Stepping up to show what they’ve got: Summer Steps with Step Afrika! takes to a new stage at The National Building Museum

Stepping up to show what they’ve got

Stomping, clapping youths take the stage to showcase skills after Step Afrika! camp

Written by MARK JENKINS for the Washington Post, published August 15, 2013

“For an hour Sunday afternoon, the National Building Museum’s vast atrium took a pounding. It wasn’t from mallets, jackhammers or other construction tools. The noise was made by the clapping hands and stomping feet of the more than 100 children who had just finished Step Afrika’s “Summer Steps” camp.

Funded and operated by the Washington Performing Arts Society, which has a two-decade history of collaboration with Step Afrika!, the camp has operated for seven years.

This is the second summer that the workshops have culminated with a performance at the museum. “It’s a great opportunity to activate this great hall,” said Scott Kratz, the museum’s vice president for education.

Like many established cultural institutions, the National Building Museum is looking to introduce itself to a wider public. The stepping performance, along with a mini-golf course and a pop-up barbecue joint, is part of transforming the red-brick 1887 landmark into what Kratz called a “town square for this part of the city.”

The area around the stage was packed with spectators, and more people cheered from the second and third-floor balconies of the massive interior space.”

VIEW THE FULL 2013 ARTICLE HERE