PushPush Arts celebrates a new space, new theater production and its 25th anniversary

February 14th, 2023

The dichroic renderings of PushPush Art’s new building and arts campus, once construction is completed. (Courtesy of Push Arts)

This year marks the 25th anniversary of PushPush, an Atlanta arts and theater mainstay. PushPush has kicked off a new chapter of expansion and artists’ support with the grand opening of their new space in College Park, as well as a new production of the classical Greek tragedy “Antigone,” creatively adapted for modern audiences.

“Antigone ’23,” as it’s called, is on stage at PushPush Arts’ new theater annex in College Park through Feb. 25. To talk about the play and the future of PushPush, “City Lights” host Lois Reitzes was joined via Zoom by “Antigone” co-directors Tim Habeger and Shelby Hofer, as well as PushPush marketing and development manager Kaleigh Malloy.

Interview highlights:

A refresher on the tragic tale of Antigone, and the new production’s angle:

“It follows a civil war in Thebes. There were two brothers that were to take the throne in alternative years, and one of them refused the peaceful transfer of power… a civil war broke out in which both brothers killed themselves. The new King Creon, to unify and unite the people of Thebes after the war, decided that the brother that was the traitor, in his mind, should lay outside the city gates and not to be buried,” recounted Habeger. “His sister is Antigone, and she feels that it’s her right and need to bury her brother, goes against Creon…. The two have a battle, basically the state versus one young woman fighting for her own beliefs.”

“There’s a lot of parallels [to modern-day America] – obviously, peaceful transfer of power, two sides. It feels very partisan in one way, and we didn’t really want to go there because I think the best productions of this play are when you’re really torn between Creon and Antigone’s arguments,” Habeger commented. “Our interest was in trying to tell the story from the Chorus’s point of view… We’ve broken it up into four different camps, so that you have sides that argue for revolution and sides that argue for the status quo or for precedent – the state. And then there’s also the side that argues for just factual information, and there’s a side that argues for how this kind of debate is good for a nation in general.”

How Push Push found and launched its new annex:

“We knew that to build a community of artists that were incubating new and original work; we really did need to have a central location. But it was very important to us that we had access to MARTA because our larger vision had to do with providing as much access to artists who didn’t traditionally have access to growing their art forms, and so the MARTA piece felt very important to us,” Hofer explained. “The College Park First United Methodist Church, Good Places Development and PushPush, along with another impact developer who was across the street developing an affordable housing unit, with our assistance as the art partner, we all banded together to start visioning out how an arts center, an arts campus, could be created in this location that was not being used at all, or very little.”

On new PushPush goals and a broader mission to enable creators:

“For the last two and a half years, three years almost, we’ve been moving quietly in a capital campaign to purchase one of the spaces on the campus, and to provide affordable artists’ housing to artists of all genres, and to work with these artists in our programming,” said Hofer. “One of our biggest visions is to be able to have a large annual immersive event that’s narrative-based… We wanted to explore telling a story with multidisciplinary artists and having, really, a destination event right there, three minutes from the world’s busiest airport, one of them anyway. So we’re moving towards that, but this involves a lot of partners and a lot of development. So things are slow and steady, which is actually a good way to do things in the end.”

“We are primarily an incubator. How the public can get involved is in following Atlanta artists. We have A-listers all the way down to emerging artists,” said Habeger. “There’s something going on every week. There’s a “Seedworks” program where the public can get involved in the inception of projects, where artists can propose new ideas… We continue them through to what we hope is a sustainable career for that artist. So whether you’re looking for new voices or different voices, whether you’re looking for something that is more focused on the art than, say, entertainment, this is always something that PushPush can provide, and there’s ways to get involved, from being a volunteer to presenting your own cultural ideas.”

“Antigone ’23” is on stage at the new PushPush College Park annex through Feb. 25. Tickets and more information are available here. More on PushPush Arts and its new location can be found at https://wwwpushpusharts.com.