Photographer and filmmaker Aaron Wheetman’s fine art work has been described as cinematic and surreal, a blend of traditional documentary photography styles with fictional elements. His portrait series “between us” was featured at the Photographic Center Northwest and in his short film “Drift” took home best short at the Orcas Island Film festival. His work has appeared in the Seattle Times, the Ballard Art Walk and the Seattle International Film Festival.

Project Website

The Alchemy Tap Project is a Seattle-based performance company for serious tap dancers ages 16 and up. The company was founded on the principles of experimentation, entertainment, and excellence. Since its inception in 2012, ATP has become a regular on stages around the Pacific Northwest.

Project Website

Allies Left Behind follows the lives of Afghan refugees residing in Pakistan who helped the American-led war and reconstruction effort in Afghanistan. These Afghans served as policemen, intelligence officers, journalists, and human rights activists who partnered with the U.S. government to create a brighter future for the country. This film uncovers the difficulties these Afghans face in obtaining residency visas to the US despite promises from the US government. Leading civil society actors explain the bureaucratic challenges preventing quicker processing speeds, revealing the disturbing truth of how the U.S. failed to uphold its commitments.

We are raising funds for post-production and publicity for the project. We are hiring an editor, colorist, sound mixer, music producer, and graphics expert to help us finish the project. We are also hiring a publicist that will help spread the word about the film and ensure that we are raising the voices of the Afghan allies who were left behind by the U.S. government. With your help, we can continue our project to tell this critical story.

The community artists program is a collaborative venture among local for profit/non-profit organizations and local artists for the mutual goal of enhancing community, building good will, and creating a new sustainable business model.

Art in Suburbia is a nonprofit arts organization based in Waltham, MA whose mission is to provide art, education, and awareness to suburban communities for social impact. Founded in 2017, our objectives are to provide an outlet for artistic and creative expression and exploration, foster community engagement, and promote social and sustainable development through its mission-programs.

Barbara Noah is a hybrid works artist (painting, print, photography, digital art, sculpture, installations, public art). Barbara is the recipient of the Artist Trust Twining Humber Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, the Pollock/Krasner Grant, a Betty Bowen Merit Award from the Seattle Art Museum, two Faculty Excellence Awards from Cornish College of the Arts, and the Aurelia Henry Reinhardt Faculty Purse from Mills College. Her work also includes public art at locations such as the Canal Substation and Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

The Beyond: UFOs & A New Reality is a docuseries being developed by Ontocalypse Productions—a media company that leverages the arts to help people understand and integrate the emerging realities at the bleeding edge of science and culture. The recent US government admissions about the reality of UFOs, the rapid emergence of AI into our daily lives, and groundbreaking discoveries from the realms of quantum mechanics, consciousness studies, and more have all brought us to a tipping point in human history where we are ready to ask bigger questions about the nature of reality itself. By leveraging rich storytelling along with deep scholarship from top experts across fields, The Beyond is a docuseries that will help to build the scaffolding within the public consciousness on which this emerging future will be built. All donated funds will go directly to production costs for The Beyond.

Project Website

Dear Friends and Supporters,

Thank you for joining me on this exhilarating journey, where we embrace our planet's beauty while championing the human spirit's resilience. My name is Daniel A. Cardenas, and I'm honored to introduce you to my latest endeavor: "Beyond the Salish Sea," a documentary that explores the challenges facing this unique ecosystem and celebrates the hope and positivity driving positive change.

Close your eyes and envision a world where the Coastal Salish people thrived alongside a flourishing marine paradise—a world where the waters of the Salish Sea teemed with life, and the land echoed with the harmonious songs of nature. Now, open your eyes to today's reality: a world where these once-vibrant ecosystems are threatened by overpopulation, pollution, and the looming specter of climate change.

But amidst the challenges lies a glimmer of hope—a testament to the resilience of nature and the unwavering commitment of passionate individuals determined to make a difference. In "Beyond the Salish Sea," we will showcase the remarkable stories of citizen scientists, local activists, and community leaders spearheading innovative solutions to protect and preserve our planet's precious resources.

From innovative conservation projects to grassroots initiatives promoting sustainable living, our film will highlight the incredible strides being made to combat climate change and restore balance to our ecosystems. We'll celebrate the power of community, the ingenuity of human creativity, and the profound impact of collective action.

Through stunning cinematography and heartfelt storytelling, "Beyond the Salish Sea" will inspire audiences to believe in the possibility of a brighter future. We'll invite viewers to join us on a journey of discovery that transcends borders and bridges divides, uniting us in our shared responsibility to safeguard the planet we call home.

As a fiscally sponsored project of the Allied Arts Foundation, your support will enable us to amplify these voices of hope, resilience, and optimism. Together, let's rewrite the narrative of environmental decline into one of empowerment, renewal, and possibility.

So, are you ready to dive deeper, dream bigger, and join us on this extraordinary adventure? Together, let's prove that while the challenges may be daunting, the power of human ingenuity and compassion knows no bounds.

With boundless optimism and gratitude,
Daniel A. Cardenas

Black and Loud Fest & Tour is a Music Fest focused on celebrating the art and culture of black front bands playing music in genres outside the expected norms of traditional hip hop and R’n’B. Explains project founder Cameron Lavi-Jones who is the frontman of his own black fronted band King Youngblood, “ Our vision is to create space for black fronted bands and artists playing everything from Afro-Punk to Rock to Alternative Soul, Alternative Pop, to Spoken Word to pretty much anything but what the main stream music industry expects from black artists. Black and Loud Fest and the touring we are also creating with the brand are a great beautiful for black people and really everyone to celebrate the rainbow of creativity that is Black artists. Donating helps us make it so more people that look like me are seen and heard. This is important not just for Black people but for everyone. Diversity is the core of culture. Black and Loud is a key part of the cultural mosaic we so so so must elevate especially so that we are putting our money where our mouth is when we say Black Lives Matter.

Project Website

Café Racer Seattle is an organization that operates a live music venue and an internet radio station. We are focused on creating community around the love of music and art. We have created a “genre fluid” environment with a focal point on DIY and emerging artists from youth, LGBTQ, BIPOC, and other underserved communities. Our online radio station features music exclusively from Washington State musicians, and our music venue, located in the heart of the Capitol Hill Arts District of Seattle, provides access to live music experiences for all (including our underage population), presented by artists from our localized region and around the world.

Our mission is to have a safe space for people of all ages to come together and create, explore and share art and music of all genres in a welcoming, community setting in the heart of a Seattle neighborhood where music and art are embodied.

Project Website

Cook on Clay is a woman-owned artisan manufacturing ceramics studio. Co-founded by Robbie Lobell and Maryon Attwood, Cook on Clay is dedicated to educating and mentoring younger women in studio arts, artisan-based manufacturing, and sustainable small business practices.

Their Zakin Apprenticeship offers training for emerging potters to develop skills and experience in studio practice, pottery design, business, and manufacturing.

David T Phung is a musician, trained as an architect and storyteller originally from Palm Springs, CA. He has the ability to traverse different worlds and connect with people from different groups and cultures. Social circles are his canvas, objects are his tools, and artifacts are the social proof of connection; architecture is the place to experience things together.

He believes that technology is the key to reconnecting humanity with its senses, culture, and space. As a social connector, David imagines and brings together different social circles to collaborate and overlap on-location, online, and onchain. His work and passion serves to bring us together, to elevate our senses, so we can change the world for the better.

D&G Dance Company provides dance classes for youth and adults in Hiphop, Jazz, Lyrical, Breakdancing and Ballet. They are an inclusive, passionate group of teachers that care about each other as a dance family.

The Design Lecture Series, produced by Civilization, brings world-class designers to the stage to share their knowledge for free. Its aim is to stimulate conversation around design, share its rich history and inspire our communities. Posters from the series have won multiple print awards and are included in SFMOMA’s permanent collection.

Project Website

Doll Fest is a celebration of the feminine energy, friendship, and gathering together of a community in support of one another. We recognize that femme-dom is a powerhouse feeling, emotion, and revolution in action. Following the footsteps of previous incarnations of feminine fests such as Lilith Fair and She Shreds, Doll Fest aims to be the next femme-fronted music and arts festival showcasing two full days of femmes, and femme-fronted bands and artists, including pioneering bands that brought the Riot Grrl movement to life and active bands today that are paving the legacy of grrl power. 

We are still battling for true equality against the archaic non-values of patriarchy, still fighting for the power over our own bodies, and still proving our worth as voices to be heard. Doll Fest intends to bring together like-minded folx who embody the true spirit of Doll Fest - through empowerment, resilience, and nurturing of communities. We are anti-homophobic, anti-transphobic, anti-racist, anti-police violence and strictly anti-fascist. Let’s rise up the dolls in March 2025!

EARTHRISER is a climate change film composed of two parts: “Love Song For A Wailing Earth” and “Dance Of A Future Climate Refugee.” The film features Seattle-based dancer Allegra Searle-LeBel, renowned mediamaker Cole Rise, and an award-winning Pacific Northwest production team.

The first part, “Love Song For A Wailing Earth,” is about one woman’s climate grief, expressed through her dance in a Washington old-growth forest. This project is currently in production, to be released worldwide on the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day (April 22, 2020).

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Embrace Diversity in America Art Project is being produced by Janice Maria Alexander, artist, author, and president of Artistic Angels Corporation. The project’s mission is to contribute to the goal of reducing hate crimes in America and helping to unify our nation by bringing an artistic awareness to the beauty and blessings of multiculturalism.

Project Website

Fremont Fridays is a free music series that centers BIPOC voices and vendors for 11 straight weeks in the heart of Seattle's Fremont neighborhood from June 23rd through September 1st. This outdoor event is on its third summer and has economically empowered 150 performers, 75 vendors and the surrounding businesses. This year we aim to take the production and impact of Fremont Fridays to the next level and with the help of Allied Arts we know we can raise the funds to keep Fremont Fridays FREE!

Project Website

The Paragon is a large public art piece on the Duwamish, created in 2001 by artist Donald Fels (www.artisthinker.com) in collaboration with many people and institutions. At 3/5 scale, it is modeled after the Paragon, a wooden halibut schooner, built in 1923 in Seattle by immigrant fisherpersons. The original Paragon worked the waters of Alaska for 90 years.

The wooden boat frame, made of old-growth fir reclaimed from beams taken from a Puget Sound warehouse, was lofted in Tacoma at Bates Technical College by boatwrights Capt. Mike Vlahovich and Chuck Graydon, and their students. The 50’ long ‘boat’ floats 35’ above W Marginal Way on a sculptural base of steel and concrete. Beneath the boat are panels narrating the story of the site, those who lived there over the centuries, and the creation of the boat itself. It was recently discovered that the wooden frame is infested with carpenter ants and is rotting. It will have to come down. Working with the community of West Seattle, the Duwamish Tribe, whose Longhouse is across the street, and several arts, historical and maritime heritage organizations, Fels is spearheading a project to build a replacement for the wooden boat frame, and to renew what has become a community treasure. It will be a broad collaborative effort, just as was its creation over twenty years ago. He is donating his time working on the project, and there will be much volunteer help. Nonetheless, there will be substantial hard costs. Friends of the Paragon now exists to raise those funds.

Sinners, a play by veteran Israeli dramatist Joshua Sobol, is a theatrical protest against heinous fact: the stoning of women to death in Iran and other Middle Eastern countries. The play’s setting is stark and startling: Layla, a married professor of English, is buried over her waist in the desert sand. She is about to be stoned because of accusations she had an adulterous affair with one of her married students, who, out of guilt, talked about the tryst to the authorities.

This project is working to bring this powerful and important theatrical work to new audiences.

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From Within Nucleus is a not for profit organization that organizes professional dance shows using Bharatanatyam dance technique.

From Within Academy is their own dance school, sharing Bharatanatyam instruction and spreading the true traditions of Indian art and culture throughout diverse communities.

Snohomish photographer Gregory Kemmis has been involved with multiple creative photography and music projects for over a decade, including album cover artwork design.

Project Website

Hearts of the Dulcimer is both a podcast and a feature-length documentary film about the mountain dulcimer.

Artists Patricia Delich and Wayne Jiang are now seeking funding to create a docuseries which will provide the general public with an entertaining and in-depth introduction to the dulcimer, while affirming its cultural position to dulcimer enthusiasts.

The docuseries will combine footage from live performances, archival material, travelogues, on-location interviews, narrative animation, and motion graphics.

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Rap and video artist Rio Da the Profit is creating a modern-day upcoming clothing line that involves a mixture of A.I., envisioning the future of the industry for the 22nd century.

Project Website

Founded by Loolwa Khazzoom, the band Iraqis in Pajamas fuses ancient Iraqi Jewish prayers with original punk rock and personal storytelling, singing in Judeo-Arabic, Hebrew, and English. In turn vulnerable and angry, haunting and inspiring, the band disarms audiences, opening listeners to deep contemplation about trauma, healing, and transformation. The band is fundraising to produce and promote a full-length double album, Punk iRock: The first CD will be the original version of the 10 Iraqi Jewish prayers, and the second CD will be these prayers sung in all their punk rock glory.

Project Website

Karma Collaborative provides coaching, consulting, facilitation, and practical guides to help shift the way we think, feel, talk, act and essentially tell stories about our lives.

“Our skilled practitioners facilitate change, cultivate possibilities and open the flow of creativity, leading to the generation of new ideas and innovation for the emerging paradigm.”

A certified professional food photographer, Kayako also takes time out for photographic art, such as her recent “One Food / One Month” project.

Cameron Lavi-Jones is a University of Washington Communications Major graduate, award-winning, musical artist, producer, sound engineer, songwriter, bandleader of his alt-rock band King Youngblood, multi-instrumentalist, graphic designer, film maker, and the executive director of his own non-profit project – Hold Your Crown, fiscally sponsored by the Allied Artist Foundation. He recently graduated with honors with a communications degree from the University of Washington where he focused on marginalized communities, BIPOC social justice issues, and the democratization of media. He has organized BIPOC musical teach-ins in and around the Pacific Northwest. He is one of the founders of the popular podcast The Revolution Will Be Harmonized on Spotify and Apple Music. Lavi-Jones is also working long hours as the youngest senior sound engineer/producer/writer/session musician of a major recording studio in the greater Seattle area at Robert Lang Studios and Studio Sage– both - state-of-the-art multi-track facilities in Seattle, WA. He is also a partner of Dreaming In Color Entertainment LLC and its wholly-owned subsidiary - DICE LAB.

The focus of his project is threefold: 1) propel his music career through his band King Youngblood into the largest market share possible both in the traditional music industry and the Web 3 realm; 2) produce compelling music for traditional fans and NFT collectors offering collectible audio and visual digital art, vinyl, merchandise and other formats of King Youngblood’s music; 3) produce the Black and Loud Fest and tours with his team to elevate King Youngblood and other black fronted alternative music artists and bands regionally, nationally and internationally to assure that his motto all boats rise when the water rises is visualized and actualized.

Hold Your Crown is an ongoing project founded by rising Seattle alt-rock band, King Youngblood (formerly Gypsy Temple), that focuses on breaking the stigma that many young people from middle school through college-age and young adults face when they live with a mental illness.

Project Website

Founded by Danielle Evelena Doell and Leah Crosby, LanDforms Dance’s often funny, sometimes tragic, always unusual performances explore the absurdities of human relationships, nostalgia, and the intersections of power, control, and love.

Eli Ives of Lumikalai Film is producing Colour Creates Light: A Diaspora in Four Films, an international series of feature-length documentary films related to the atelier of painter Hans Hofmann (1880-1966). The teaching at the Hans Hofmann School of Fine Arts, permutated through the lives of three alumnae, offers a conduit into the heart of the visual creative process.

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Founded by Lee Mozena of Zena Consulting in Redmond, WA, the Malikah Festival brings the elegance and nuance of modest fashion out of mosques and private homes, and into a public venue. It also shatters simplistic stereotypes about families who practice modesty as a form of dress and lifestyle choice, using arts and culture as a vehicle to bring citizens together.

Annabel Quintero, M.Ed., Bgirl, bestselling author, and holistic guide with RUNA Empowerment programming is committed to reshaping artistic diversity, equitable wellness, and economic inclusion. By celebrating Afro-Indigenous Latino history through dynamic collaborations, we trace the socio-political journey from Mambo to Hip Hop, creating immersive experiences that foster cultural understanding and transformative dialogue. Our mission is to empower communities to build sustainable incomes through art, ensuring that the stories of the past inspire artistic innovation, economic inclusivity, and lasting empowerment for generations to come.

Marcia Marcus: Art in the Family is a feature-length documentary film which explores the life of an artist working during the fertile decades of post-war America, the beginnings of performance art in the 1960’s, through the Feminist Art Movement of the 1970s and beyond.

Project Website

The Hero’s Journey Campaign is an ongoing project founded by rising Seattle Funk-Hop group know as the Marshall Law Band (MLB). The campaign focuses on creating hero’s in our own lives and community. The MLB aims to make an impact on a variety of issues including homelessness, mental health, youth mentorship and environmental awareness.

Project Website

The Migration Project is making migration visible through art exhibitions. To date, it has included three displays of the portfolio Migration Now published by Just Seeds and Culture Strike.

LA-based, Trinidad-born artist Miles Regis is prolific in both fine art and fashion design. Regis freely swaps the materials and languages of each to enrich the other. His large-scale mixed media paintings on canvas and linen incorporate dimensional collage elements of denim, buttons, leather, printed matter, sequins, and patches of eclectically sourced found textiles along with his dextrous, gestural, richly hued abstract and figurative painting techniques. Aggressively hopeful and humanistic, Regis embraces a storytelling stance in his stylized renditions of fundamental scenes of love, loss, freedom, survival, activism, and living history.

Project Website

The mission of Miss Africa Washington State Pageant is to pave the way for a new generation of young African women leaders and to instill into them the culture of giving.

The competition has produced more than 30 confident, more assertive and goal driven women. Today, Miss Africa Washington State has grown to be the largest African pageant in the Northwest, bringing many communities together.

Modulation Institute is a safe space for Trans & Non-Binary individuals to receive 1:1 private vocal training from any location. Modulation Voice is designed for us to work together as a team on vocal feminization, vocal masculinization, and non-binary vocal expression in speech or singing.

Museum Without Walls’ objective is to inspire the next generation to become social justice leaders who will ignite change in their communities. We do this by providing the unique opportunity to hear first hand accounts of intolerance and racism at the site where it was experienced.

Non-Breaking Space is a not-for-profit exhibition space created by the design firm Civilization and devoted to showcasing important works of graphic design.

Nothing Novel is a project produced by Mary Maguire, a multi-disciplinary artist from Detroit, MI.

Nrityalaya School of Dance was founded by Vidyalakshmi Vinod in 2002 in the greater Seattle area to teach students the ancient Indian classical dance, Bharatanatyam.

The school strives to impart quality dance education and disciplined training to its students and help them grow into professional classical dancers.

Nrityenakatha is devoted to showcasing the captivating tales of ancient Indian literature through the language of dance. We intertwine Kuchipudi and Garba/Raas to create our own unique dance style. Dances are set to vibrant soundtracks in the semi-classical, Hindustani genre.

Open Flight Studio (OFS) is a space for performance-based artists to research, experiment, develop, teach, dialog and perform. OFS strives to maintain a neutral space that is affordable and accessible to enable the goals, pursuits and interests of individual artists, groups and art advocates.

Paul Kikuchi is a musician, activist, and educator whose work is informed by highly diverse influences — from his roots as a rock drummer to his experience as a Feldenkrais practitioner — as well as his research into Japanese-American history in the Pacific Northwest.

Project Stained Glass was created to rethink the way music is funded, created, distributed, and ultimately contextualized and experienced in an ever-increasingly digital world where algorithms homogenize art. Our goal is to spark a music patronage movement to shift culture by enabling artists to purely create outside the current constraints of the modern music industry.

Public Goods is the ongoing exploration of the intersection of art and technology by community organizer, theorist, multimedia artist & musician Yuri Rybak. Yuri’s work examines the ways in which the internet is redefining the production and distribution of culture in the 21st century. Public Goods explores the emerging school of thought known as ‘platform theory’ which is concerned with the limits of current paradigms for cultural distribution on the internet and hopes to imagine more equitable and productive models.

Over the course of the coming year, Public Goods will deploy their grant to document and explore a variety of online cultural communities and creators. We will author and distribute a newsletter (titled Public Goods) highlighting communities and individuals doing exciting work at the intersection of technology and culture. This will be electronically released and then compiled and printed into a physical zine. We will commission, print and distribute a Zine & LP from the $Crash community, an onchain collective of artists, designers & musicians exploring the meaning of air travel and theories around its cultural position. Lastly, this funding will support a series of ambient musical works that will be released onchain and later as an LP by Public Goods founder Yuri Rybak. The process of making and distributing this work will be covered in the newsletter.

Quest of Life Media & Broadcast produces QLRadio, a 24/7 streaming internet station devoted to the music of the LGBTQ global community.

QLRadio strives to expose the world to and market the music of LGBTQ Independent Singers/Songwriters/Musicians. Listeners from over 23 countries around the world have visited QLRadio.

Rain City Relief is an arts funding program created by Adam Simon of Sinking City Apparel to help Seattle-area musicians through the promotions and sales and of music albums.

Robert Lang Studios Academy offers programs structured for students to understand and respect the recording studio environment, as well as develop an understanding of how to best use the spaces and tools available to make their career in the studio industry.

From the early Northwest sound of the Sonics and 15 year old Kenny G, to Nirvana’s final studio recording, to today’s finest musicians like Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, Robert Lang Studios continues to expand, create and inspire!

Rravan Productions Performing Arts Program meets the needs of persons with different abilities and different learning styles, of all ages, by teaming up with community artist and presenting musical comedy productions to its audiences.

Annabel Quintero is a visionary storyteller to help others heal. She is a September 11th survivor and creates trauma-informed spaces dedicated to public service and community empowerment. As a certified holistic health coach and cultural wellness guide, she creates safe spaces for communities to experience Andean Indigenous wisdom, helping them remember their wholeness and reconnect with Mother Earth.

Through her work with RUNA Empowerment programming, Annabel is committed to reshaping artistic diversity, equitable wellness, and economic inclusion. She celebrates Afro-Indigenous Latino history by forging dynamic collaborations that create immersive experiences, fostering cultural understanding and transformative dialogue. Her mission is to empower leaders and communities to build harmony in their relationships, wellness, and lasting empowerment for generations to come.

Founded by famed football running back Robert Turbin, Runnin4U allows Robert to continue his passion for community service, help fund the research and treatment of Multiple Sclerosis and Cerebral Palsy, and to supply the Irvington High athletic teams with safety and field equipment, uniforms, first-aid, coaching and training assistance. Runnin4U will be partnering with a Seattle music station to promote local musicians.

Project Website

Award-winning filmmaker, writer and journalist Scott A. Capestany is producing The Rainforest, a film about a group of international explorers that set off into the heart of a mysterious rainforest in search of an ancient lost civilization while attempting to solve and uncover the truth about an ancient mystical tribal legend that protects its rumored existence.

SEATTLE CINEMATOGRAPHY WORKSHOP is produced by Danczmode/Hallie Aldrich. This one-day, monthly shoot is a creative crewing mentorship workshop for emerging and professional filmmakers to work together through small creative projects. Using a “mock set” environment, a mentee crew is invited shoots a mini script, or scene, shadowed by professional mentors. Each month is led by a revolving team of Directors and Photography and Directors, two mentees and two mentors. The project is designed to provide a space for experimental making where community members build connections, share professional rental equipment and resources, and collaborate through creative and technical problem solving in a low pressure, non-commercial environment. Suggested donations from participants fund venue rental, equipment insurance, and lunch). Donations from other supporters sponsor participants who opted to contribute on the lower end of the sliding scale.

DANCZMODE is a performance media dance company owned by Hallie Aldrich, dancer, choreographer, and visual media artist. Aldrich is a born/raised local dancer and choreographic movement designer who has worked regionally and internationally. She returns to AAF’s roster to continue her work in visual media installations, dance films, and performance projects with a Mobile Performance Dwelling, aka the “Dance Pod” which she designed and built.

SEATTLE CREATES is a youth focused initiative providing FREE monthly, in-person workshops and immersive training sessions that foster support for interdisciplinary careers in Arts, Tech, and Creative industries. Our core focus is to develop professional skillsets, strengthen regional innovation, and build pathways of access for any person, regardless of age, who is interested in pursuing a creative career in Seattle. Our ultimate goal is to support the greater creative economy and build community connections that allow everyone to thrive.

Open to the public every 2nd Thursday of the month, workshop attendees have the opportunity to immerse themselves in a creative community and networking playground as we open up various studios located throughout the SLU campus of Cornish College of the Arts. With first hand access to industry leading professionals and business development resources, workshop participants glean insights from cross-industry panels (arts + tech), interactive presentations, robust conversations, and breakout groups. In addition to the workshops, we provide FREE access to business coaching sessions, complimentary drop-in classes, job fairs, cultural events, and field trip invitations to attend Open Studios and Gallery spaces as an extension of the program.

This series is produced by T.O.N.E. with the support of our core partners: Cornish College of the Arts, Business 101 for the Creative Entrepreneur, Seattle Office of Economic Development, and Women in Tech REGATTA.

Seattle World Tour Foundation‘s mission is to build a more equitable and healthy community by helping to provide funding and programing to underserved communities. They unite artists, businesses and community members through unique events, programs and concerts.

Project Website

The mission of SOLA (“Support of Old Lady Artists”) is to award cash grants to female visual artists over 60 who are currently working and living in Washington State and have created a body of work spanning at least 25 years.

The SOLA Award honors accomplished yet under-recognized women artists for their dedication and persistence.

Project Website

South Sound Baroque Orchestra is a group of local musicians that began meeting in September of 2015 with the intent of performing concerts in and around the Seattle area. Because of their instrumentation, their musical selections will generally come from the baroque period and will include composers such as Bach, Handel, Haydn, Vivaldi and others.

Project Website

My work is about themes that everyone can relate to on some level: rejecting conformity, embracing authenticity, and finding the connections between healing ourselves and building the world we want.

Sometimes, when I’m stuck on where a musical idea belongs, I’ll write lyrics from the perspective of a fictional character and see where that takes me. I love this approach because I tend to obsess over stories: telling them, absorbing them, analyzing them. It doesn’t really matter as long as I’m immersed. I’ve written songs that started out as screenplays and the beginnings of musicals that I originally thought were novels. It all makes me ridiculously happy.

Project Website

TASWIRA is not only a premier African art gallery and event space; it is a visionary hub for cultural exchange and community engagement. Our mission transcends mere presentation; we aim to cultivate a world where artists and businesses thrive together, fostering a vibrant tapestry where African heritage is celebrated and integrated into Seattle's societal fabric.

Within 2000 square feet, our versatile space serves as a nexus for in-person experiences and unique merchandise reflecting a rich tapestry of BIPOC- owned businesses. In addition to showcasing revolving collections of historical artifacts and contemporary works, TASWIRA is committed to curating modern expressions of the past and present. We dedicate ourselves to cultural programming centered around health and wellness, youth empowerment, and education about African heritage.

Standing as a cultural beacon in Pioneer Square, our diverse array of programming enriches the community experience in numerous ways. From live performing arts to engaging youth initiatives, from health and wellness workshops to exclusive events, we offer a dynamic platform supplementing African heritage often erased from curriculums.

Our flagship youth empowerment programs inspire and uplift the next generation of leaders and creatives through mentorship and hands-on learning experiences. By fostering pride in heritage, we empower them to become agents of change.

Our commitment to holistic wellness extends from physical to mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being. Through unique partnerships, we offer workshops that provide attendees with valuable tools for self-care and growth.

In addition to regular programming, TASWIRA opens its doors to the public for private and public events to celebrate within our exhibitions. We’ve seen the gallery serve as a host for building stronger teams, holding space for community dialogue, fundraising for youth resources, and highlighting remarkable artists and small businesses. These opportunities foster important connection, reflection, and celebration.

Ultimately, TASWIRA is a living testament to the power of art and culture to transform lives and communities. Through our initiatives, we create a space where people of all backgrounds learn, connect, and celebrate the beauty and diversity of the African diaspora. As we grow, we remain committed to promoting cultural exchange, fostering community engagement, and uplifting Black/African artists and innovators.

Program Website

Tatiana Bacchus, Owner/Senior Producer of Teaspoon & Pound Media, LLC, is an emerging independent filmmaker, who curates the ancestral wisdom of invisible characters by telling their untold stories.

Tatiana is currently working on her first feature length documentary, Freedom Denied, which posthumously tells the story of Jean-Baptiste Edvard Pierre’s near decade-long battle for political asylum in the United States, as told by the attorneys and community activists who fought for his freedom.

Project Website

The Firehouse Arts and Events Center is a local, regional and national venue for the performing arts, and is dedicated to connecting the community with the arts.

Located in a Bellingham, WA, renovated historic 1927 Fire Station, the Firehouse offers space for classes, workshops and performances. The Firehouse is home to many fine local artists and strives to be a quality affordable venue for the smaller performing arts groups so they have a space to teach, learn, and perform, allowing them opportunities they cannot otherwise afford.

Project Website

Like many classical performance majors, Seattle indie-folk musician Ellie Barber, now known as Ollella (oh-lel-uh), spent her college years performing in juries at the end of each semester. A jury is a rigorous assessment—a solo performance in a concert hall where students showcase pieces before a panel of judges to evaluate a musician's skill and progress. Barber remembers these starkly:

"I grew up playing the cello immersed in the culture of classical music, which is rooted in perfectionism—you are taught to seek perfect intonation, perfect shifts, perfect tone. You're essentially graded on how well you can replicate someone else’s creative work. During a jury, even a minor mistake—a note landing slightly sharp or a shift lagging during a quick passage—would cause my mental state to crumble. The entire performance felt ruined; I would self-sabotage. It felt over."

This mindset is what Barber confronts in her sophomore release, Antifragile. Now leading an indie-folk band as a singing-cellist, the innovative nature of her craft has taught her to embrace the imperfections in her process. “I’ve gotten really good at messing up,” she confesses playfully. With few examples to look to while developing her sound, Barber’s experimentation has led to a unique blend of her influences, ranging from the delicacy of acoustic folk to the grit of alt-rock. Antifragile explores the fear and excitement of pursuing an uncharted path, and the mental resilience that emerges as a result of it.

Ollella is a two-time finalist in the NPR Tiny Desk Contest (2022, 2024), and her 2023 debut album received acclaim from KEXP, Spotify editorial playlists, Glide Magazine, Atwood Magazine, and earned a spot as KRCL's #18 album of 2023. Antifragile is a maturation of her debut, deepening her collaboration with producer and multi-instrumentalist Jordan Cunningham while introducing new talents such as Sean Lane on drums (Heart, Perfume Genius) and horn arrangements from Willem de Koch (Fleet Foxes, The Westerlies). 

Andi Stover is a play-write, screen play writer, project manager and nonprofit development specialist. Her newest project The Passion of KellyAnne promises to be incredibly compelling. Donations will be used to produce the play and promote for a first production. Please give generously – the goal is to raise $10,000 in the next 30 days from October 10,2024.

Rae Isla is an independent singer-songwriter and pioneer in the web3 music space, having generated 100 ETH (~52 million Spotify streams) between her collections and attended festivals around the world to present her music and ideas. Classically trained in cello, then studying voice as well as business at Berklee College of Music, Rae launched her career as an indie musician in Brooklyn, NY, collaborating on early releases with producer Gianluca Buccelati (Lana Del Rey, Arlo Parks). She went on to self-produce and release her first EP while becoming a staple in NYC’s indie live music scene, frequenting clubs like Rough Trade and SoHo House. Rae’s music has been featured in Rolling Stone, Billboard, Complex, and more. Her debut album “Another Life” was the 27th most added record in the world on NACC Charts. Rae has returned to the West Coast after a year in Mexico City, and is gearing up to release her sophomore album while traveling to perform, advise music platforms, and build a local & global community of true music fans.

The Seattle Drum School of Music (SDSM) is a cornerstone of musical education in the Seattle region, fostering creativity and skill development for students of all ages and abilities for nearly 40 years. Established in 1986 by Steve Smith, Steve and his wife Kristy Smith (both lifelong instructors at the school) grew this family-owned institution into a comprehensive music education hub with two Seattle locations and a team of over 40 professional musician instructors. As a fiscally sponsored project of the Allied Arts Foundation, SDSM benefits from a supportive framework that enhances its mission to provide top-tier musical education to a diverse community of aspiring musicians.

The SongCatchers were formed in the late 1980s in Seattle, Washington during an impromptu musical improvisation of the Lara Lavi band and the intertribal Native American singing and drumming group the White Eagle Singers led by Arlie Neskahi, Dine` (Navajo) at the original Crocodile venue. The SongCatchers’ musical sound is a fusion of Native American intertribal singing and drumming with rock, jazz, alternative pop music and spoken word. The group’s sound is one of a kind integrating intertribal vocables into the core of the songs without watering down the impact of their melodies and meaning. The founding members are Lara Lavi, Mark Cardenas, Arlie Neskahi and Charles Neville of the Neville Brothers. Since forming, they have toured the world with Peter Gabriel, The Band, and the Neville Brothers to name a few, won two Native American Grammys, performed at literally every larger Reserve and Reservation in North America, signed to A&M records at one point in their career, bought their masters back, held on to their publishing, took breaks, lost members to cancer and covid and simply continued to find ways to create. The SongCatchers have now re-grouped with three generations of musicians both on the band side and the Native singers side despite decades of challenges. They are considered in Indian Country to be the first band to significantly pave the way for Native American fusion music with popular genres in a way that tribal elders support as music that has proved to be an evolution of a living culture for Native American music and culture. In 2002, the late Robbie Robertson of The Band and his own solo career once told Rolling Stone Magazine “The SongCatchers have transformed the way we Native people think of Indian vocables - they have integrated these ancient songs and sound into hook lines, powerful centerpieces of deeply profound compositions giving all of us a license to explore what is possible in a real cultural conversation between Native Americans and the rest of us.”

Now in 2023 going into 2024-2025 after the loss of Mark Smith, Shoshone, to Covid in 2020, Charles Neville to pancreatic cancer in 2018 and in the wake of a changing world in need of the spiritual musical goodness the SongCatchers’ music offers, the SongCatchers are back with three generations of members – the sons and daughters of some of the founders – and a focused approach to live performance, recording, cultural education and youth engagement.

The SongCatchers future vision is to be an artistic group that can bridge the crevasse between tribal communities that often isolate from their non-Native neighbors and the broader community of arts and culture community members and music lovers within and outside BIPOC communities. Working with the Seattle Symphony is a significant part of this vision of connection and evolution of Native American living culture vision.

Now the SongCatchers seek to partner with the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe and other interested Tribes where possible to develop and sustain a long term program that engages tribal youth and young adults in arts and culture. The vision for engaging youth is to a real world program that has something for every participating young person. If they play an instrument, they can perform, if they can write – they can handle working on press outreach, if they want to learn how to record in a world class studio, they can be part of the production team, if they want to learn how to be a film maker, they can be part of the filmmaking team etc.

The SongCatchers plan to raise money through grants, donations from Tribes and local government and individual donations.

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Thistle conjures wonderfully strange creations and challenges our codified perception of history and lore. Thistle's work blooms at the intersection of theater and concert dance, using movement as our primary language to bridge the gap between audience and artistry.

Thistle Dance creates movement based storytelling for the stage and screen that celebrates the unexamined or overlooked. We use movement as our primary language, to reflect the nuance and complexities in the world around us. The cannon is being re-evaluated for biases, and as we re-examine our facts, we should re-explore our fiction.

Sculptor and musician Timm Duffy’s career includes over 25 years as a sculptural fabricator and designer for the film industry, as well as work with Directors Guild of America and Frank Gehry Associates. His work, mostly in bronze, celebrates ideas and emotions, form and shapes, abstraction and textures, and dreams and stories.

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Westmoreland Performing Arts, located in Greensburg, PA, promotes physical and emotional well-being through performing arts classes and live performances that take place in a safe, accepting and non-judgmental environment. They give students of all backgrounds and beliefs the skills to become independent, creative thinkers, critical problem solvers, and successful collaborators. They mentor, support, protect and encourage, a respectful and professional community, where each student’s creative potential can be explored.

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With Love, Solé is a movement of the healing arts. Curated by founder Nika Solé, the organization is designed to bring healing around the world by way of mobilizing healers and wellness practitioners, talks and lectures given by wellness experts, and art projects created for the healing of all people everywhere. Empowering people with both the knowledge and first-hand experience of mind, body, soul revival.

Words of a King is an initiative to bring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s words to younger generations through hip hop, related visuals, and curricula.

Co-written by Katherine Lynn Nemeth and Cameron Lavi-Jones, the song, “Words of a King,” is based as closely as possible on quotes from Dr. Martin Luther King’s speeches using rap and gospel style with a hip hop beat. The final version of the song and visuals will be broadcast quality for worldwide distribution. “Words of a King” is performed by 21-year-old activist, producer, and artist Cameron Lavi-Jones.

Katherine Lynn Nemeth is an artist, educator, and visionary, who is passionately intent to reach every school-age young person in America. “My goal is for every child, whether BIPOC or Caucasian, to feel the elevation and enlightenment through this song and visuals to effect the powerful social change we need now and in the future.”

Zinnia TV provides online content channels with artful videos to help people with dementia feel engaged and connected.

Even the most dedicated care partners rely on TV at times to occupy the person living with dementia. But standard programming created for healthy brains can trigger distress for a person who is no longer able to track a plot, tell fiction from reality, or track rapidly moving images and sounds. Zinnia’s content channels feature familiar faces, subjects, and sounds.

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