For 18 years, the LA Women’s Theatre Festival has showcased female solo artists and aided them in developing a new work, a career, as well as a support network. It’s hard to work in LA theater and not know about the annual festival, or run into someone who performed in it.

The organizers often branch out, refusing to be categorized, broadening their perspective. The artists have included actors, singers, dancers, storytellers, spoken word and trapeze performers. Even the “women” in the festival name is not all-encompassing — two men are among the co-hosts of festival programs this year. Events and workshops are produced year-round.

Adilah Barnes

Executive producer Adilah Barnes tells how she and co-founder Miriam Reed began this eventful journey in 1993, on the heels of a National Women’s Theatre Festival held at UCLA in 1992. The two women were connected by the dual purpose of their work:

“We both do what I call edu-tainment, theater that entertains and educates at the same time….Miriam had the bright idea of asking all of the women solo artists…how we could collectively support each other. I told her I thought it was a great idea.” After Reed and Barnes spread the word to a number of these artists, “those same women came to the Burbank Little Theatre; by the end of that evening, the Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival was born.”

Each year the festival is themed, and the theme for the 18th anniversary is “Coming of Age.” Barnes explains the choice was “a take-off of the number 18 and being grown.”

“We never know who we’re going to get,” continues Barnes, “Some years ago, we had an acrobatic performer. It was a nice surprise to see we attracted acrobatics again this year” — however, this year’s festival venue, the Electric Lodge in Venice, couldn’t accommodate acrobatics.

The festival kicks off on Thursday with a champagne gala and presentation of the Eternity, Integrity, Maverick and Rainbow Awards, won by Joan Benedict Steiger, Charmaine Jefferson, Suzanna Guzman, and Velina Hasu Houston, respectively. Noted theater and event director Iona Morris stages the opening events, culminating in performances by Ingrid Graham, Monica Hunken and Vanessa Adams Harris. Vocalist Florence LaRue and actress Hattie Winston, of Becker and Homefront, will host.

Ingez Rameau

Eighteen years ago, Barnes and Kern saw a great need for female solo performers to have a hub, and today managing producer Shyla La’Sha believes the need is even greater. “Unfortunately,” she says, “although there have been major gains and strides for women in the performing arts, you still don’t have the same opportunities or same platform as an independent artist as a woman.”

Barnes elaborates on the festival’s year-round programming, including workshops for seniors, workshops with women who are ex-offenders (supported by a grant from the California Arts Council) and a public access show called LAWTF On the Air, among other outreach efforts. Because the festival tries to provide producing opportunities throughout the year for its solo artists, Barnes refers to the March event as the “crown jewel” but says the work throughout the year is just as important to the growth of the performers.

La’Sha agrees:  “We may not necessarily see the effect that performing in the festival has on performers.” But the festival organizers “continue to connect with them and provide them with other opportunities to perform.”

Juliette Marshall

The process of screening and choosing participants in the festival is always fun, Barnes says. She believes in the bond between a good story and its audience, especially in solo shows based in an artist’s experience. In such a show, “not only is it specific about their own lives but if it’s really good theater, it’s also universal. And those in the audience will be transported, able to relate in many cases, sometimes hear their own story told through this artist, so it’s taking the personal to the universal.”

La’Sha considers how these universal connections inspire volunteers and staff. She describes ” the connection that you have when you see someone or when you see a person that compels you to introduce yourself to them or want to say hi or want to get to know them for some reason. Adilah has that with her, that presence and she carries it with her and it’s intriguing. You want to find out more about this woman. ”

A number of outreach efforts attempt to keep the buzz about the festival strong and still fresh year after year. Tickets are available to low-income, at-risk youth, seniors; a certain number of tickets are set aside, Barnes says,  in order to attract “those to the festival who may otherwise not have come or even known who we were.”

Stacie Chaiken

Both women share a common favorite part of the festival — when they are able to experience that energy between the audience and artist.

“It’s really an amazing type of synergistic experience, to go through it and witness it,” says La’Sha. “And it’s not just for the performers, it’s for the community as well; to provide an option that is always available, for performers who may not necessarily have been accessible or may not have come out to do this work, were it not for the opportunity we provided. ”

Barnes acknowledges the work that every member of the production team puts into the festival:

“Every year when I sit in the audience and the festival is up, technicians have taken over the show and they’re making sure everything happens for the audience…. that is really the most satisfying moment, when I can sit there and see these extraordinary artists from around the globe share their voices with our audiences…It’s really exciting to be a part of the audience. It just makes all of the effort worth it when the work is up on the stage. ”

The Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival, Electric Lodge, 1416 Electric Ave., Venice. Thur-Fri, 8 pm; Sat 3 and 8 pm; Sun 3 and 7 pm (different performers at each event). Admission to the Gala is $40, or two tickets for $75 (includes light fare and Champagne). For the other programs, festival VIP passes for all six shows at $125; and  general admission single show tickets at $20 in advance, or $25 at the door. Discounts are available upon request for students, seniors, and groups of 10 or more. (818) 760-0408.  www.lawtf.com.