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Ian (he/they) is a writer/director by passion and a creative executive by trade. Ian is founder & CEO of Hoodbutch Studios and the executive director of Inclusion & Belonging at the Art Institute of Chicago. Ian has worked with a number of arts & cultural institutions, including Haven Chicago, an interdisciplinary production company, as well as Enrich Chicago, a collaborative of arts, culture, and funding institutions collectively engaging in the work of anti-racist and racial equity organizing. In 2016, he was awarded the Joyce Foundation-funded artistic producing apprenticeship at Goodman Theatre.

Selected directing credits include: Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus, Twelfth Night, and The Tempest; an adaptation of The Ridiculous Darkness by Wolfram Lotz for Sideshow Theatre; The Toilet by Amiri Baraka for Haven Chicago; a reading of The America Play by Susan Lori-Parks for Goodman Theatre. In July 2022, Ian premiered his debut short film Save Face, produced by Haven Chicago. Ian is originally from Cincinnati, OH and gives love and gratitude to the people who helped shape the person he is today.

 

“Titus Andronicus is a bloody tale about the illusion of peacetime. Despite being a child of the Clinton administration, I didn't realize it until I sat through Haven's latest production at the Den, directed by Ian Damont Martin. But that's exactly what keeps the show relevant. Haven handily rises to that occasion, loading the show with contemporary commentary about race, gender, legacy, and violence that expands the Bard's work in rebellious form. Here, I saw the tragedy of liberal politics, the failures of political reconciliation without institutional change.”

KT Hawbaker, Chicago Reader

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