Ensemble leader Michael Rohd believes art in the Obama age is about changing lives.

Clad in jeans and a shirt with the sleeves rolled up, Rohd sat on the edge of the stage and addressed his audience.
“We’re sort of a small group tonight, so that’s lovely, we can have a conversation!” Rohd said.

From there he went on to talk about what it means to live in an age of civic division.

“As an artist and a citizen, something I’m called to do is to try to make spaces for people on all sides of big issues to come and talk about them,” said Rohd. His Portland-based company, Sojourn Theatre, rarely uses theaters for their performances. Instead, they make events site-specific, and use location as a fundamental part of their message (search “GOOD / Sojourn Theatre” on YouTube to see an example). In the productions, which typically involve dancing, singing and active audience participation, everyone is invited to voice his or her opinion.

“If we can approach an issue with curiosity instead of certainty, we’re already a step ahead,” Rohd said. “We’re trying to infect people with a healthy curiosity rather than project to them ‘This is what I want to say.'”

According to Rohd, this method of outreach has made a variety of impacts on people. After attending a performance called “Witnessing Our Schools,” (2004) a Republican senator who was in the audience stood up. He said it was one of the best-articulated summaries of the problems with public education that he had ever seen, and informed Rohd that he was going to invite all of his colleagues to it.

On the other hand, seven boys had reacted angrily to a similar performance four years earlier called “Look Away.” They were prime examples of children who were victims of the economic misfortunes that were being presented, and Rohd said that the reality of it had gotten under their skin.

Before giving his lecture, Rohd led workshops on Whitman campus. Junior Alex Thomas attended one of them and was struck by how a group of students studying theater, politics and education were able to find common ground right away.
“We didn’t really know each other at all, but he created a space where we could all talk about things that normally we wouldn’t talk about or wouldn’t plan to,” Thomas said. “Creating a space for dialogue isn’t really something people are aware there’s a need for, but once [Rohd] says it, it makes so much sense. I was thinking to myself how you can get hundreds of people into the same room, smashed up against each other, without having any interaction between them. I’m still unwinding from it!”

First-year Alex Folkerth, who attended a workshop with his acting class, was impressed with how well Rohd provoked genuine responses from the participants.

“He gave us two minutes to prepare, so everybody had to use their first impulse, which is more honest than when you think about it too much,” he said.

In a time of staunch partisanship, Rohd sees it as his duty to bring people together in a way that fosters unity: as he said, “I have a lot more to learn from your point of view than I do from my own.”