24 Aug Guest Blog | Matt Barbot
KSF Artists of Choice is open to artists across the disciplines of dance, theatre, musical theatre and film. Over the next few weeks, we will post guest blogs from some of our 2016 grant winners about how the grant has impacted their work. Applications will be open in early 2017.
Name | Matt Barbot
Project | El Coquí Espectacular and the Bottle of Doom
Year Awarded KSF Grant | 2016
What does the KSF grant mean to you and your project?
It means we get to think big, which is important in a play that contains comic book dream sequences where the protagonist - dressed as a superhero - fights a super villain who embodies his insecurities. Subtlety isn’t really this play’s strong suit, and the Kevin Spacey Foundation grant allows us to realize on stage the way this play looks in our imaginations. There are a lot of factors out there that might hold a play like this back, but KSF has helped encourage me to press on. That’s an incredible gift. It helps expand the notion of what a play can be.
What inspired your project?
When I was eight years old or so I went to Puerto Rico for the first time with my family and was immediately taken with the vejigánte masks I saw. The ornate masks with their bright colors and horns wouldn’t seem out of place alongside the comic book characters I had recently become obsessed with, and the idea of a vejigánte superhero stuck with me.
As I grew up, questions of what my heritage meant took on a lot of importance: Was I Puerto Rican enough? Did I really “act white,” as some other kids told me? What did I have in common with other Nuyoricans? With people on the island? Superheroes are often caught between dual identities, and as I continued to ask questions about my own identity, El Coquí Espectacular took shape.
Talk about your journey prior to the receiving the award. What kind of difficulties or roadblocks did you encounter along the way? How did you overcome them?
It took me a long time to figure out where to focus my energies. I began my work in the theater as an actor. Ultimately, it was the hardship of trying to balance my artistic work and a day job that pushed me to begin to take my playwriting more seriously. I had trouble attending rehearsals and auditions, but I could always stay involved by writing.
It was a blessing in disguise, of course: while I still love acting, I realized that as a writer I could create the stories I wanted to see on stage.
What would you say have been the most defining moments of your career thus far?
Well, being awarded this grant is pretty huge! Besides that, being accepted to Columbia University School of the Arts’ MFA program has been very important to me. I’d come to a decision that I needed to focus, and I needed an environment to develop. I’ve grown so much alongside my classmates, under the tutelage of my professors. It’s helped me to figure out who I am as a writer, to focus and to stretch and bend myself.
Do you have any advice for emerging artists?
It’s very difficult at first to distinguish between the feedback and advice that gets you closer to what you’re trying to accomplish with your work. The right notes will feel expansive. If a suggestion isn’t helpful, you don’t have to take it… but do try to identify what the person making the suggestion was trying to fix.
Make lots of friends in your field. Collaborate with your friends. Support their work and ask for them to support yours. Talk about what your art means to you. Don’t stop emerging.
Read more about Matt’s project here.
Matt discusses his project here.