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Artists
OK Naledi is an Afro-House music project created by Queer, Motswana Canadian musician Kimberly Naledi Sunstrum.
Traditional sub-Saharan clean guitar lines, classic deep bass, movement-inspiring beats and that iconic, driving Afro-House tempo - these are the pieces that define OK Naledi.
There is a lot of complexity when it comes to being a visibly Queer, biracial, womxn, artist who grew up in Botswana, South Africa, Malawi, Sudan, and Sri Lanka and is creating music in a Western demographic. It's important for diasporic marginalized folks to stay connected to their heritage and roots and to push back from the ongoing pressure to assimilate and fit in. This pandemic and all it's boil over moments exacerbated the importance of nurturing identity and infusing it in the music creation process. This is the essence of OK Naledi -- proudly, powerfully and consistently.
Lucila Al Mar is a Salvadoran Canadian singer-songwriter who has the amazing skill of being an introverted hermit by day and an audience-captivating performer by night. Her ability to move between genres; from the gnarly defiant energy of punk rock to the lushness of folk music, to the soulful resonance of an acapella song all within the same performance will have you asking yourself “wtf hit me?!?”. Her performances welcome you into the precious space of her life; to revel in the many ways human presence can be shared, and the multitude of ways music can beautify our experience of life, death, and ultimately bring us together.
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Over the past 15 years, Jessica Ruano has worked extensively as an arts and culture journalist for multiple publications, as well as in marketing and communications for numerous theatre companies, arts organizations, artists, local businesses, and festivals in Ottawa and in London (UK). She is perhaps best known for directing and producing the award-winning touring productionsSappho...in 9 fragments and The Ghomeshi Effect. Currently, she is delighted to be surrounded by artists of all disciplines in her role as Community Program Director with MASC. She is grateful to be living on the traditional unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishnaabeg people with her daughter Joy Apitak.
Rachel Weldon (she/her) is founder and executive director of music presenter organization Debaser, and music programmer and administrator for artist-run centre SAW. She has produced and/or programmed hundreds of events and programs, working in festival management, creative production, programming and marketing. Rachel is also chair of the board of Halifax outsider music festival EVERYSEEKER, and DJs and makes radio under the moniker Pink Veil.
Rosina is the lead singer of the protest electronic duo LAL, who were long listed for the Polaris Prize for 2019 and 2021. They/she are a queer/gender fluid, culturally Muslim and Bengali identified artist. Rosina helps run the alternative DIT (Do it Together) community and arts accessible (physically and financially) space Unit 2, a space dedicated to supporting QT2SBIPOC and friends in order to support an arts ecosystem.
Rosina also co-curates shows, participates in theatre and other collaborative art making practices and runs workshops around sound, recording and poetry. Rosina will be releasing her first solo dance /electronic album called BASIC INCOME, in 2022. She / they have curated for Luminato Festival, Mayworks Festival, Bricks and Glitter festival while releasing music, playing live, building new worlds and s supporting emerging and established artists.
Rosina currently lives and was born in the territory of the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnaabeg, Haudenosaunee, Lenni-lenape and the Wendat Nations..
King Kimbit is a literary Hip-Hop artist based in unceded Algonquin territory (Ottawa). King is passionate about empowering and encouraging youth, community care, and sharing love through writing, reciting, and the abolition of punitive, carceral institutions. King became Urban Legends Poetry Slam Champion in 2012, which launched her career in performance arts.
King has coordinated Youth Speak! writing and performance workshops for teens and is also 1/3 of the founding force behind Cap City Cyphers, a space for rappers across the city to unite and celebrate love and unity through Hip-Hop.
She has reached for her roots through various organizations, holding executive positions in local and regional VSAs, as well as performing and presenting for the Union of North American Vietnamese Students Association in Anaheim, New Orleans, and Seattle. She was also cohost of Spirit of Vietnam on CKCU 93.1FM.King is currently a writer and vocalist for Speaking Vibrations, an interdisciplinary performance group with tap dancer Carmelle Cachero, ASL poet Jo-Anne Bryan, and contemporary dancer Jordan Samonas.
In 2017, King released her debut album Life Lessons Poetically, a collection of poetic and music by artists local and abroad. She is now working on her solo album Healing Trauma From The Projects.
A manager and cultural promoter, Oaxacan at heart, she is a communication specialist
graduated from the Universidad del Mar Campus Huatulco (Oaxaca, Mexico) with
experience in procurement and fund management.
She started in the cultural and entertainment area at Casa del Lago Juan José Arreola
UNAM in 2013.
Since 2014, she has led her career in music through different roles as tour manager,
promoter, assistant, R.P, talent developer, tour manager and manager. Over 7 years, it has
served more than 40 national and international groups with different needs, such as:
DakhaBrakha (Ukraine), Fatoumata Diawara (Mali), Eliades Ochoa (Cuba), Afrocuba de
Matanzas (Cuba), Son Huasteco ( Hidalgo, Llera Tamaulipas), Romengo (Romania), Ariztía
(Chile), La Siniestra (Argentina), SnowApple (Holland), KekoYoma (Chile), Caña de Azúcar
(Argentina), Orquesta El Macabeo (Puerto Rico), Juanito Ayala (Chile), La Vodkanera
(Colombia), Balkumbia (Barcelona) as well as national bands such as Polka
Madre,BuenRostro (CDMX), Women's Band Women of the Florido Wind / Mujeres del Viento
Florido (Oaxaca), Ajimsa (Chile) to mention a few.
In 2017 she formed her project El Colibrí Cultural Agency with
Treasa Levasseur is currently the Program and Community Engagement Manager at Folk Alliance International, as well as a JUNO-nominated songwriter and seasoned sideperson. As passionate about community building as she is about music, Treasa also works as an artist educator with many organizations including Theatre Aquarius, the Art Gallery of Hamilton, and recently composed the soundtrack for 'Wishes in the Wind', a piece created for the National Arts Centre's 'Grand Acts of Great Hope' initiative. Treasa has recently been activated by the words of Margaret Killjoy: 'what if we replaced gatekeepers with ushers and helped people find where they belong?'
Valentina lives between Italy, Dominican Republic and Canada, where she works as consultant for outreach and international relationship for the Dakar Music Expo festival. In Italy she covers the role of Head of Programming for the Artepassante project in Milan and works as consultant for the Eufemia - Social Arts, being in charge of the strategic development and community artistic programming in the town of Turin.
In 2015 she funded her own cultural association called: "CreatiVì Musicali", an organisation aimed at promotion of the artists and the realisation of international tours. His organisation works around the world for connecting cultures and people in the name of equality, anti-racism, collaboration and art in all its forms.
In 2021 she funded "Your Music Manager": an online Academy dedicated to empower independent women musicians and performers, with tailor-made coaching and mentoring programs.
Laura Camacho Salgado (born in Colombia, based in Oslo) is the international festival coordinator at Oslo World. She is co-creator of initiatives such Map the World (https://maptheworld.no/) and the Utopian Manifesto, a transnational action-oriented document (written by more than 100 people) which outlines actions, strategies, goals and even structural changes that need to be done to reach a cultural sector without discrimination, racism, and gender inequality (https://m.osloworld.no/). Since 2016, she has curated the day-program of the festival around themes such as: Forbidden Songs, Freedom, and Utopia with the goal of underlining the importance of cultural institutions and artists in fighting for freedom of expression, freedom of speech, and gender equality. Oslo World is one of Europe’s leading venue festivals, presenting a global outlook on today’s music scene, with a special focus on music from Africa, Latin-America, Asia, and the Middle East. The festival will run from November 1-6, 2022. During the year, The Foundation Oslo World has different events, such as VårtNabolag (Our Neighbourhood), a festival arranged in refugee centres, the Children’s Art Exploration Day, which is arranged in multiple municipalities in Norway, among others. Laura Camacho Salgado is also an independent researcher interested in body politics, migration studies, and border esthetics. She has been a guest lecturer at the University of Oslo for the course Borders, Bodies and Memories: Textual and Cultural Representation of Contemporary Migration in Europe. Her background is in literature, arts, and cinema. Having studied at six universities in Colombia (Universidad de los Andes), the UK (University of St Andrews) France (Université Perpignan Via Domitia, Université Lyon 2) and Italy (the Universities of Bergamo and Genova), she has researched transnational representations of migrant bodies in different cultural narratives in Europe and Latin America.
Born in Paraguay in 1990, Amanda Chamorro is a visual artist, musician, graphic designer, certified Creator Coach, and founder of the artistic collective El Inka Cultural. Trained as a flautist in an academic environment, she played progressive rock, folk, jazz and experimental music for almost a decade, now focusing more on music, sound and frequencies as healing tools and connection with ancestry. In 2020, she co-created Mujeres Haciendo Eco, the first directory of women in Paraguayan music to shine a spotlight on the diversity of roles of women in the local industry, aiming to inspire them to know each other, make connections, and collaborate.
Kristyn Gelfand is a Toronto based arts administrator, producer, and activator with over two decades of experience creating spaces for music and expression. From her early start in the vibrant techno scene of the late 90s, she has sought to create fun, liminal, and meaningful events, bringing audiences together to enjoy music from around the globe. Since 2012, she has worked with Uma Nota Culture as they continue to host events uniting dancefloor-centred music by live bands and DJs under the same banner. She is currently booking artists under the brand’s agency division.
Featured by Ottawa Life Magazine as one of the 2013 Top 25 people in the Capital, Claudia Salguero is a Colombian-Canadian professional multidisciplinary artist and Community Engaged Artist working with multicultural groups in communities at risk. Working in collaboration with different Social Institutions, she has created more than 40 community murals in the City since 2014.
She was awarded by Ottawa Arts Council with the 2021 Peter Honeywell Mid-Career Artist Award, recognizing and encouraging the achievements of Ottawa artists of all disciplines who have evolved beyond the emerging stage in their career to become recognized professional working artists contributing to the community.
Through her work, Claudia has evidenced the power of community art and her capacity to work with communities in big projects. In 2017 she was awarded with the 150Neigbourhood Arts Grant for the creation of her mural “Canadian Pride, Harmony in Cultures” as part of Canada’s 150 Anniversary official celebrations.
She is the creator of "The Wisdom Mural" the tallest mural in Ottawa, created with the participation of close to almost 70 members of the community from all backgrounds, genders and corners of Ottawa.
Claudia is also a Latin Folk and Jazz singer who has been raising funds for kids’ foundations in her home country Colombia through her annual sold-out concerts at the Ottawa’s National Arts Centre since 2011.
She is a member of the Arts Network Ottawa’s Board of Directors.
Claudia believes in art and music as a tool for a better society
Marisa Gallemit is a Filipina-Canadian visual artist. Informed by motherhood and third culture
rituals, her work spans sculpture, site-specific installation, storytelling, and arts
advocacy. Since 2010 Marisa has been active in Ontario and Quebec with performative works,
design installations for music + art festivals and art-making workshops; she has directed visual
art programs for non-gallery community venues in Ottawa, and has produced a large-scale
public art installation for the City of Mississauga. Through an ongoing exploration of found
objects and their potential energy, Gallemit’s practice leans deeply into Buckminster Fuller’s
Query: “Now how do we make this spaceship work?”
Kseniya Tsoy is a community-engaged and mural artist originally from Uzbekistan. As a person of mixed heritage, diversity is a vital component of her life and a constant inspiration for her work. Her personal murals are a visual exploration of complex cultural identities and are inspired by folk motifs from diverse cultures that have influenced her. Occasionally, she loves doodling comics that fight stereotypes with lightheartedness and humour. Sometimes those doodles even make it into public murals!
Being a woman in Guatemala is an act of resistance. Being a Mayan Kaqchikel woman and an artist is, in itself, a political statement, but also a radical gesture towards life and it would be the best way to present Sara Curruchich.
Sara Curruchich was born in 1993 in San Juan Comalapa, Chimaltenango, in a Kaqchikel community in the Guatemalan central highlands. His people have a long tradition of art and knowledge, but also with a great strength of resistance and struggle. From that account, his musical proposal is based on the collective and individual feelings of the peoples, history, memory, culture, languages and struggles combined with personal vindication
Alka was at Folk Music Ontario as the Executive Director starting in 2013 and was there until 2021. Prior to that, she worked as the Interim Executive Director at the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival and spent many years as the Senior Manager of Operations with the Toronto International Film Festival. Alka has also worked at CBC Radio as the Associate Producer for Outfront and in campus/community radio in Ottawa, Guelph and Toronto. Alka sits on the Board of Directors as Treasurer for the Folk Alliance Board of Directors and is a Board Member for the Ottawa Music Industry Coalition.
iskwē | ᐃᐢᑫᐧᐤ is, among many other things, a Juno-award winning artist – a creator and communicator of music and of movement, of pictures, poetry and prose. And through it all, she’s a teller of stories that have impacted our past and will inform our future. Her music is a sonic exploration that not only blurs lines between sources and styles, but also between the actual and the ideal, the real and imagined. Her message is most impactful when delivered from the stage, where it’s not uncommon for people to leave in entranced contemplation or even in tears. Her music merges with dance, multimedia, and more in a completely engulfing and cathartic experience – meant to bring people together and celebrate that which unites over that which divides us.
iskwē is Cree Métis from Treaty One Territory. She was born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. She is an urban Indigenous two-spirited woman from the Red River Valley, the birthplace of the Métis Nation.