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More about me:

 

Day to day work and other interests and experience…

I support myself with positive work as an office manager at an environmental & renewable energy company by day and have almost 20 years of experience at my job. As part of my work I also do marketing and maintain the website and social media accounts. Previously I was a freelance graphic designer, videographer, web-designer where I designed websites for several artists and businesses. After graduating from school, everything became digital and so I had to teach myself all these skills in order to pay rent. I didn't learn them at school. I learned on the job.

 

The Power of Art and Athletics

As a former triathlete I have also worked for at least a decade on open water sporting events as an assistant to the late Pedro Ordenes with Water World Swim, documenting our swimming events with video and social media. Digital storytelling helps to bolster the confidence of the athletes, giving them the encouragement to stick with their goals and introduce the sport to new people. Practicing visualization techniques of seeing yourself achieving your goal is a powerful practice that leads to transformation. Artists do this all the time. Being a witness to the transformation of others is quite an experience in itself.

California is a beautiful place to live. Being outdoors in the bay and on park trails is such a bonus for our mental health and well being and helps us gain more respect and concern for protecting the environment. This is why I also love painting landscapes.

 

Arts and The City

I love San Francisco and volunteering has helped me to learn more about the city. I have volunteered at several non-profit organizations including Back on my Feet, Project Open Hand, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition and as a GED tutor, meeting all kinds of caring people who are wonderful to be around. I started volunteering in the arts after the Pandemic because I wanted to reconnect with my own arts practice and with other artists to help rebuild the social networks that I feared we would lose. My weekly figure drawing sessions at Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts were suspended. The art school I attended, SFAI, closed on July 15, 2020 after 151 years of being a prestigious institution. This was a wake-up call for me. What was going to happen to the arts in our increasingly tech-driven society? Where is the artists’ voice and vision in the urban landscape and future planning?

 

The good news is the arts are rebounding, despite the obstacles, and want to help shine a light on the amazing work I see artists doing and the valuable role that the arts have in our city and in our lives. I’m currently volunteering at the San Francisco Women Artists Gallery, where I’m honored to be a member and have met many amazing artists in an inclusive, welcoming space. I also volunteer at Hayes Valley Art Works, a converted shipping container gallery inside a beautiful community garden. The unused lot was re-imagined and repurposed to be a valuable asset and green space to the surrounding neighborhood by a group of local artists, filled with flora, murals, sculpture, workshops and live music events.

 

We are currently facing critical obstacles right now with environment, politics and social disparity. I’m interested in seeing how we can address that with arts and activism.