Submit Your Work
Submissions for all 2025 labs are due by December 15, 2024.
ABOUT THE OP GREENHOUSE
The Orchard Project Greenhouse Lab is a year-long New York City-based accelerator for directors, writers, composers, choreographers, designers, and other generative artists to seed ambitious and unexpected work, form relationships, and develop a new generation and network of working artists. This lab aims to provide ongoing support to participants hoping to generate new material and build a network of curious, engaged up-and-coming artists. Unlike other Orchard Project labs, this program’s focus is not on the projects themselves, but on the diversity and generative skills that each artist brings to the table.
The Greenhouse lab is a hybrid virtual/in-person lab that meets bi-monthly with occasional in-person get-togethers in New York City. Please note that unlike our normal performance residency program, the Greenhouse is intended for artists looking to instigate work with the Orchard Project rather than receive its support on existing work. That is not to say that work in early stages of development cannot find a home within the program, but rather to suggest that the focus is on the discovery and support of a group of collaborations within the program.
Each year, members of the Greenhouse Lab meet with their program director at the beginning to map out a structure for the year, so expectations may change year to year. In recent years, however, this has included bi-weekly meetings in which members have brought various projects in development to the group for feedback, and full working workshop weekends in NYC for members to share work and working methods.
No matter the exact structure, as a member of a Greenhouse cohort, you will be expected to present excerpts from your work or responses to prompts at as many meetings as possible and read your cohort’s scripts and provide feedback in a group setting. You will also be pushed to generate new ideas and content on a regular basis for group meetings.
Learn more about our 2023 artists
The fellows are individuals who are excited by fostering community in a group of like-minded peers, and who are curious and committed to understanding and developing their own work. The Greenhouse program supports artists with a clarity and promise of artistic vision, prioritizing underrepresented stories and voices in our selection process.
Unlike other programs, our process and focus is not to focus on projects themselves, but on the diversity of the generative skills that each artist is bringing to the table. The OP Greenhouse moves beyond the limitations of a traditional writers’ lab and aims to serve directors, writers, composers and other generative artists that might defy categorization. It is a program intended to encourage collaboration between leading creative voices and can adjust to the needs of each member.
In line with the Orchard Project’s focus on process and commitment to diversity of aesthetic, experience, and background, the Orchard Project is looking to bring together a disparate group of extraordinary artists who it believes should and could work with one another on a myriad of projects.
The selected fellows are individuals who are chosen through a rigorous outreach and selection process, open to the public. As with all the Orchard Project labs, participants will join with varying degrees of professional experience, but will likely have some history of manifesting their creative work in public before joining the Orchard Project community. Anyone can apply, there is no age requirement, and applicants can be either represented by an agent or not. To honor the history of the Orchard Project and the constituency it serves, the program will aim to include at least some with a live performance interest or background.
- The Orchard Project NYC Greenhouse is free for invited artists to participate in. There is also no fee to apply.
- The Orchard Project’s 2023 Greenhouse Lab will require each artist to agree to both the Orchard Project’s general participation policies (2022 LINK here), and an agreement that, while not providing any royalty or compensation to the Orchard Project, allows projects developed through the program to credit their participation in it.
- The focus of our labs is on the creation of self directed progress, peer and industry community. The Orchard Project, however, does have particular resources that it allocates to work after labs through our new OP Forward Program. We know that these resources/options are not an ideal match for all participants, but in certain circumstances, the Orchard Project and artist may continue to work together on the development and advocacy of their work after the program, in which case other arrangements will be made on a case by case basis.
All artists and participants in OP Labs will be invited to participate in annual Community Learning events, a series of weekly panels and conversations with leading artists, practitioners, and industry working in all the various forms. From discussions about television writing rooms, case studies in digital performance, best practices for collaboration (both in the room and in a contract), to pitching workshops, these events will provide all OP artists – across all our labs – to join in a community wide conversation about where storytelling will be heading in the future.
To apply to the 2023 Greenhouse Lab, CLICK HERE (apps open Nov 1, 2022).
Full information about how the application process for the 2023 Orchard Project works is available here.
In addition to biographical information asked for in our new common application, we are asking Greenhouse applicants to articulate what the artist stands to gain from membership in such a group at this point in their career. We would also like to briefly ask applicants to outline three (3) theoretical projects that show a range of inspiration and current interests. Please note that these are not projects to be worked on in the lab, but purely to give us a sense of you and your interests.