Director Ashley Tata’s works have been called “fervently inventive,” by Ben Brantley in the New York Times, “extraordinarily powerful” by the LA Times, like something that “reaches out across the centuries and punches you in the throat” by Alexis Soloski in the New York Times and Tata’s production of Kate Soper’s Ipsa Dixit was named a notable production of the decade by Alex Ross in The New Yorker. These works  have been presented in venues and festivals throughout the US and internationally including at Theatre for a New Audience, Ars Nova, PS21, LA Opera, Austin Opera, The Miller Theater, National Sawdust, EMPAC, BPAC, The Crossing the Line Festival, the Holland Festival, The Prelude Festival, The National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, and the Fisher Center’s Summerscape Festival at Bard. 

During the pandemic-induced theatrical shut down Tata worked consistently, creating a live cyberformance of Caryl Churchill’s Mad Forest which transferred from Bard College’s Fisher Center, Off-Broadway to TFANA, a Zoom-based production of performance band Sky-Pony’s work entitled The (Virtual) Wildness at Ars Nova, a Zoom-accessed Virtual Nightclub and dance party called The Boot with Beth Morrison Projects, a music video for rock band Sylvan Esso which aired on Colbert’s YouTube Covid channel, a physically-distanced adherent, landscape-integrating adaptation of John Luther Adams’s Ten Thousand Birds with ensemble Alarm Will Sound at PS21 in Chatham, NY and a multimedia live-streaming event from National Sawdust to mark the release of the quarantine-created album Con Alma with Paola Prestini and Magos Herrera and broadcast to Canal 22 in Mexico, WNET All-Arts and WQXR.

Tata’s creative output also manifests in immersive entertainment, escape rooms and advertising encompassing roles such as Creative Director of Immersive Escape Productions; devising environmental, multi-platform, immersive escape rooms; creating an experience for musician St. Vincent tailored for the drop of her album, Masseduction; and leading the team that was awarded a gold medal in Medical, Marketing & Media awards in 2018 for an immersive escape experience tailored for the release of a cholesterol-reducing drug for Amgen. 

Tata’s MFA in directing was earned at Columbia University under the mentorship of Anne Bogart and Brian Kulick. In turn Tata has taught, guest taught or been a guest artist at Columbia University, Bard College, Mannes School of Music, Harvard University, MIT, Marymount Manhattan College, Colgate College, and LIU Post.

www.ashleytata.com