Creative Support for Individuals-Round 1

Cristeta Boarini: Cristeta Boarini is a writer and fiber artist based in South Minneapolis. Originally from the Chicagoland area, Boarini graduated cum laude from the University of Minnesota in 2011. Boarini's entire professional career has focused on amplifying marginalized voices across Minnesota. As a journalist and often the only person of color in the newsroom, Boarini forged connections with and highlighted the growing immigrant communities in her storytelling. She won First Place awards from the Minnesota Newspaper Association and the Inland Press Association in 2014 for her reporting. Boarini's writing has been featured in local media outlets such as The Growler Magazine, bMag (Bush Foundation), MinnPost, and KFAI. She has also organized and led workshops with RadAzns. Boarini previously served on the boards of the Radio K Alumni Association and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council. Since 2018, Boarini has served as 826 MSP's Program Director. She identifies as a mixed race Asian American and White woman; David Hull: The recipient of a 2013 Traditional Arts grant, Dakota Dave Hull is an acclaimed acoustic guitarist, producer, and composer with well over 20 recordings to his credit. He's made the Twin Cities his home since 1969 performing with folks like the Sean Blackburn, Peter Ostroushko, Butch Thompson, Doc Watson, Dave Van Ronk, and many others. He was an early regular on "A Prairie Home Companion." More recently his playing has taken him all over the world with regular tours in Europe and Japan. He continues to compose and record, as well. ; Alexandra Lewis-Sadrant: Lewis-Sadrant grew up in Northeast Minneapolis and moved back after living in New York and in France for more than a decade. She works for a local nonprofit with a focus on education, and enjoys discovering artists and their work as a spectator and through volunteer opportunities with artistic organizations. She sings with her neighborhood choir and tries her hand at visual arts like watercolor painting, collage, and paper quilling.; Melanie Schmidt: Schmidt is currently the youth development program coordinator with Mankato Area Public Schools' (MAPS) Community Education and Recreation Department. She has been working for MAPS since 1996. She coordinates primarily enrichment opportunities for youth in grades K-12. She has long promoted and coordinated visual and performance arts through her work with MAPS. In addition to working with community education and recreation, she has supported regional arts as a board member with Prairie Lakes Regional Arts Council, managed Minnesota Poetry Out Loud regional and state contests, and arts specific grants for MAPS, as well as other local nonprofit groups. Finally, she is often spotted at Minnesota Service Cooperative Conferences leading conference sessions on topics such as readers theater.; Richard Sennott: His assignments have taken him into conflicts in Bosnia, El Salvador, Iraq, Afghanistan and the West Bank, and to disaster coverage of floods, tornados, forest fires and earthquakes. Sennott's, artful independent documentary work has earned him various awards in POYI, two McKnight Photography Fellowships a National Endowment for the Arts grant and the Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism gold medal for photography and writing for a story about Italy's convents . His work has been published in Life, Newsweek, Time Magazine, the New York Times and the National Geographic Traveler. ; Samantha Wisneski: Wisneski is communications associate at the Weisman Art Museum at the University of Minnesota, where she manages digital communications and oversees a team of student content creators. She has worked in various marketing, hospitality, and visitor services roles at arts organizations including the Ordway Center for Performing Arts, the O'Shaughnessy Auditorium, and the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival. She has an MA in art history and BA in art history and communication and journalism from the University of St. Thomas.