Creative Individuals-Round 2

Michael Brown: Brown is the founder of Como Lake Marketing Partners, a consulting firm providing strategic and marketing advice to arts and other nonprofit organizations. It seeks to help these organizations build community through shared values and understanding. Clients include the St. Paul Art Collective, The Phipps Center for the Arts, Skylark Opera Theatre, the Saint Paul Art Crawl, the City of Big Lake. Past experience includes director of community relations and marketing at Target, and VP of marketing and branding at GREATER MSP. In addition to working with organizations, Brown is an actor and frequent volunteer with arts organizations. He has a BS from Marquette University and MBA from the Carlson School of Management.; Anitra Budd: Budd is an experienced editor, copywriter, educator, and public speaker whose clients include Fortune 500 corporations, literary publishers, marketing agencies, universities, and local and national magazines. Over her career, she?s presented on publishing and editing topics at a variety of venues, including State University of New York?Binghamton, Hamline University, and the Minnesota Book Publishers Roundtable, and has made guest appearances on MPR News with Kerri Miller. She has taught at Macalester College and the University of Minnesota, and currently teaches in the creative writing MFA program at the University of Nevada?Reno. She holds BA and MA degrees from University of Minnesota Twin Cities.; Lisa Horton: Horton has been working in the arts in Minnesota since the early 1990s, particularly in theater tech and in music, but also making wearable art for display and sale. Currently she volunteers as a stitcher with the costume shop at the Norshor Theater/Duluth Playhouse. She also holds a PhD in medieval literature and has taught at the University of Minnesota Duluth since 2011.; Tanya Juarez-Sweeney: Juarez-Sweeney has worked in various creative roles for more than 30 years?writer, art director, graphic designer, videographer, and in post-production. She was part of the team that launched the Star Studio television program at Children?s Minnesota. During that time, Juarez-Sweeney had the privilege of partnering with many local arts organizations such as COMPAS, McPhail, and Children?s Theatre. After fifteen years at Children?s and completing her master?s in technical communication, Juarez-Sweeney moved on to Calabrio, Inc. where she is currently a senior designer in the Learning Studio striving to create beautifully useful video content.; Riley Kleve: Kleve is an emerging textile artist and educator. They have created art and classes for Northern Spark, The Weavers Guild of Minnesota, American Swedish Institute, and Textile Center. Kleve volunteers with the Weavers Guild as a state fair spinning demonstrator and group coordinator for the Whorling Spinsters. They run a small business in the arts, Better Days Yarn Co. Kleve has a BA in studio art and curatorial practice from Hampshire College.; Brook LaFloe: LaFloe (Turle Mountain Band of Chippewa) grew up in the Twin Cities of Minnesota and is an artist-educator and entrepreneur with passion for revitalizing culture and facilitating the growth of local Indigenous economies. LaFloe was born into the Eagle clan and descends from the Bear clan. Her academic background includes a Tulane University bachelorof science degree in neuroscience and anthropology, a Loyola University of Maryland master?s in education, and two Association Montessori International (AMI) diplomas in assistance to infancy (birth-3 years) and primary (3-6 years). LaFloe has eight years of experience in educational material making and many years in beadwork and sewing.; Jeanne Lutz: Lutz grew up on a small dairy farm in southern Minnesota, attended the National University of Ireland Galway, and spent two years in Japan. A Pushcart Prize nominee, Best-of-the-Net nominee, and winner of the Loft Mentor Series for poetry, she is the author of Until the Kingdom Comes (Atmosphere Press). Lutz divides her time between the family farm and giving tours at the Minneapolis Institute of Art.; Elizabeth Moe: Moe is a nonprofit consultant who has worked in the field for more than two decades. She provides multiple services to nonprofit organizations including board governance, strategic planning, and grant writing. She graduated from Concordia College (Moorhead, MN) with a mass communications major and English writing minor. She is involved as a board member or volunteer for various art organizations in Winona.; Anne Paper: Paper has been a strategic marketing professional in the high tech industry?primarily at Microsoft Corporation?for more than 20 years. Her current part-time role as a consultant to an international cycle tour company is her "dream job" that combines her French fluency with her passions for travel, arts, culture, and cycling. Her BA degree in American studies from Stanford University led her to Washington, DC where she worked at both the Corcoran Gallery of Art (education department) and the National Gallery of Art (fundraising department). While living in Seattle, WA during her business career, she was an active member and volunteer at the Seattle Art Museum and the University of Washington Henry Art Gallery. She was selected for the Microsoft Corporation Employee Art Committee and served as a volunteer board member for the Alliance Francaise de Seattle. She prepared the successful proposal for federal COVID-19 operations relief funds awarded in December 2020 to the nonprofit French/Francophile/ Francophone cultural organization Made in France USA. Recently relocated back to the Twin Cities, Paper has been a volunteer communications advisor to the nonprofit French-American Chamber of Commerce of Minnesota.; Elke Zimmermann, Zimmermann is retired and has previous experience as a reviewer of individual grant applications for the Minnesota State Arts Board. In her retirement, Zimmermann enjoys the visual arts; she has taken continuing education watercolor courses through Minneapolis College of Art and Design and her local community center from 2015-2023. She was also selected by a jury to enter her artwork at the Plymouth Primavera show in 2021. Zimmermann has extensive volunteer experience through organizations like Goodwill, Zooniverse, the Germanic American Institute, and the Washington Ear. Zimmermann graduated with a BA degree in communications. Her career included working as a graphic designer for the German Embassy in Washington, DC, for the press and public relations department.