2026 Lineup

Box Cutter Collective is a New York City based political puppet troupe whose members met while working at the Bread and Puppet Theater. Their work addresses current political movements drawing inspiration from anti-fracking activists, efforts to unionize workers, anti-war demonstrations, decolonization thinkers, abolitionist strategists, and others. They believe cultural change precedes political change and that puppetry, humor, and music are essential tools for collective transformation. They have performed at venues across New York City and beyond. In 2025, they premiered Dimension Zero, an anti-capitalist sci-fi musical, which received grants from the New York State Council on the Arts and The Henson Foundation and had a sold-out run at HERE Arts Center in Soho. They most recently premiered the latest show, The Cardboard Pizza Puppet Circus at the NYC International Puppet Fringe Festival - a  circus created in collaboration with community groups like Sane Energy and El Puente and featured 30 live performers.

Salomé Egas (she/her/ella) is an Ecuadorian interdisciplinary artist, educator, and cultural worker weaving dance, theater, film, and textiles to question identity and belonging. Her embodied practice creates experiences for immigrant communities to process displacement while imagining pathways for cultural innovations rooted in her Ecuadorian and indigenous ancestry. A three-time Brooklyn Arts Council grantee (2026, 2024, 2022) she created Más que un Pétalo, an award-winning interdisciplinary work exploring her immigrant experience, supported by the 2023 NYC Women’s Fund and The Opportunity Agenda’s Narrative & Culture Fellowship.

Her performances cross borders, from Ecuador to Cuba, Argentina, Canada, Romania, and throughout New York City. She founded F.U.N. Collective, and is the Director/Lead Choreographer of KIPA PACHA at the Ecuadorian American Cultural Center. Salomé holds an M.A. from NYU Gallatin and a B.A. from Skidmore College, and has shaped her artivist practice with Creative Capital, Broadway Advocacy Coalition, and EmergeNYC.

Established in 2012, The Freedom Dabka Group has proudly formed into a cultural icon in the NY/NJ Middle- Eastern community. The team started with just a group of six family members with a deep passion and love for their culture. With hard work, dedication and creativity, The FDG has become a professional, renowned Brotherhood. Through hard-work and passion The FDG continues to grow not only in size, but also in innovation and performance.

Rude Mechanical Orchestra is a radical protest marching band based in Lenapehoking, the unceeded occupied land of the Lenape Nation, colonially known as the New York City area. We play music and provide chant support in the streets at protests, marches, rallies, direct actions, community events, and more for the revolution and all its intersecting avenues, including (but not limited to): feminism, immigrant rights, queer and trans liberation, labor, peace, equitable community self-determination, decolonization, and racial, social, economic, housing, and climate justice. We actively resist and seek to dismantle racism, (cis)sexism, anti-queerness, ableism, ageism, classism, colonialism, zionism, antisemitism, apartheid, war, genocide, ecocide, gentrification, and all forms of oppression.  

Through our music, we strive to bring joy and inspiration to the communities we are in solidarity with and to inspire new people into activism of all kinds. We pay tribute to the world’s cultures and the revolutionary role music has played throughout history. Internally, we work towards being a safe, welcoming place for all genders, ages, races, sexual orientations, disabilities, neurotypes, religions, ethnicities, and musical skill levels.

The Street Theatre Crew was founded by Radical Evolution in October 2023 by a group of theater makers who participated in a two-week exchange with the historic, New Delhi-based street theater company Jana Natya Manch (aka Janam). Collectively, we are a multidisciplinary crew who are writers, musicians, choreographers, performers, producers, and community organizers. We make work in support of left and progressive social movements in NYC and beyond.

2026 Participating Organizations:

American Indian Community House

The mission of American Indian Community House (AICH) is to improve and promote the well-being of the American Indian Community and to increase the visibility of American Indian cultures in an urban setting in order to cultivate awareness, understanding and respect.

AICH is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization serving the needs of Native Americans residing in New York City.

AICH was founded in 1969, by Native American volunteers as a community-based organization, mandated to improve the status of Native Americans, and to foster inter-cultural understanding.

AICH membership is currently composed of Native Americans from 72 different tribes. Native American migration between urban centers and reservations demonstrates the inter-relatedness of all Native Americans, and from this reality emerges the recognition that our issues and concerns are truly shared.

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Authors Against Book Bans (AABB) is a coalition of writers, illustrators, anthology editors and contributors, and other book creators, who stand united against the deeply unconstitutional movement to limit the freedom to read. We unequivocally support the availability of diverse voices on our library shelves, in our schools, and in our culture. We pledge to band together against the oppression of literature, to speak when our voices are silenced, to go where our bodies are needed, and to fight as one to ensure this freedom. Together, we will be fearless. Find out more at https://www.authorsagainstbookbans.com 

Freedom Agenda (fa.urbanjustice.org) is dedicated to organizing people and communities directly impacted by incarceration to achieve decarceration and system transformation. To build power and affect change, we engage formerly incarcerated people and their loved ones as members and leaders who drive campaigns that utilize a range of tactics including direct action, public education, narrative change, and grassroots advocacy. With our members leading the way, and with a broad coalition of over 200 partners, we organize the Campaign to Close Rikers (closerikers.com).

The People’s Forum is a movement incubator for working class and marginalized communities to build unity across historic lines of division at home and abroad. We are an accessible educational and cultural space that nurtures the next generation of visionaries and organizers who believe that through collective action a new world is possible.

The People’s Plan NYC (TPP) is a coalition of more than 100+ grassroots organizations and unions fighting for a New York City that provides dignity, care, and justice for all New Yorkers. TPP brings its member organizations together to run the multi-issue citywide fights no single group can win alone, from the annual People’s Budget campaign to City Council legislation, including most recently defending our protest rights. Our Make ’Em Pay campaign pushes the City to collect the fines and fees that lawbreaking landlords and corporations like Amazon and DoorDash already owe, by increasing enforcement and collections staffing across City agencies, and to put that money toward the services New Yorkers depend on. TPP works inside and outside City Hall, pairing grassroots pressure with direct work with Council Members and their staff. Learn more at peoplesplan.nyc and follow us at @PeoplesPlanNYC.

Theatre of the Oppressed NYC (TONYC) brings the power of live theatre to the revolution. In partnership with communities confronting racism, housing injustice, and inequality, TONYC creates plays that put real struggles onstage and invite the audience to step in, take risks, and rehearse change. Inspired by the global Theatre of the Oppressed movement, our work transforms spectators into “spect-actors” who collectively imagine bold alternatives. TONYC’s performances spark dialogue, ignite action, and prove that theatre is a rehearsal for the world we want. (https://www.tonyc.nyc/)

Theater Workers for a Ceasefire exists to organize U.S.-based theater workers in solidarity with the people of Palestine. We aim to use our bodies and talents in pursuit of a comprehensive ceasefire, which we understand is merely the first step among many in realizing a Free Palestine. Since our founding in 2024, we have organized forty theatrical organizations to publicly commit to the cultural boycott of Israel (PACBI), with several becoming Apartheid Free Zones. Among its many activities, TW4C has published a zine to fundraise for relief efforts, passed out hundreds of solidarity pins to attendees at high-profile events, hosted multiple teach-in’s, and organized contingents at rallies and protests. Our public statement calling for a comprehensive ceasefire has nearly four thousand signatories from theater workers around the country.  Most recently, TW4C led the BDS-backed campaign to boycott the play Birthright. Solidarity Fest, a day of cultural programming for Palestine, raised over $6,000 for The Freedom Theater of Jenin, The Sameer Project, and Middle East Children’s Alliance. Get involved: tw4c.com @theaterworkersforaceasefire

TIME’S UP! is a grassroots environmental group that uses educational outreach and direct action to promote a more sustainable, less toxic city. For 35 years, TIME’S UP! has worked to educate people about the environmental impacts of everyday decisions, from the food we buy to the means of transportation we use.  (https://times-up.org/)

Francesca Barr is a working artist and writer from Massachusetts. She loves screenprint for the physical labor it demands, as well as its value in movement-making past, present, and future. Her practice intertwines the tradition of the propaganda poster with modern photographic methods, exploring the relationship between image and message. Before her term as Harvard University’s Henry Russell Shaw Fellow in Ireland and Spain, she graduated from Harvard College with a degree in Sociology and Art, Film, and Visual Studies. Francesca is now based in Brooklyn, NY where she leads arts education programming for community organizations—including The People’s Forum, Penikese Island School, and Strother School for Attention.

For the Streets! is supported in part by: 

La Plaza Cultural Community Garden

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs
New York State Council on the Arts