Exploring Accessibility and the Arts at the Lincoln Center

Episode Transcript

Dr. Correa:
From the American Academy of Neurology, I'm Dr. Daniel Correa.

Dr. Peters:
And I am Dr. Katy Peters, and this is The Brain & Life Podcast.

Dr. Correa:
Welcome back to the Brain & Life podcast. Thanks to the Lincoln Center Arts program for that clip from a performance by the group, Big Band Holidays of Go Tell It on the Mountain. A little last-minute bit of holiday music as we continue our transition into 2024, even though we are well past the Larry David approved window to wish anyone a happy New Year, happy New Year's, Katy. We're eking out a last little bit of those holidays.

Dr. Peters:
Happy New Year.

Dr. Correa:
So Katy, for your family, when does the holiday music and festivities stop?

Dr. Peters:
I think we just roll onto the next holiday. We're always ready to celebrate. So even though we put away those winter holiday decorations, my mother is already starting to decorate for St. Patrick's Day, which is her favorite holiday, so we'll be decked in green, wishing everyone good luck. And I hear you have a really lively music-filled episode for us?

Dr. Correa:
Yes, and for today's episode, I have a discussion with the director of accessibility at Lincoln Center Moments and she shares with us the role of arts in all of our lives and how the Lincoln Center Arts team is working to make the arts more accessible to all of our community. Throughout the episode, we'll have other clips of music and along with the intro at the end, we will also feature another clip shared by their team of the group Invoke performing their original song Burlywood from their latest album Evolve & Travel, which was released on Sono Luminus in October '23. We hope you enjoy the episode and the different music we're bringing you today.
Welcome back to the Brain & Life podcast. I'd like to introduce you all now to our guest for today, Miranda Hoffner. She's the director of accessibility at Lincoln Center Moments. Her work as focused on the importance of making the arts and performing arts accessible to diverse audiences, especially including people with disabilities. As an accessibility expert herself, she works to create systems to ensure access and accessibility at all levels within their organization also. The Lincoln Center itself is an amazing performance program, but I'm going to let her speak more about that, and thank you Miranda for joining us here today.

Miranda Hoffner:
Thank you so much, Daniel. I'm so excited to speak with you today. I am very privileged to work at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, which is a large performing arts institution located in New York City, and our goal really is to make sure that people have access to the arts. We want to make sure that the arts reaches the widest audience possible and that's very much reflected in the programming that we offer and very much reflected in the audiences. We want everyone to see themselves at Lincoln Center in what's performed on stages.

Dr. Correa:
Before we even get to what is being performed and how you help people get access to Lincoln Center and to the arts programming, I'd just like to hear from you, how has disability touched your life and what got you interested in expanding accessibility programming?

Miranda Hoffner:
I am not currently disabled. That's not an identity that I have right now, and I've dedicated my whole professional career to thinking about how people can have access to cultural arts. I began working at The Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum, a beloved institution in New York City that's on an aircraft carrier. And when I worked there I was in the education department very early career right out of grad school and one of my boss's bosses had a friend who was deaf and she said, "What can we do to have her come tour the ship?" And that is when I realized that there was this whole world of art accessibility that I was not aware of.
So I began exploring the amazing work going on at the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum, really leaders in cultural arts accessibility work, and from there got really excited about how we can bring more people in. The work that we create., it makes such an impact on people. It is the reason why people live in New York City. It is a huge part of my life. And to think of the number of people who are left out because of inaccessible design is something I really want to make sure that we right in my career. So from The Intrepid, we began thinking about very specific audiences and how to address these gaps, participation.
And then when I was really fortunate to come to Lincoln Center, there was a foundation of phenomenal work and accessibility that had been going on for decades. Lincoln Center, actually, it had wheelchair accessible locations when Philharmonic Hall was built in the '60s way before the Americans with Disabilities Act. We also had programming and ticket distribution for a wide range of disabled populations. So I had a great legacy to build upon when working there. And then really thought pretty deeply about beyond just physical disabilities and physical access, what are we doing around disabled artistry? What representation do we have on our stages? How can we adjust performance going activities to make sure that more people have more access? So for the past decade or so at Lincoln Center, it's been a real joy to think about how to continue to expand who is part of our audience and our staff and our artists.

Dr. Correa:
And it's so important. I mean, we had an episode and our listeners can go back and listen to it with Corey Lee who's a disability access advocate and travels the world and explores these questions of what areas are actually accessible and how they could be improved and helping those who are planning these trips that they want to do with their families or for themselves and just getting to places that they've seen online and have imagined themselves in, but then want to make sure when they get there they can get around.
And it's great to hear, in terms of the ideas of coming to New York City, that places like The Intrepid Center and Lincoln Center are making sure that if you go through all that other effort of getting through the airports and getting around the city with subways and curbs and stairs, that when you get to these destinations that you've seen and you dream about going to that you can really have an enjoyable experience. Now you mentioned some of these institutions at Lincoln Center go back many, many years. Tell us a little bit about the history of Lincoln Center and what it actually is.

Miranda Hoffner:
The Lincoln Center was conceived in the 1950s and '60s as to be a center of the arts. So right now we're comprised of resident organizations including the Metropolitan Opera, the New York Philharmonic, The Juilliard School, Jazz at Lincoln Center, so it really is representative of the whole range of performing arts. We have a 16 acre campus, we have over 30 stages and there is something going on all the time. We especially have really rich and robust programming that happens in the summer where we did hundreds of events in a couple of months, many of them overlapping with each other in outdoor spaces and really activated and enlivened our campus.

Dr. Correa:
I went to a summer stage that you guys had in Lincoln Center and it was great to see there were lots of different access points, making sure that lots of people from different abilities could get in and lots of adaptations and saw a variety of dance performances and Latin American music, both some from the Caribbean where I'm from and other places. So I really enjoyed those opportunities, and I bet there are probably similar kinds of opportunities in many of the other neighborhoods where our listeners may live. So I think hoping that other organizations are following that model. I'd like to even zoom out even further and ask you Miranda, when you are thinking about the arts and maybe the whole Lincoln Center organization, what do you really mean by the arts or performing arts and how do you think it fits into our lives?

Miranda Hoffner:
Foundationally, what I enjoy as a very much not a performer, as an audience member, is the way to feel in community with other people. It's sort of that feeling of being in a crowd, and that crowd can be virtual, it can be in person, where an artist is sharing something and you have that moment where you're like, "Oh, that lyric is exactly how I felt." Or, "Oh, that movement articulates a feeling that I have inside of me." And there's something incredibly powerful about having those experiences, again in community with other people that really is the foundation of who we are as people of our humanity. And to know that that is happening every single day across Lincoln Center, across the country and all those opportunities for us to feel in connection with each other, particularly at a time where I think many people feel an incredible sense of isolation, is so important.

Dr. Correa:
All these different artists, I think are just different ways of us somehow bridging that big gap of space between us and other people and developing a way of just understanding and connecting to people. I mean, so much of our world now is connected with wires and mechanical and electronic connections, but it's somehow amazing that various arts, whether movement and music and performing arts and visual arts somehow cross over space of feet and hundreds of feet to still help us connect with emotion and understand or at least connect with something that's going on with them. I think it's something I enjoy about dance and music and something that really gets me going back regularly to Lincoln Center as one of the institutions for me also in the New York area.
How would you suggest, our listeners, if they're looking for performances maybe in their own communities, that they find local organizations that are bringing performing arts to all of the community and maybe help in supporting them by participating or finding other ways to support them?

Miranda Hoffner:
Yeah, there are arts going on every day, all around us all the time, and it's so incredibly important to support our local artists. Go to your local community theater, participate in the arts, join a choral singing group, feel a way to feel that connection with others through the art all the time. We also have an incredible Lincoln Center, and so many other arts organizations have an incredible body of virtual programming, so I know you can go on our YouTube channel at Lincoln Center and see hundreds and hundreds of performances all the time. We also have a wide variety of virtual programming that happens synchronously so you can join others from across the country and participate in the arts and discussions together. So there's no limit to the amount of arts you could have in your life.

Dr. Correa:
Now I'm wondering when you are thinking about it within the physical spaces and for in-person performances at Lincoln Center, what are some of the ways that you help and conceive to expand access to performance spaces at Lincoln Center?

Miranda Hoffner:
One initiative that is recent for us and something I'm incredibly proud of that our team is working on now is to think about not only the physical spaces, it is incredibly important for people to physically be able to access spaces, but also the social expectations of attending performances. And we're starting an initiative around relaxed performances right now, which has been so exciting. We are in our pilot season now, we are learning so, so much, and it's been such a joy to really think about, what do we expect people to do when they attend the arts and how are those expectations limiting for so many people?
So as we think about, one of the first times I went to Lincoln Center, I got free tickets. I think I was a new employee, I'd only been there a couple of weeks. I invited my now husband to attend a performance and we entered this beautiful grand hall, thousand seat hall, very fancy. I felt very, very elegant going. I sat down in my seats and the performer walked on stage and I whispered onto my date, "This is amazing." And the woman next to me hit me with her program, actually hit me with her program. And what I didn't realize was that I wasn't cued into the social expectations of what was "supposed" to happen in that space.
So I think for people who aren't clued into those things, people who make involuntary movement or sound, people who make voluntary joyous movement and sound, people that need to take breaks to take medication, people who are traveling with small children, there's a huge and wide variety of people where sitting quietly in a seat for three hours without moving is not accessible for them. So as we're imagining what the next round of relaxed performances could be, we're really focused on creating a welcoming environment. So just as you described earlier, people can just take a breath when they show up, be their whole selves, not have to worry about carrying anything or thinking about anything that could be difficult for them and just have a great time at the arts.
So I think we're beginning to try to peel away this onion of barriers that are leaving people out with access and continue to bring more people in. And it's been so cool to train the next generation of performers. It's been such a joy to work with performers who are just beginning their careers to imagine more expansively what an audience can be and who deserves to be in the spaces with them.

Dr. Correa:
Miranda, from your experience working with Lincoln Center and Intrepid for some of our listeners who may work at other institutions, other spaces in public access spaces or even private spaces and organizations, what are some changes that you would suggest they consider or think about in expanding access to everyone?

Miranda Hoffner:
I think one really important consideration is that accessibility is a process. It is not a thing that you complete. So wherever you are, you personally, you and your institution are in that journey, there is always more work to do. You were never sort of starting too late, so it's really important to consider your community around you. What do people need? What do people want? Consider representation. What stories are you telling at your institution? How can you expand to those stories. And consider ways that you can continue learning yourself? Are you personally going to lots of access events? Are you thinking about ways that you can learn and leverage the knowledge of your peers to expand who is welcomed at your institution?

Dr. Correa:
Yeah, I mean, I think... And my own exposure to it is just realizing how much it's not just a physical limitation in considering access, but so many other aspects may actually limit people's access in various different ways, even if we wouldn't necessarily think of them as disabled, there are lots of other ways that might be barriers to someone's access. Like you were mentioning, the relaxed style performances seems like a really great opportunity for more people to be introduced to different types of arts and what it's like to be joining in the audience.

Miranda Hoffner:
Lincoln Center also just started choose what you pay model, which makes a huge difference to take away some of the financial barriers to attending the arts too, incredibly important. And not only does that serve people who are disabled, but it serves a huge variety of people to be able to just get over the financial threshold of attending performing arts.

Dr. Correa:
So today's a perfect example of the changes in our modern world. We both live in New York City area, but funny enough, we are both joining very remotely from completely different states today and hoping to both make a connection together and share that connection with our listeners. I'm wondering, as you are thinking about virtual programs and all these other settings now where we're on Zoom and Teams and every other version of telecommunication, both professionally and now, even with arts and other community programming, how do you think about developing and growing on connections with people?

Miranda Hoffner:
We're thinking a lot about how to leverage the virtual space to increase access for everyone. When the pandemic began and we had to shut our doors at Lincoln Center, in May 2020 we moved our program called Lincoln Center Moments for people with dementia and their caregivers to a virtual setting. We started employing artists who performed from their living rooms, and we also supported our teaching artists and music therapists and facilitators to practice their art form from home.
So while we learned a tremendous amount in the last couple of years, we've continued doing virtual programming, we've found that it is not only a great way to access amazing performing arts, we can't necessarily put up a full opera in a one-hour form for people with dementia in a small setting, but we can show a video and have performers discuss their artwork, so that's something that we certainly still do. And that we also know that we continue to be in a pandemic time. There are many people with disabilities that do not feel comfortable gathering in public in the same way that they may have used to feel. So we want to make sure that we maintain access to virtual programming as a way to make sure that everyone has access.
We are also building an audience that's national, which is really exciting. I was just on a program earlier today with a performer who was joining us from New Orleans, Leyla McCalla, who's performed at Lincoln Center, and we had folks with dementia and their caregivers from all over the country joining, which was so cool. So to listen to people share their stories, maybe those folks don't have as much access to live arts in the communities that they live in. I think the virtual platform is such an incredible opportunity for us to increase some access to the arts.

Dr. Correa:
And have you heard back from people participating in a lot of these programs more virtually that it maybe makes them feel connected to other people in ways that they didn't have before, either because they are at home and have limited access or are isolated or just because we're moving into this virtual space where sometimes we have less time actually together in a room?

Miranda Hoffner:
Yeah, we definitely get that feedback. And often with our populations, they can't necessarily share verbally or reflect upon it after performances, but I think today the program with Leyla McCalla is a great example because one of our music therapists asked a prompting question about, "What are you carrying with you right now? What are you holding onto? What feels heavy for you right now?" And the things that people shared had a lot to do with feeling isolated from their family and friends, things that were going on with them physically, emotionally, mentally, and so there was so much shared thematic response in a lot of the things that people were bringing up. And then our musician created a song around it. She said, "This sounds like a minor chord." She created a song using only the lyrics of what people shared in the chat. And it was a cohesive song, people were really sharing shared feelings together. It was remarkable. It was such a beautiful, beautiful moment.

Dr. Correa:
I really hope that maybe some of these community programs, virtually and in person, can help us all feel more connected and can combat some of the pandemic of loneliness and isolation that many people are experiencing. What else do you have upcoming at Lincoln Center through your programming? You talked today about some recent programming and what other things are happening in the virtual space for our listeners to have an opportunity to go to?

Miranda Hoffner:
We are about to launch our spring season for Lincoln Center Moments, our program for people with dementia and their caregivers, and we have such an amazing lineup for the spring. I'm so excited. We're going to begin in February with a virtual program with American Ballet Theater, and they are premiering a new video work with us, and we're going to be joined by their dancers. So that will certainly be an exciting moment. And then we're ending the season at the end of May with the Calidore String Quartet who's joining us from the Chamber Music Society, one of our constituent organizations at Lincoln Center. And I'm especially excited about the Calidore String Quartet because they were one of our first programs when we piloted the program almost 10 years ago. So I think that the journey that they have had as musicians and coming back to share that with our audience is so incredibly exciting. So we have a huge, huge range of programming this spring.

Dr. Correa:
Yeah, I looked at the list, it looks like you have over six or seven different performances. And for our listeners, we'll include the schedule and the list of the performances, the both virtual and in-person in our show notes. And for those, as I mentioned, who are looking for an opportunity to visit New York and take advantage of the accessibility options that you have there at Lincoln Center, what are some of the highlights of the in-person programmings that you have coming up?

Miranda Hoffner:
Well, we do programs every day all the time, and our relaxed performance season is truly remarkable. It is a cross-campus initiative. We are doing a sensory-friendly performance with the New York City Ballet this spring, and we have over 30 other performances, some very, very small, more experimental theater, some huge, huge hall events like Jazz at Lincoln Center. So a really, really big range of programming, and the hope for all of those shows, whether you choose to go to a tiny intimate theatrical performance or a large joyous musical performance, you can just show up and have your needs met. That is our number one goal. So we're really looking forward to this spring.

Dr. Correa:
Yeah, I thought that was a really great idea. I saw on your website the sensory-friendly autism-friendly workshop that you have with the ballet. It would be very interesting to hear and see how that goes, and just to even hear from families and the children encountering it like their own experience with that opportunity.
Now for our listeners who want to get involved maybe within your institution or think of how to reach out to the local institutions in their own areas, what would you suggest?

Miranda Hoffner:
Be a patron of the arts, show up, go to great things, suggest artists. The other thing I would certainly encourage, which comes up a lot with our Moments participants, is we hear as they attend events, it makes them want to pick up the instruments they played as children. Someone recently told me after seeing a performance with the Philharmonic that she wanted to pick up her cello again. So I think we are all artists, it is all inside of all of us, so the ways that we can use the arts to inspire ourselves and our own self-expression is incredibly important.

Dr. Correa:
You said participating and being a patron of the arts, for those who want to just look for examples of some of your past programming and see either discussions with artists or even performances before that you've had in your programming, where can they go?

Miranda Hoffner:
We dedicated a Google site, which is really remarkable. It has a wide, wide range of different kinds of art forms in small bite-sized clips, and they're facilitated by music therapists and teaching artists, so you can activate the artist within you from home. And those are designed both for families with children with disabilities, we have one collection there, and then we have a collection for older adults with dementia and their caregivers.

Dr. Correa:
We will include that link also in our show notes. And thinking towards building a new and young generation of future leaders, I understand your office also has developed internship opportunities. Tell us a little bit more about those. If some of our younger listeners are interested in dedicating time and their work about expanding access for individuals with different abilities,

Miranda Hoffner:
We have an amazing internship program at Lincoln Center that actually places interns throughout all of our resident organizations, so that's a really exciting place if you're interested in learning more about the arts. We have internships within the access department that are placed, and our interns right now are doing an incredible wide range of programming from analyzing feedback from our events and suggesting new types of events to stage managing virtual events and sort of everything in between. We also have a high school job training program for students with disabilities, high school students who are learning front of house skills. So we're using the setting of Lincoln Center to work on social skills and professionalism and learning about working within the arts, which has been a really great program as well.

Dr. Correa:
Now, thankfully our government does give some funding to the arts to help a lot of this programming, but I know from my enjoyment of the arts at Lincoln Center and the Paul Taylor Dance Company and their season there, my wife works with a nonprofit that supports individuals with food insecurity and housing insecurity, that nonprofits like the Lincoln Center are completely and totally dependent of our own community also supporting through donation and contributions. If our listeners find value in your programming and in the in-person and virtual experiences, how do they reach out and connect with Lincoln Center to help support this type of effort and future programming?

Miranda Hoffner:
Well, we absolutely appreciate donations and support in a monetary way, that is an incredibly important way to keep our doors open. And I think we also write so many grants and look for funding from so many foundations, and what makes a huge difference in building our case is understanding the impact that the arts have on your lives. So if you attend something amazing and it has shifted your perspective or it sparked joy in you, if you can take a few minutes to write a testimonial and send it to that organization, they use that then to be able to raise money to then spread that joy more deeply. So if you are able to donate financially, amazing, if you're able to pay for tickets, amazing, but know that just showing up and knowing that your body and space counts as showing advocacy around the arts and what's important to you, or if you have a chance to write a testimonial, that also makes a huge, huge impact on the effect that we are demonstrating of why the arts are important.

Dr. Correa:
That's so important. Just as I would remind our listeners it's important after the episode, if you find it valuable that you leave us a review, your listenership and your input and your perspective is just as important for us that even beyond a small or larger donation financially, it's essential for all the arts organizations that you enjoy. So whether it's reviews or sending testimonials by emails, it's such an important thing to get your feedback and perspective, and even, like you suggested before, suggesting artists and topics and areas to work towards.
Now, Miranda, many people in our community, whether they live with neurological disorders or not, may every day encounter physical and other barriers to all kinds of services essential to their well-being and quality of life. In those moments of frustration, what would you suggest that they consider or tell them in reassurance to help them cope and work towards finding a path for greater accessibility for themselves or for those they love?

Miranda Hoffner:
Yeah, I think the principles of disability justice come to mind right away. As you mentioned that, we are all people who are interdependent on each other. So know that your needs do not create a burden, we are all here to uplift each other. So that is incredibly important. And also keep in mind that disability is an ingenious way to live. People with disabilities are navigating spaces every day that are not built for them. So know that you are a part of a network of ingenious people who can help support you. So certainly want to raise up that you can advocate for your needs, of course, that's incredibly important, but also know that you are part of a very large and wide and ingenious community.

Dr. Correa:
And that ingenious community and their advocacy, I really do think, improves all of our society. But I'm wondering you, if you're given the power of the pen and the purse and policy, what would you like to see in the coming decade as a future of a more equitable and accessible society for all of us?

Miranda Hoffner:
This probably goes against everything that's good for my career, but I would love to live in a world where accessibility departments are not needed. It means that everyone is designing experiences for everyone to be able to fully participate in. So I think the more ways that we can expand as a society to sort of disrupt what we think of as normal, disrupt who we think should be in our audiences, who should be performing on our stages, what stories we should tell, let's keep working towards that future. That's really what I would like to see, what I would like to magically make up here.

Dr. Correa:
We can all hope. Today, I so appreciate you giving your time with us to help us learn and hear about some of the programming and the efforts that you've been working towards and the opportunities through the Lincoln Center, and we really appreciate your offering and providing music and other content for our listeners to enjoy in this episode and the opportunities for them to experience the arts in many different ways.

Miranda Hoffner:
Thank you so much, Daniel. I'm so grateful for the time.

Dr. Correa:
Thank you again for joining us today on the Brain & Life Podcast. Follow and subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss our weekly episodes. You can also sign up to receive the Brain & Life magazine for free at brainandlife.org. Don't forget about Brain & Life en Espanol.

Dr. Peters:
Also, for each episode, you can find out how to connect with our team and our guests along with great resources in our show notes. We love it when we hear your ideas or questions. You can send these in an email to BLpodcast at brainandlife.org and leave us a message at 612-928-6206.

Dr. Correa:
You can also find that information in our show notes, and you can follow Kay and me and the Brain & Life Magazine on many of your preferred social media channels. We are your hosts, Dr. Daniel Correa, connecting with you from New York City and online @NeuroDrCorrea.

Dr. Peters:
And Dr. Katy Peters, joining you from Durham North Carolina and online @KatypetersMDPhD.

Dr. Correa:
Most importantly, thank you and all of our community members that trust us with their health and everyone living with neurologic conditions.

Dr. Peters:
We hope together we can take steps to better brain health and each thrive with our own abilities every day.

Dr. Correa:
Before you start the next episode, we would appreciate if you could give us five stars and leave a review. This helps others find a Brain & Life podcast. See you next week.

Exploring Accessibility and the Arts at the Lincoln Center

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