This story was originally published by ArtsATL.
Matt Torney, artistic director of Theatrical Outfit, has been directing theater for the last 25 years in the U.S. and Ireland and has extensive experience as an art director for film, TV and photography. He loves good food, live music, exploring nature and a good laugh with friends.
As part of an effort to help readers get to know members of Atlanta’s arts community better, we asked Torney to share 11 things on his mind. Here, in no particular order, are his 11 good things:
- Voting. I just became an American citizen last year, and voting for the first time was an amazing feeling. A beautiful fall day. My son was in my arms. An incredible moment when the world felt both very big and impossibly small.
- Oakhurst Porchfest. Two hundred bands in one afternoon with 20,000 people and no fighting, stealing or mayhem. It blows my mind that this is possible. This year, we fired up a smoker that we got for $70 on Facebook Marketplace and had a crowd of old and new friends feasting on our porch and rocking out to the band next door. Good times.
- The Beltline.
- Brick Store Pub. My haven during the pandemic. One of the best in the world.
- Coffee in bed.
- Addae Moon. A brilliant playwright and a brilliant human being whom I work with at Theatrical Outfit. I wish every theater had a wise, kind, no bulls---, punk intellectual, revolutionary artist like him around the place, making the art deeper and the people more real.
- My daughter’s special education teacher, Ms. Ball. Endless patience and grace. Isla says, “Hello, best friend” to her every morning in car pool.
- Video artist Bill Viola. I will never forget walking into his “Stations of the Cross” exhibit in MoMA in New York. A dark room with luminous figures floating in a void in vibrant color. An atmosphere that comes back sometimes in dreams.
- “Let the Great World Spin” by Colum McCann. My favorite novel written by another Irishman who crossed the Atlantic to make the USA home. A tightrope walker defies gravity as he walks between the Twin Towers in 1974, while an impossible story unfolds in the city below him.
- Yosemite National Park. For our honeymoon, my wife Amber and I hiked for five days in the backcountry. We saw waterfalls, towering cliffs, majestic sunsets — and it’s all right there for everyone.
- Whiskey nights with our friends January and Will. Conversations that ebb and flow over months and years. Good bourbon. Art and life. Laughter and tears.
Credit: ArtsATL
Credit: ArtsATL
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