Prototype, the festival of new work whose ambitions are aptly conveyed by its subtitle, Opera/Theater/Now, has in its seven seasons gained a reputation as a star spotter.

It has brought to New York two pieces that went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music: Du Yun’s “Angel’s Bone” and, this year, Ellen Reid’s “prism.” (Both those works were produced by Beth Morrison Projects, which presents Prototype with HERE, the arts center in SoHo.)

So audiences will be watching carefully to see if awards recognition might be in the future for the six works that will be shown in Prototype’s eighth season, which will run Jan. 9-18 at theaters throughout Manhattan and was announced on Wednesday.

The characteristic Prototype work is short in length and grim in subject matter. Last year’s festival revolved around presentations “of almost cataclysmic suffering, the kind of pain that lingers without reason or resolution,” I wrote in a New York Times review.