Kuumba Artist Feature: Diana Webley
Harbourfront Centre’s Kuumba festival is spotlighting a different Black artist each day of February. Today we’re sharing the story of Diana Webley.
We are a product of our communities and our families, though some of us more so than others. For Diana Webley, her grandmother has always been a compass and a confidant. She was a resilient woman, who made the difficult choice to move from Jamaica to Canada while her husband took care of the family at home. For three years, she worked tirelessly to establish herself, saving whatever money she could. It was hard. There were cash jobs and factory work. Then she brought her children to Canada, one by one.
Then Diana was born. Having settled into Toronto’s Little Jamaica neighbourhood, the family was always working, and so Diana was raised by a community of relatives. If her mother was at work, then there was always a family member to look after her, most often her grandmother who, kind and matriarchal, gave Diana her most teachable moments, in terms of motherhood and leadership. Diana learned how to be confident and proud, to always carry her dignity with her, in any situation, and to keep moving regardless of the obstacles thrown in her way. Even now, as Diana talks about her grandmother, who has since passed away, her face lights up. “She’s with me every day,” she says.
Strength is an important asset for producing festivals. Putting a festival together takes an enormous amount of work, and, even with a significant amount of experience, it can feel like putting out 10 fires at once. When audiences see a successful festival, they tend not to see the processes and sweat behind it. That’s the point, though, because an effective producer makes everything look effortless from the outside. This year, Diana is curating and producing Kuumba, which is Harbourfront Centre’s annual Black Futures Month festival (a forward-thinking analogue to Black History Month).
With the COVID-19 pandemic trudging on, and with Toronto mostly in lockdown, this year’s edition of Kuumba has been more challenging than usual. With almost all of its programming being virtual, the technical side has been much more work. However, Diana sees the pandemic as an opportunity. In previous years, audiences had to come to Harbourfront Centre to have the Kuumba experience, but now they can attend Kuumba from anywhere. The result is that the festival is more accessible and can reach a larger audience. This is especially important for Canadians living outside Toronto, or any major city centre, whose exposure to black culture, black voices and black stories may be more limited.
When it comes to festival curation, Diana tends to think generationally. What do people of different ages want? How do you make something cohesive for all of them, especially when they come from different walks of life? This is a special challenge for Harbourfront Centre, which has a relatively unique position in this city. As both an arts organization and a waterfront destination, it must cater to all Torontonians, rather than just a narrowly defined niche. Diana makes it work, though. The broadness works, because it makes it more likely that she’ll expose people to new experiences, which is something that matters to her. When she sees an audience member light up with joy, it gives her joy. “All of that hard work means something,” she says.
Diana is a Senior Producer at Harbourfront Centre, where she has worked for 16 years. She has produced countless events over her career. In 2018, she joined Centennial College’s faculty as a part-time lecturer on Arts Management. She recently was promoted to Harbourfront Centre’s Interim Manager of the Cultural Engagement Department.
