Where I’ve been

Professional Experience

October 2006- December 2011: Executive Director of the Siskiyou Arts Council. I grew the job from 20 per week to 35 hours a week salaried position.  Duties include general office administration tasks, extensive community outreach to service clubs, chambers of commerce and arts groups, and fundraising and grant writing. This position requires building close and effective relationships, partnerships and collaborations with the California Arts Council, local city and county governments and agencies. Support staff to the Board of Directors and Advisory Team. This position requires extensive knowledge and experience in fundraising, group dynamics, and government protocol and personal/volunteer management.

During my tenure:

  • The Siskiyou Arts Council’s budget from $37,000 to $185,000 in five years.
  • Restored the reputation of Siskiyou Arts Council (SAC) as a countywide organization by going out into the community to meet people where they are and educate them about the arts and how the arts council functions enable the arts in a community.
  • SAC opened an Gallery in Mount Shasta and an office in Yreka. Prior to 2004 SAC didn’t have a physical space in the county.
  • Individual memberships tripled.
  • In 2009 SAC won the Mount Shasta Chamber of Commerce’s Not For Profit Business of the Year.
  • Revitalized the Arts Council by building partnerships and collaborations with an innovative variety of groups, business and organizations. We now have an art gallery.
  • Wrote successful grants to receiving over $200,000 for the Siskiyou Arts Council.  Funders  including  Union Pacific Foundation, Shasta Regional Community Foundation and multiple program from the California Arts Council.
  •  Develop relationships with the arts community to show works by “outsider artists.” Integrated “outsider artwork” into community shows and the county fair.

 

2006 – present: Art instructor to Siskiyou County Special Day Class students (ages 10 to 18 years old) with emotional disabilities. Art instructions included drawing, watercolor and acrylic painting, collage and a class mural. Summer arts instruction includes photography where students explore the outdoors using basic arts principles including composition, negative space and grayscale. The student’s work is entered into the Siskiyou Golden Fair where all junior entries receive a ribbon. This is a moral and self esteem booster for the students and their families. One year we show the students work at an art opening and then at the Mount Shasta Library. Many students have sold their work. Student show their work a the Siskiyou Golden Fair.

2008-2011: Art instructor for Art Matters, a fiscally sponsored project of the Siskiyou Arts Council with funding from the Far Northern Regional Center. The purpose of Art Matters is to work with adults with developmental disabilities to learn about art materials and techniques, and the business of art. This program worked with students to hosts five art openings in three galleries in Yreka, Weed and Mount Shasta. Students have displayed and sold work in local businesses and the Yreka Library. Students are encouraged to find “their medium” through exploration and experimentation. Instructors worked with students to create business cards, web pages, and portfolios.  Students learned how to frame and professionally present their work. The grant funding for this program will not be renewed, so the program will end in July 2010. We are looking to partner with the Siskiyou Opportunity Center, a work training facility to continue the program whose mission is to provide support services that assist individuals with developmental disabilities to obtain and earned income, function independently, and maximize their highest level of vocational potential.

1999- 2005: West Marin Public Waste Information Coordinator, recycle consultant to the County of Marin. Duties included: marketing recycling programs through weekly ads and monthly columns for the Point Reyes Light (a Pulitzer Prize winning newspaper) Created with a web designer the West Marin Recycle Hotline and West Marin Exchange Board, www.westmarinexchange.org. Organized and promoted biannual Wild Women’s Clothing Exchange and annual Recycle Circus; both waste reducing events include advertising and promotion, grant writing and fund raising, manage budget, manage volunteers and reuse materials. Programmer for a weekly community radio show that provided recycling information with interviews of experts in a variety of waste issues including authors, Mary Appelhof, Worms Eat My Garbage, Dan Imhoff, Fatal Harvest, Julia Butterfly Hill, One Makes A Difference, and Pamela Gordon, Lean and Green. Community presentations including schools, garden clubs and Chamber of Commerce’s to educate waste diverting program. Project manager, researcher and writer for the West Marin Green Guide. Manage all income, expenses including billing and invoices for the budget. Support staff to the West Marin Waste Advisory Group.

2002-2004 Promoter and organizer of “Oh Rapture its Scrapture on Tour, Junk Art Show and Competition.” Duties for this annual event include fund raising, grant writing, all aspects involved in accounting and disbursement of funds, “call to artist”, promotion, advertising. See <www.garbage.org/events>

1980-present:  I have always been and artist. Please visit my artists biography.

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