C. Meranda Flachs-Surmanek

C. Meranda Flachs-Surmanek is an urban planner and theater artist. Surmanek specializes in verbatim theatre and Theatre of the Oppressed to explore community conceptions of place and belonging. Their scholarship focuses on the centrality of aesthetics to navigating complex social issues. Surmanek is a Co-Investigator with the University of Florida’s Center for Arts in Medicine working to develop a Core Outcomes Set for the arts in public health. With Civic Arts, Surmanek provides services in professional policy and engagement to integrate arts and culture into the ways we create our cities. Surmanek has worked with Ping Chong + Company to create community-based documentary theater and Virginia Tech's Center for Communicating Science and School of Performing Arts as an Adjunct Instructor. They are a master’s degree candidate in Virginia Tech’s Urban & Regional Planning and Theatre’s: Directing & Public Dialogue programs.

Credits

Devising:

Co-Director with Taylor Wood, The Race by Sojourn Theatre, The Cube/Moss Arts Center, 1 week, 2020



Co-Writer, Co-Director, Performer with Mariana Sofía Lima, teach your daughter to lose their tongue, Kerouac International Festival, Instituto Cervantes, Performance Project and Abrons, 1 year, 2019

Co-Writer, Co-Director with Vaimoana Niumeitolu and “The Senior Teens”, The Listeners and the Talkers, The Town Hall, 1 day, 2019

Co-Writer, Co-Director with Alex Becker and middle school students, ¡Tengo una voz!, P.S. 102Q + Ping Chong + Company, 1 week, 2019

Co-Writer, Co-Director, Performer with Art Action Academy, Queens Hate-Free School of Magic and Wizardry, Queens Museum and Jackson Heights - Roosevelt Avenue Subway Station, 1 day, 2018

Writer, Director, Performer, entre-deux, New York University, 1 week, 2014

Directing and other roles:

Director, THREE ANNE FRANKS by Maya Macdonald Theatre 101, 1 week, 2019

Dramaturg, XIV by George Emilio Sanchez, Dixon Place, 1 week, 2019

Performer, Carguen con sus muertos by Regina José Galindo Performer, Hemispheric Institute, 1 day, 2018

Performer, Go Between by Dillon de Give, Essex Street Market, 2 weeks, 2018

Assistant Director, The Station by InnerCity Projects, Whitebox Art Center, 1 week, 2014

Training

MA Urban and Regional Planning, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA, current
MFA Theatre: Directing and Public Dialogue, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA , current
BFA Studio Art and Art & Public Politics, New York University New York, NY, 2014

Double Edge Theater, Ashfield, MA, Winter Intensive, 2020

Center for Performance and Civic Practice, Chicago, IL, Civic Practice, Creative Placemaking & Placekeeping: Building Effective Partnerships, 2019


Columbia Law School and Broadway Advocacy Coalition, New York, NY, “Theater of Change: Artistry, Law & Activism” winter session course, 2019

The Creative Center at University Settlement, New York, NY, Training Institute for Artists in Healthcare and Creative Aging, 2019

Hemispheric Institute for Performance and Politics, New York, NY, EmergeNYC Fellowship, 2018

Yoshiko Chuma and the School of Hard Knocks, New York, NY
, "Shifting Concepts: from Poem to Body" workshop intensive, 2018

The Art & Law Program, New York, NY
, 2017

The Center for Artistic Activism, Queens, NY, Art Action Academy, 2017

Creative Writing from Queer Resistance, Queens, NY, Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, 2017

The Institute for Community Action Training (ICAT), New York, NY, Workshop intensive led by Gibney Dance and Theater of the Oppressed NYC, 2015

Additional:

2021
Hurricane Gap Community Performance Intensive, Pine Mountain Settlement School, Pine Mountain, KY
Facilitate for Freedom Fundamentals Training, Anti-Oppression Resource and Training Alliance (AORTA), Virtual
 Adamah Farm & Fellowship, Hazon: Jewish Lab for Sustainability, Virtual
RE:THEATRE Master Class: Examining How We Tell Stories with Andrew Russell, Virtual
Developmental Transformations (DvT) Workshop with M.E. Louis, Virtual
Shlepn Covid / Isolating while Yiddish Theater Workshop with Jenny Romaine, Yiddish New York, New York, NY

2020
Holding Space Part 1: Anti-Oppressive Facilitation and Holding Space Part 2: Co-Creating Accessibility, Anti-
Oppression Resource and Training Alliance (AORTA), Virtual
 Movement as Medicine, Dancing Earth, Virtual
Cultural Organizing for Community Change, Arts & Democracy and NOCD-NY, Virtual
Vocal Workshop with Victoria Hanna, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA

2019
Radical Inclusion: Intersectional Approaches to Facilitation, Ping Chong + Company, New York, NY
Vision, Action and Social Change (course audit), taught by Susan Sturm, Columbia Law School, New York, NY
Artists Beit Midrash: Artist Collective and Jewish Text Study Group, Town & Village Synagogue, New York, NY
Cultural Organizing for Community Change, Arts & Democracy and NOCD-NY, New York
Weekend Intensive, Shakespeare & Company, New York, NY

2018
Training Program in Mind-Body Medicine, The Center for Mind-Body Medicine, New York, NY
Intersectional Identities: Innovative Methodologies for Classrooms, Leslie-Lohman Museum, New York, NY
 Creative Aging Training for Teaching Artists, Lifetime Arts, Queens, NY
Teaching Artist Cohort Training, Urban Arts Partnership, New York, NY
Teaching Artist Training: Intersectional Identities with Kirya Traber, Ping Chong + Company, New York, NY
Teaching Artist Professional Development Workshop, Abrons Arts Center, New York, NY
The Race Within Erasure: A Master Class with Robin Coste Lewis, Cave Canem, Brooklyn, NY
Tell Your Story: Theater Workshop on Gender and Public Harassment, The Performance Project, New York, NY

2016
Physical Comedy Intensive: Workshop with Hilary Chaplain, Triskelion ArtsBrooklyn, NY