was offered.”
– Abhimanyu Acharya
Help the Bursary Grow – Online Auction Time
To sustain the longevity of the Majdi Bou-Matar bursary, we have a goal to establish an endowment fund in partnership with the Waterloo Region Community Foundation. This will ensure that the bursary will permanently continue to support an emerging Racialized or Indigenous artist year after year.
This month, we invite you to contribute to nurturing this endowment fund.
Beginning on Giving Tuesday, November 28, we will be hosting an online silent auction filled with exciting items and services from community members like you to bid on. You can also donate directly through the link below. Give generously. Give what you can. All donations are welcomed and appreciated.
Pam Patel
Artistic Director
MT Space & IMPACT Theatre Festival