About
Her work has been shown in divergent contexts from New York City galleries to courtyards in Vietnam, East African amphitheaters, European opera houses, American public housing, and rural auditoriums in the United Arab Emirates. By creating art that speaks many formal, cultural, historical, aesthetic, and experiential languages, she seeks expansive audiences. Schaal received a 2021 Guggenheim Fellowship; the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts; the United States Artists Fellowship; the Soros Art, Migration, and Public Space Fellowship; and the Ford Foundation Art For Justice Bearing Witness Award. She directed the 2023 Pulitzer Prize-winning opera “Omar.”
Schaal is an arts-in-education advocate. She most recently taught a course on theater and social practice at Harvard University and served as the Denzel Washington Endowed Chair in Theatre at Fordham University. In her commitment to artist-centered institutions, Schaal co-founded the Gahinga Institute for Contemporary Art in Kigali Rwanda, and served on the boards of PS122/PSNY, the leadership council of the artists employment and guaranteed income initiative of Creatives Rebuild New York, and the Artistic Leadership Committee for New Victory Theater. She is currently a co-director of Under The Radar Festival in New York City.