Portfolio

Community Art

  • August 2023: Story Navigation was a place-based community art project with Catholic Social Services’ 3rd Avenue Resource & Navigation Center at its heart and core. Visitors, partners, and staff of the Center were offered creative choices: opportunities to engage in a variety of artistic activities. Participants created in the mediums which best honored their voices and experiences – from music, to writing, to verbal storytelling – with me serving as listener and facilitator.

  • April 2023: I facilitated a community poetry practice at the See Stories Summit. The Summit was a gathering of artists, students, and educators who came together to celebrate the work of See Stories, an Alaskan arts education nonprofit, and to share in conversation about their next steps as a growing organization. The poetry practice was a fun and meaningful way for See Stories to capture its impact and its hopes for the future while also fostering a sense of connectedness among Summit participants.

  • May 2023: Through daily creativity challenges on my social media pages, this digital event provided beginner-friendly introductions to various forms of sharing stories and connected participants to arts resources in Alaska. This Adaptation and Innovation project was supported by a grant from the Alaska State Council on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts.

  • Winter 2021-2022: I hosted two workshops as part of my Stories for Joy series.

    Stories in the Home was a holiday creativity workshop co-led by Kim Heyano of Blue Feather Nest and sponsored by Furnish Studio + Salvage. Kim taught participants how we can use decor to share stories of the lives we’ve lived and the holidays we celebrate. She guided us through the process of creating a meaningful home for the holidays.

    Stories Just for Me was a journaling workshop co-led by Kenzie Snyderman of Kenzie’s Desk and sponsored by 10 Cups of Tea. Participants were guided through various methods of journaling. We explored how journaling can be used to record the thoughts and memories we hold dear.

  • February-June 2021: Pandemic Soundtrack was a community-driven creative writing project designed to promote COVID-19 safety and prevention practices amongst Cook Inlet Housing Authority residents. Using postcards, I engaged residents in compassionate, inclusive dialogue based on their experiences with practicing COVID-19 safety and being mindful of protecting others. I then used the responses gathered to compose a song that was shared with residents across various mediums.

Creative Writing Workshops

  • October 2021-October 2023: Write Moments was a collection of virtual generative creative writing workshops. I facilitated these workshops using the Amherst Writers & Artists method. In its two years, Write Moments grew into a small community of writers (mostly women) who learned to honor their voices and make space for writing in their lives.

  • July 2023: Writing in Your Parks took advantage of Alaska’s endless sun and the creative energy that comes with it by writing in Anchorage parks. Each writing workshop took place at a different park, giving participants opportunities to discover beautiful pieces of nature in their own backgrounds. Guided prompts encouraged participants to write with presence and awareness, using the sights, sounds, and smells of their natural surroundings as inspirations.

  • May 2022 & May 2023: I led small-group virtual creative writing workshops for Amherst Writers and Artists’ annual fundraiser.

  • April 2022: This workshop for Anchorage songwriters and composers used prompts to inspire participants, who wrote their own lyrics and melodies. Participants shared their songs with each other and provided responses, focusing on what was strong about the song and what stayed with them.

Grant Writing for Artists

  • March 2024: I facilitated a Grant Narrative writing workshop for Bristol Bay Native Corporation shareholders and descendants. This four-hour, small-group workshop served artists seeking to further their grant writing skills in a supportive setting. Through extended writing times with prompts and tips, artists were guided through a process of developing an art project and writing a grant narrative around their project. Participants had opportunities to ask questions, share their grant narrative writing, and gather feedback.

  • October & December 2023: As a Technical Assistance provider with Anchorage Community Land Trust, I teach artists how to fund their work through grants. These small-group workshops (up to 10 participants) are primarily for graduates of ACLT’s Indigenous Peoples Set Up Shop and Plan It! programs, with remaining spots open to the broader Anchorage artist community. Participants are walked through the grant application process, including plenty of time for questions, as well as hands-on practice in writing a grant narrative.

  • October 2023: This presentation provided information for artists seeking to fund their work through grants. I walked participants through the basics of the grant writing process, from finding grant opportunities to telling a story and managing a grant application. The presentation was provided virtually through Zoom to about 30 BBNC shareholders and descendants.

Music

  • 2024: I attended the fifth annual Alaska Music Summit and was a featured artist in a Spotlight video.

  • July 2023: I was interviewed by Alaska’s Fresh Catch radio. I spoke about my early music inspirations and the making of the All Things with Time album. Listen here.

  • 2023: “Make Room for You,” a song from my first album Emerging, was featured in Anchorage Museum’s Pass the Mic exhibit. The exhibit celebrated contemporary Alaska sound art and music.

  • 2022: I was honored to write and record a song for the first campaign of U.S. Representative Mary Peltola. Watch the video here.

  • I released my second album, All Things with Time, in 2022. This album is about growing into a life of creativity, exploration, and restoration with the love of my life. All Things with Time was self-produced and recorded in my home office. Listen here.

  • I released my first album in 2020. The songs on Emerging were written between the ages of 18 and 24: six years of becoming. Loving, breaking, trying, failing, leaving home, returning home, facing loss, finding hope. Those who study human development call this period emerging adulthood – a bridge between adolescence and adulthood. Anything is possible, but not everything is true. I am grateful I had music in the crossing. Emerging was produced by Kurt Riemann and recorded at Surreal Studios. Listen here.

  • In 2023 I performed at Anchorage Folk Festival in Juneau (Wendy Williamson Auditorium, January) and at Spenard Song Circle with Emma Hill and Shane Russell (Rage City Vintage, July).