Theatre Professor Awarded Mississippi Arts Commission Fellowship

The highly competitive fellowship honors Mississippi artists who demonstrate the ability to create exemplary work in their chosen field.

"The Mississippi Arts Commission supports my own professional creative work, which fuels and supports the work I do in class with my beloved students," Noble said. "By supporting working artists, MAC supports future artists as well."

The fellowship gives Noble flexibility to pursue a variety of projects. Over the summer, she directed "An Iliad," at the Franklin Stage Company in New York's Great Western Catskills. The show, adapted from Homer's classic poem, "The Iliad," is an examination of "our fascination with war, heroes and the terrible human cost," Noble said.

Looking ahead, Noble is creating a new solo show for the FESTN4 festival in Orlando. The show, "suff(rage)," is a historical revenge fantasy reimagining the days around the Seneca Falls Convention, which launched the women's suffrage movement.

"FESTN4 is a curated festival held over four days, hosting national and international artists," she said. "There are a wide variety of avant-garde and new works; Orlando is a great city for theater in general and experimental theater specifically."

Noble is also working to bring a new production of "A Christmas Carol" to Oxford and is in the beginning stages of research for a play about the subjective perception of reality, time, memory and shared history, and the relationship between mothers and daughters.

In 2022, she was awarded an MAC individual project grant that helped her take her solo show "Fury!" to New York City for its off-off Broadway premiere on Theatre Row at United Solo, the world's largest solo theater festival.

Noble's work spans many theatrical styles, from classical forms to avant-garde and physical theater.

"Professor Bone Noble is a talented artist who is passionate about her work both as a performer and a teacher," said Michael Barnett, chair of the Department of Theatre and Film. "The recognition provided by being awarded the Mississippi Arts Commission Performing Artist Fellowship serves as a reflection of her important work and contributions to the university, state, region and beyond.

"We are fortunate to include her among our colleagues in the Department of Theatre and Film."

Noble said she is thankful to the MAC and her department.

"Both the Mississippi Arts Commission and the Department of Theatre and Film have offered such necessary funding," she said. "It's rare for artists to have this level of support.

"It's what allows me to be able to continue to make new things and grow my own individual artistry as I help young artists grow into theirs."

This project is supported in part by funding from the Mississippi Arts Commission, a state agency, and in part, from the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency.

Top: Theatre arts professor Lauren Noble appears in a promotional image for her show 'Fury!' The solo show, supported by a Mississippi Arts Commission grant, is 'an interactive reimagining of the Medea myth in the darkly comic Bouffon clown style.' Submitted photo