Austin’s inaugural poet laureate Zell Miller III is not done making noise. After shutting down his long-running production company, he has launched Black Rose ATX, a new nonprofit theater outfit that puts kids and teens front and center. The group is planning seasonal arts camps, in-school pilot programs and scholarship-backed seats so families with tight budgets are not shut out. Miller and his newly formed board also say they want to pay working artists a living wage and, if the money lines up, keep a home base at Hyde Park Theatre.
A new nonprofit with a youth-first mission
Black Rose ATX was created to tap a wider mix of public and private dollars and to tie what happens onstage directly to classroom and out-of-school programs, as reported by KUT. Miller is listed on the poet laureate page at Austin Public Library as the first person to hold that title in Austin and plans to use it to push for literacy and performance-based learning. The company has already pulled together a board with backgrounds in arts administration, fundraising, and youth services to steer those school partnerships.
From ZM3 Live To A Nonprofit Model
Miller’s pivot comes on the heels of last year’s closure of ZM3 Live Productions, his more-than-two-decade-old production company that ran into funding gaps. At the time, he told KUT, "We didn't get funding again, so this is a farewell show." Black Rose ATX, set up as a nonprofit, is meant to open up multiple revenue streams so a single missed grant does not shut the doors again.
Grants, hotels and a competitive landscape
City money looms large for Austin arts groups. The city runs competitive funding programs like Nexus, Elevate, and Thrive that draw from the hotel-occupancy tax, according to Create Austin. Those grants can help cover artist pay and program costs, but are limited and often fall short of what organizations request, which makes a mix of funding sources crucial for a newcomer like Black Rose ATX. Leaders say they plan to chase both city grants and private donations to steady the operation.
Programs, pay and access
To start, Black Rose ATX is focusing on seasonal camps for students from elementary through high school, along with spring-break and holiday sessions and early test partnerships that bring artists into classrooms. The company intends to hold scholarship seats for low-income families and has said it wants to pay teaching artists a living wage instead of leaning on unpaid labor. Board members emphasize that the work will be process-driven, giving young people room to write, move, and speak, rather than centering everything on one big final show for parents.
What’s next
If a city grant comes through, Black Rose ATX’s first announced production is a hip-hop inflected adaptation of Aesop’s fables, with Hyde Park Theatre expected to serve as the company’s home base. In the meantime, the organization is in fundraising mode, shoring up partnerships while the board fine-tunes pilot programs and scholarship policies.
