NEW

Being there at the start of something great is magic. So, we made it our mission.

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MISSION

To engage our region with new and reimagined theatre in intimate settings, creating a body of work that moves, connects, and challenges all who join the conversation.

VALUES

Integrity

We are committed to safety, compliance with laws and regulations, organizational transparency, and inclusivity for all collaborators and audiences.

Cultivation and Collaboration

We believe that cultivating new work is essential to the practice of theatre. Cultivation of new work demands labor, attention, courage, and care — and most of all, collaboration. We collaborate to serve the vision of the playwright and to nurture a creative process where every participant is both empowered and accountable.

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Access

We recognize the persistent injustice and inequity for marginalized groups and identities perpetuated by societal, governmental, and cultural structures. We commit ourselves to continuous improvement in diversity, equity, inclusion, and access in our board, staff, and offering. We acknowledge that no statement can stand in for action, and no single action can repair the harms of history — our work for social justice is an abiding endeavor that underlines every aspect of our mission.

Humane and Sustainable Workplace

We value process as much as product, and commit to creating a safe, supportive, and productive space free of bullying, intimidation, physical violence, sexual harassment, or any other form of abuse. We believe in offering grace and restorative justice, but do not tolerate toxicity.

Operational Excellence

We continually strive to adopt and invent best practices to help improve our efficiency and our impact.

Place

We believe our work is inseparable from the place where it grows. We honor and celebrate local character, culture, and history.

What’s in a name?

 

We named Thrown Stone after an allegory by the 17th-century philosopher, Benedict de Spinoza. Opposing Descartes’ conception of free will, he argued that like thrown stones, we are set in motion by “the impulsion of an external cause” and are “necessarily determined by some external cause to exist and operate in a fixed and determinate manner.”

So much for free will.

But Spinoza goes deeper. He asks us to imagine the stone is “capable of thinking and knowing, that it is endeavouring, as far as it can, to continue to move.”

Such a stone, being conscious merely of its own endeavour and not at all indifferent, would believe itself to be completely free, and would think that it continued in motion solely because of its own wish.

This is that human freedom, which all boast that they possess, and which consists solely in the fact, that men are conscious of their own desire, but are ignorant of the causes whereby that desire has been determined.

So, if we’re all thrown stones — already in motion at the inception of consciousness — what is our agency? What is our power to affect our trajectory? And what happens when stones inevitably collide? These are questions that theatre is uniquely equipped to address. The recognition of our shared “thrown stone” predicament is a lever for compassion, and finds its best expression in the live space between artist and audience.

If all this seems a little too grandiose, you could just say we thought “Thrown Stone Theatre Company” sounded cool.