ACTA - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Co - Founder
- Executive Director
Amy co-founded the Alliance for California Traditional Arts (ACTA) in 1997. Understanding California's unique position as the nation's epicenter for diverse cultural and multi-national communities, ACTA's work has focused on social change through grantmaking, capacity and leadership development, technical assistance, and bilingual program development. Trained as a public folklorist with an M.A. from UCLA, Amy has piloted participatory cultural asset mapping in neglected and rural areas of the state and consults with other organizations and across sectors on this method of discovery and inclusion of community voices. She continues to serve as a consultant for many national organizations and has taken part in two U.S.-China Intangible Cultural Heritage exchanges. She has published on a variety subjects involving California folklife, including immigrant arts training and transmission, and Asian American folk arts. She served on the board of the national Grantmakers in the Arts from 2014 - 2020, and in 2017 was appointed by the US Congress as a Trustee of the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress. By 2019, she was elected as Chair of the American Folklife Center. Amy and husband Hugo Morales are the proud parents of twin boys who dance and sing with regularity. Photo by Craig Kohlruss.
Antara Bhardwaj is one of the most dynamic kathak artists of this generation. She began her study of kathak (an Indian classical story-telling dance form) at the age of nine with legendary maestro Pandit Chitresh Das, and now runs her own dance ensemble and school, Antara Asthaayi Dance. Antara's panache and magnetism have dazzled audiences internationally, performing at the International Kathak Festival (Chicago), Kohler Arts Center (Sheboygan, Wisc.), Disney's REDCAT Theater (Los Angeles), National Centre for Performing Arts (Mumbai), and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival (Scotland). She has also had a prolific career as a filmmaker, working as an assistant director to acclaimed filmmaker, Jagmohan Mundhra (Provoked, Shoot on Sight) and most recently as a producer of Upaj: Improvise, where she brought her worlds of dance and film together. The film was broadcast nationally on PBS and screened in several festivals throughout the world. In 2019, Antara was honored as a Mosaic Silicon Valley Fellow for commitment to artistic excellence and strengthening community through multicultural arts. She continues to develop her mastery of rhythm under the mentorship of Sandeep Das (a Grammy-award winning artist with whom she regularly performs and tours) and mentors over twenty-five young girls and women in the art form of kathak.
Job Titles:
- Program Manager
- Worker from Wilmington
Betty Marín is a cultural worker from Wilmington, CA. Her work uses popular education and language justice to create spaces that encourage learning, dialogue, and solidarity between different communities. Currently some of this work happens with the LA Tenants Union, and previously with the language justice collective Antena LA, and several other independent projects. With the Alliance for California Traditional Arts, she supports artist fellows to integrate the traditional arts and cultural practices in health equity campaigns, co-curates a roundtable series to share resources and create exchange between traditional artists, and co-manages a community based sound archive about stories of cultural belonging and struggle in Boyle Heights. She has contributed curriculum for ACTA's Arts in Corrections program and will begin managing their Reentry program in 2022 integrating the traditional arts into facilities for people recently released from prison or transitioning out. She graduated with an MFA in Art and Social Practice from Portland State University. As a student, she edited a book titled Art and Education, centered on a conversation with artists and educators Pablo Helguera and Luis Camnitzer. Betty joined ACTA in July 2018.
Job Titles:
- Secretary / Executive Director, Advocates for Indigenous California Language
A basketweaver, linguist, language instructor, community organizer and advocate, Carly has been creating a career in language and culture ever since she began weaving baskets at the age of ten. Carly is a member of North Fork Rancheria Band of Mono Indians on her father's side and a descendant of Dunlap Band of Mono Indians on her mother's side. She have been an apprentice through the Alliance for California Traditional Arts twice for basketweaving technologies under the guidance of her grandmother, Avis Punkin, and her sister, Mandy Marine. Carly co-founded a youth weavers' circle through the Living Language Program and has presented on California Indian language and cultural revitalization to local area schools, museums, and libraries. She has a bachelor's degree in Anthropology with emphasis in Linguistic Studies from CSU Sonoma, and a Master's degree in Linguistics from University of Arizona through the Native American Languages Master's Program (NAMA). Upon graduating, Carly made a point to attend as much language revitalization training as possible to gain teaching methods, resources, and professional connections to assist in sustaining her heritage language, Western Mono. Currently, Carly is the Executive Director for the Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival (AICLS) and is responsible for the implementation of the Advocates' programs, vision, and mission to support the revitalization of languages Indigenous to California. In her spare time, Carly facilitates online language courses and YouTube videos, and is developing a website of online Mono resources.
Job Titles:
- Retired Executive Director of the Western Folklife Center
Charlie Seemann is the retired Executive Director of the Western Folklife Center in Elko, Nevada. He holds a B.A. in Political Science from San Francisco State University and an M.A. in Folklife Studies from the University of California at Los Angeles. He was Deputy Director for Collections and Research at the Country Music Foundation/Country Music Hall of Fame for 12 years, and then Program Director at The Fund for Folk Culture in Santa Fe, New Mexico, before coming to the Western Folklife Center in 1998. He retired from that position in July 2014. Charlie was a past congressional appointee to the board of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, and is a member of the board of the Washington D.C. based National Council for the Traditional Arts.
Job Titles:
- Board President / Executive Director, Silicon Valley African Film Festival ( SVAFF ) San Jose, CA
Chike Nwoffiah is an actor, theater director, educator, award-winning filmmaker, and consultant on theater, film, television and multimedia projects. After twelve successful years as a corporate strategist for a Silicon Valley bio-tech company, he transitioned into private enterprise and has vast investments in Media, Agribusiness and Real Estate in USA, Nigeria and South Africa. He is the president of Rhesus Media Group, a full-service media production and consulting firm with offices in Stockton, California, Cape Town, South Africa and Lagos, Nigeria. He is also the founding director of the Silicon Valley African Film Festival (SVAFF), the only film festival in California that is exclusively focused on films by African filmmakers and provides a platform for Africa's seasoned and emerging filmmakers to share their stories with a global audience. Listed as one of the "TopTen Most Influential African Americans" in the San Francisco Bay Area by CityFlight Magazine in 2000, Chike has served on several regional and national grant review panels including: the National Endowment for the Arts, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, Sacramento Arts Commission, San Francisco Arts Commission, Arts Council Silicon Valley, Walter and Elise Haas Fund and the Center for Cultural Innovation. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Management Consultants of Nigeria and Senior Fellow of the American Leadership Forum - Silicon Valley.
A native of Bakersfield, California, and longtime resident of Virginia, Daniel Sheehy earned his PhD in ethnomusicology from the University of California, Los Angeles before joining the National Endowment for the Arts in 1978. He was instrumental in developing and sustaining the infrastructure of the folk and traditional arts field and served as director of folk and traditional arts at the NEA from 1992 to 2000.
In 2000, Dan became director and curator of Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, the nonprofit record label of the Smithsonian Institution. Under his leadership, Smithsonian Folkways published more than 200 recordings and earned five Grammy awards, one Latin Grammy, and 21 nominations. He has also served as acting director of the Smithsonian Latino Center and director of the Smithsonian's Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage.
Dan served as co-editor (with Dale Olsen) of the 1,100-page South America, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean volume of the Garland Encyclopedia of World Music (1998). His book Mariachi Music in America: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture was published by Oxford University Press in 2006. Dan was awarded the Bess Lomax Hawes National Heritage Fellowship by the National Endowment for the Arts in 2015 and the John David Guggenheim Fellowship in 2016. He has served on the boards of the Alliance for California Traditional Arts, the National Council for the Traditional Arts, the American Folklore Society, the Society for Ethnomusicology, and the Association for Cultural Equity. Also a musician, in 1978 Dan co-founded Mariachi Los Amigos, the Washington, DC area's longest existing mariachi ensemble.
Job Titles:
- Certified Public Accountant, Castro Accountancy Corporation / Los Angeles, CA
Job Titles:
- Program Analyst, City of Oakland, Cultural Funding Program
Job Titles:
- Professor Emeritus, American Indian Studies, CSU Sacramento
Gayatri Subramanian is the Founder/Artistic Director of KA Academy of Indian Music & Dance. She is a professional Bharatanatyam dancer, choreographer and instructor is one of the senior most disciples of Guru Smt. Padmini Radhakrishnan, the Founder-Director of the institute "Soundarya Natya Kalalaya Foundation", Mumbai. She has undergone intensive training for over 25 years from her Guru and has won accolades and awards for her performances.
Gayatri has been teaching Bharatanatyam in the United States for about 19 years now. She holds a Bachelors Degree in Fine Arts and is currently pursuing her Masters Degree. She has several accolades and over 300 performances to her credit. Her students have successfully completed their Graduation performance (Arangetram) in dance and have received Grade level certificates as well. Gayatri has worked on many Fundraising projects for non-profits and believes in giving back to the community. She actively serves as a member of the Arts Advisory Committee in the City of San Ramon. Her students have participated in many of the City's cultural events.
Job Titles:
- Executive Director, Radio Bilingüe
Job Titles:
- Founding Board Member and Chairperson, California Indian Basketweavers' Association ( CIBA )
Jennifer Bates has been a basketmaker for over four decades. She began learning traditional Mewuk basketry at the age of 17, studying with family members and tribal elders, including Julia Parker, Mable McKay, Dorothy Stanley, and Craig Bates. She was a founding board member of the California Indian Basketweavers' Association (CIBA) and was their chairperson for the first thirteen years. Jennifer is of Central Sierra Mewuk (Miwok) descent and resides on the Tuolumne Rancheria, where she continues to teach basketry, including traditional methods of gathering and processing raw materials, as well as weaving techniques. Additionally, Jennifer has also become well recognized for demonstrating acorn processing, specifically making traditional acorn soup, ‘nupa,' and cooking in traditional baskets and using hot rocks.
Jennifer is a Long Beach-based cultural worker and public folklorist committed to supporting artists and communities through a practice that strives toward cultural and racial equity. Jenn came to ACTA from the Mississippi Arts Commission where she served as the Folk and Traditional Arts Director since 2014, administering traditional arts grants, providing consultation to artists and organizations, revived and managed the digital publication Mississippi Folklife, and led fieldwork projects related to a wide range of cultural arts practices. Jennifer also worked in digital media for SPACES Archives, a non-profit archive dedicated to documenting and advocating for the preservation of international art environments. With an M.A. in public sector folk studies from Western Kentucky University and a B.A. in folklore and ethnomusicology from Indiana University, Jenn has worked with museums, archives, festivals, and cultural organizations on the federal, state, and local level, including positions or residencies at the Smithsonian's Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, Traditional Arts Indiana, the Kentucky Folklife Program, the John Michael Kohler Arts Center, the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, the Highlander Center for Research and Education, and Epicenter. Jenn was raised in the coastal city of Encinitas in San Diego County. She joined ACTA in March 2017, where she directs ACTA's media efforts, manages the Apprenticeship Program, co-leads the Traditional Arts Roundtable Series in Los Angeles, coordinates technical assistance offerings, and supports the statewide Sounds of California project.
Job Titles:
- Director, Natalie and James Thompson Art Gallery, School of Art and Design, San Jose State University / Principal, Curatorial and Museum Management Services
Joel Jacinto has extensive experience in the nonprofit and public service fields, having served as long-time executive director of Search To Involve Pilipino Americans (SIPA), a community-based organization that empowers youth, families and businesses through health and human services and community economic development. Throughout his career, Joel has been active in networks and coalitions that advocate for diverse communities, especially underserved and low to moderate income populations. Joel was active in the process that resulted in the designation of Historic Filipinotown in Los Angeles, as well as the subsequent streetscape, tree planting and street lighting improvement projects that followed. Complementing his work in social services, Joel is a long-time arts and cultural practitioner, having co-founded in 1990 a Filipino folk and traditional arts organization, Kayamanan ng Lahi Philippine Folks Arts and is a founding board member of the Alliance for California Traditional Artists (ACTA).
Job Titles:
- Arts Management Consultant
- V.P. of Development / Board Chair, Chicano Park Museum and Cultural Center
Josephine Talamantez is an Arts Management consultant with experience in cultural resource management and governmental relations. She is the former Chief of Programs and Legislative Liaison at the California Arts Council and a specialist in Chicano/Mexican-American Civil Rights era. She documented and coordinated the nomination of San Diego, California's Chicano Park and the Chicano Park Monumental Murals to the National Register. Her research projects include: oral history documentation of the Sacramento Greek community; a cultural resources study of the of the Poverty Ridge neighborhood of Sacramento; and visual and oral history documentation of the Royal Chicano Air Force (RCAF), also known as the Rebel Chicano Art Front, an internationally known artist collective based in Sacramento, and numerous exhibitions. Former Executive Director of La Raza Galeria Posada in Sacramento and of the Centro Cultural de la Raza in San Diego, she is a past Board Member of the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture (NALAC); Capitol Area Indian Resources, Inc. (CAIR); a Co-founder of Chicano Park and member of the Chicano Park Steering Committee, and member of the Royal Chicano Air Force (RCAF). Josephine holds an M.A. in Public History from Sacramento State University, where her research focused on the history and historic sites associated with the Chicano civil rights era.
Dr. Leticia Soto Flores is an ethnomusicologist, educator, and musician. She received her B.A. in Economics (2001), where she gained extensive administrative skills in the realm of database design and financial reporting. Having long been a mariachi musician in Los Angeles (since 1991), she pursued an M.A. in Ethnomusicology and interned at Smithsonian Folkways and the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, Washington DC. Leticia received her Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology (2015) with her dissertation entitled "How Musical is Woman?: Performing Gender in Mariachi Music." Combining her two passions, economics and ethnomusicology, in April of 2012, she was appointed founding director of Mexico City's Escuela de Mariachi Ollin Yoliztli en Garibaldi, Mexico's first formal mariachi music academy. During this time, she served as assistant producer and host of the radio program "Voces de la Escuela de Mariachi Ollin Yoliztli" in Mexico City, featuring the school's progress and her dissertation research. Leticia's work as an ethnomusicologist grew out of her profound value for diverse cultural traditions, issues with intangible cultural heritage, the transmission of musical traditions, and the folklorization of traditional performance practices. While many of her publications have centered on Mexican music (many published in Spanish), she has also conducted ethnographic music research in Mexico, Spain, Egypt, Israel, Croatia, Brazil, and Colombia and performed with UCLA's takht (Middle Eastern) ensemble. Her experience as a mariachi musician began in Los Angeles and extended into Washington DC and Mexico, where she also directed her all-female ensemble "Mariachi Tradicional Femenil Flores de Mexico." Leticia comes to ACTA as a Development Manager and is responsible for the development, execution, and tracking of funds. She is an adamant supporter of ACTA's mission to safeguard diverse cultural traditions by providing transmission opportunities for traditions to be sustained and unique spaces in which to flourish.
Job Titles:
- Executive Director and Co - Founder of the Ink People Center for the Arts
- V.P. of Finance & Administration / Co - Founder and Executive Director, Ink People Center for the Arts / Eureka, CA
Libby Maynard is the Executive Director and co-founder of The Ink People Center for the Arts. As well as being a professional artist, she has over 40 years of nonprofit administrative experience. She received her BA and MA in art from Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA. Her artwork has been exhibited throughout California, and is in collections across the nation. Libby is a consultant in nonprofit management and program development. She created the DreamMaker program, which has incubated over 300 community-initiated projects in the past 40+ years and currently manages over 100 self-directing projects. Libby serves on the Boards of Directors of the Alliance for California Traditional Arts, Humboldt County Workforce Development Board, Humboldt County Visitors Bureau, Humboldt Creative Alliance, and Access Humboldt. Since 2005, she has served as staff to the City of Eureka's Art & Culture Commission, and sits on Eureka Main Street's Public Arts Committee.
Job Titles:
- Director of Special Initiatives
Lily began working with ACTA in 2005 as the Living Cultures Grants Program manager. In her 14 years with the organization she has contributed to the development of traditional arts roundtable series (TARS), Community Leadership Program, provided technical assistance, advocacy locally and nationally and has served on many review panels for arts funding. In her new capacity as Special Projects Manager, she will continue to bring her training in dance and anthropology (UCLA, Dance Ethnology) and many years of working with community based arts practice.
Job Titles:
- Founder and Executive Director, California Institute for Community, Art, and Culture / Founder and Former Publisher, Heyday / Berkeley, CA
Malcolm Margolin is an author, publisher, and cultural activist. In 1974, he founded Heyday Books, a nonprofit publisher, and served as its executive director until 2016. Through Heyday, he published hundreds of books and oversaw the creation of two magazines, News from Native California (1987) and Bay Nature(2001). He also co-founded The Alliance for California Traditional Arts and was helpful in the creation of several organizations devoted to California Indian cultural revival. He has written a half dozen books (including The Ohlone Way about Indian Life in the San Francisco Bay Area), and has won several prestigious awards. After retiring from Heyday, he created the California Institute for Community, Art, and Nature (California I CAN) to expand upon his interest, including the re-indigenization of California. He lives in Berkeley with his wife, Rina. His three children are grown and leading creative and engaged lives. Malcolm and Rina have four grandchildren and another on the way.
Job Titles:
- Institute Professor, Arizona State University / Los Angeles, CA
Job Titles:
- Member of the Emeritus Board
- Executive Director, Community Initiatives / San Francisco, CA
Job Titles:
- Member of the Emeritus Board
Master artist Natividad González Morales shares techniques of barro (clay) sculpting in the Eastern Coachella Valley as part of ACTA's Building Healthy Communities program. Photo: Quetzal Flores/ACTA.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Emeritus Board
- Student Advisor, Indian Tribal Education & Personnel Program / Humboldt State University / Arcata, CA
Job Titles:
- Founder / Principal, Art for Lunch / San Francisco, California
Job Titles:
- Associate Artistic Director, Khmer Arts
Job Titles:
- Member of the Emeritus Board
- Retired Instructor of Political Science & Chicano / Latino Studies, Fresno City College / Retired Administrator, Fresno City College / Kingsburg, CA
Job Titles:
- Worker
- Assistant Professor, UC Santa Cruz Department of Music / Santa Cruz, CA
Russell C. Rodríguez has extensive experience as a cultural worker, academic, and accomplished artist. He is currently an assistant professor in the Music Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He received his Ph.D. in 2006 from the department of Anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. In 2007, he became a University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellow. Rodríguez worked as a curator for the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage annual festival, co-curating the Latino Music Program in 2004, and has contributed to a variety of productions by the Smithsonian Folkways Recordings as a researcher, producer, annotator and musician. From 2011 through 2017 he worked as a program manager for the Alliance for California Traditional Arts, managing the Apprenticeship Program and contributing to scale programming that served the California cultural communities practicing traditional arts. Rodríguez is an accomplished musician, composer, and dancer specializing in performance styles of various traditional forms of Mexico. In 2010, he completed work as the assistant producer and musical director for the documentary La Danza Escenica: El Sello de Rafael Zamarripa,and contributed original compositions to Ray Tellez' documentary The Storm that Swept México.In 2013 Rodríguez composed an original score for the B. Traven's novel Macario and in 2018 the score for the original theater play La Departera, both for San Jose's premiere Chicano theater ensemble Teatro Vision. Both scores have been recorded and produced as CDs, featuring some of the finest mexicano and Chicana/o musicians in the California Bay Area.
Job Titles:
- Artistic Director of Siddhi Creative
Surabhi Bharadwaj, Artistic Director of Siddhi Creative and Siddhi Dance Academy, is a seasoned Bharatanatyam dancer, teacher, and choreographer trained under eminent Gurus including - Guru K M Raman, Guru Radha Sridhar, Guru B Bhanumati, and Mavin Khoo. She learnt the Karana movements under Dr. Padma Subrahmanyam and Guru Nirupama Rajendra. Surabhi holds an MFA in Bharatanatyam from Sastra University, Thanjavur and an MFA in Dance: Design and Production from Saint Mary's College of California. Since 2017, she has been freelancing as a dance lighting designer.
Surabhi is an Empanelled Artist of the Indian Council of Cultural Relations and is also recognized as a Graded Artist by Doordarshan (the National Broadcasting Channel of India). She has received accolades for her performances (both solo and ensemble) across India, USA, Europe, and the Middle East. She has worked as the Principal Dancer of Punyah Dance Company and Raadha Kalpa Dance Company (two leading Bharatanatyam companies in India) before moving to the USA in 2015.
Wearing multiple hats both on the creative and the management side, Surabhi has produced multidisciplinary works including ‘Ashrutam - The Unheard Voice' premiered in San Francisco in November 2019, ‘The Dream Tree' premiered in San Ramon in May 2022, and ‘The Maze' which is currently being developed. She has been supported by the Zellerbach Family Foundation Grant and the CA$H Grant in 2019 to develop and premiere her work. She continues to collaborate, create, and hopes to reach diverse communities through her work.
Suzanne began working with ACTA in 2005, and has served in varying capacities in the organization's administration and communications programs over the past 16 years. She has worked as ACTA's website and monthly newsletter editor, executive assistant, as well other roles in grants and program administration. She holds a degree in English from California State University, Fresno. Suzanne returned to ACTA in 2021 to serve as Executive Assistant.
Job Titles:
- Director, Los Paisanos Folklórico Dance Troupe / Retired Spanish Language Teacher, Selma High School / Selma, CA