State of the Arts Summit

Bodies in Play

Bodies in Play is a mission-driven organization challenging and evolving the aesthetics of performance through a consent-based, collaboratively-directed creative process.

As an independent collective, they have produced several dance-based events over the past few years including our Bodies in Play:Work in Process (BiP:WiP) series; Bodies in Play:Dance is Pleasure (BiP/DiP) at the LA LGBT Center; a performance lecture at the Brand Library in Glendale; and their full length production “Our Dancer’s Project” in 2024.

They incorporated as a government recognized non-profit organization in 2026 to further our mission and community engagement. Bodies in Play is a volunteer run organization prioritizing financial compensation for creative and artistic labor.

Dr. Liza Bearman

Dr. Liza Bearman is the Director of the Wildwood Institute for Social Leadership (WISL). She has spent the past 25+ years working to transform K-12 education by co-creating learning environments that address the unique lives and interests of students through real-world, community rooted, project-based and personalized teaching and learning.

Liza grew up in Los Angeles and spent years living and working in both Washington, DC and New York City.

She earned her B.A. in English and Political Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and her Master of Arts (M.A.), Master of Education (M.Ed.), and Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) degrees from Columbia University’s Teachers College.

9th - 12th graders, Wildwood Institute for Social Leadership (WISL)

Leticia Rhi Buckley

Leticia Rhi Buckley is a civic strategist and executive leader with more than two decades advancing public sector and community initiatives across Los Angeles County. A lifelong Angeleno and daughter of Mexican immigrants, she brings a grounded, systems aware perspective on community, opportunity, and regional stewardship.

She strengthens institutions through periods of transition, aligns diverse stakeholders, and navigates political complexity with clarity and integrity. Her leadership has shaped major regional civic efforts, supported by service on high level boards and advisory groups – including her role as Arts Commissioner for LA County’s First District, and board positions with the Los Angeles Tourism and Convention Board and The Music Man Foundation, where she contributes to long-term resilience, public sector investment, and community-defined impact across the region. She holds a B.A. from Loyola Marymount University with executive training from Harvard Kennedy School and Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Jay Carlon

Jay Carlon is a Los Angeles-based artist working across performance, film, installation, and community gathering. His practice explores migration, postcolonial identity, queer futurity, grief, ritual, and collective healing.

Rooted in interdisciplinary collaboration and site-responsive performance, Carlon blurs the boundaries between dance, visual art, experimental sound, and social gathering.

His work has been presented nationally and internationally by organizations including The Lincoln Center, Bangkok 1899, REDCAT, The Broad, and Center for Art and Performance UCLA. His work WAKE, a performance ritual for grief that reimagines the Catholic Novena through a queer diasporic lens, has become a significant part of his ongoing exploration of ritual, mourning, and collective healing, and it is currently touring and booking for 2027–28.

Carlon is a recipient of the Ellis-Beauregard Choreographer Award, the New England Foundation for the Arts National Dance Project Grant, California Arts Council Established Artist Fellowship, and was named one of Dance Magazine’s “25 to Watch.”

Alongside his choreographic work, he has contributed to community-based organizing and artistic platforms centering Filipino, queer, diasporic, culinary, and experimental performance practices.

Through intimate and large-scale works alike, Carlon creates spaces that invite audiences into shared experiences of embodiment, memory, transformation, and care.

Mayor Eric L. Chan

By profession, Mayor Chan is an Accountant and Property Manager, holding a degree in Business-Economics and Accounting from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Elected to the San Gabriel City Council in November of 2022, Mayor Chan is the most recently-elected Councilman. For nine years previous to that, he had been proudly serving his Community as an elected Water Board Director on the local San Gabriel County Water District Board. He is a long-time resident of San Gabriel, making the City his home for the last 20 years.

Mayor Chan is a liaison for the General Plan Update Committee, Tourism Marketing Improvement District Committee, and the Dumpling and Beer Fest Committee.

Some of his goals for his City Council tenure are to improve San Gabriel’s Public Safety, Business Friendliness, and Cultural “Balance.”

Dr. Jacqueline M. Cofield

Dr. Jacqueline M. Cofield is an educator, researcher, and founder of CulturED Arts Consulting. Her work explores how art, museums, and community spaces function as sites of knowledge production, civic engagement, and social transformation.

She is an Assistant Adjunct Professor at Hunter College, a Fulbright Specialist, and a Joan Tisch Teaching Fellow at the Whitney Museum of American Art. An award-winning scholar, Dr. Cofield’s research bridges arts education, curriculum theory, museum education, and multimodal literacy, centering artists and educators as knowledge producers. She partners with schools, cultural institutions, and communities to design learning experiences that expand educational possibility and cultivate critical, creative, and equitable practice.

Dr. Cofield is also the creator and host of the Beyond Beauty podcast.

Vanessa Hernández Cruz

Vanessa Hernández Cruz is an interdependent Chicana Disabled multidisciplinary dance artist and Disability Justice Consultant based in Los Angeles, CA. Over the past several years, Vanessa has presented dance work nationally and internationally.

She is currently the recipient of the NEFA National Dance Project supporting an evening length experimental dance set to premiere in 2027 called: “Echoing Memories in a Distant Future”. In her consultancy work she has worked with AXIS Dance Company, Thomas Mann House, LAMBDA Literary, We Still Move, HomeLA, Dance/NYC, Americans for the Arts & Mid Atlantic Arts, and other arts organizations.

Bridging the realms of dance and Disability Justice – Vanessa is committed to radical accessibility and strives to transform dance into a space where marginalized bodies thrive, innovate, and lead.

Kyle Denman

Before entering the creative space, LA-based artist Kyle Denman studied political science with a focus on nonprofit policy. Having always loved art as a child, he craved creative expression and freedom. In 2016, he moved to Los Angeles to pursue fashion design and has grown a client list to include names like Beyoncé and Lady Gaga.

He has received accolades for his work, including being recognized as the 2021 International Fashion Designer of the Year and listed on Forbes 30 Under 30.

Kyle’s mission is to ignite a culture of change through creativity and curiosity through radical acts of humanizing the human experience. Hoping to create social change, share cultural narratives, and expand the creative economy, he currently serves as the Executive Director of Arts Bridging the Gap, an LA nonprofit with the mission of uplifting the voices, experiences, and self-expression of youth from under-resourced communities through healing arts programs.

Letitia Fernandez Ivins

Letitia Fernandez Ivins is the Senior Director of Civic Strategies & Partnerships with The Music Center where her work is grounded in the belief that creative expression strengthens democracy.

Representing The Music Center, a public asset, she serves as liaison with civic while implementing multi-disciplinary arts programs that seek to ignite joy, affirm participants’ identity and strengthen social connection, through equitable organizational partnerships.

Letitia previously held the role of Director, Public Art & Design with LA Metro where she collaborated across disciplines to produce art experiences that amplify the stories of people and texture of place throughout the regional transit system. Letitia has also worked at LA County Arts Commission, Ryman Arts, the Getty Foundation and Claremont Graduate University.

She is Board Chair of Side Street Projects, a member of Filipinx arts collective NAMAN and in her free time, she coaches and plays soccer.

Gustavo Herrera

Gustavo was appointed as Arts for LA’s Executive Director in December 2018.  Prior to working with us, he was the Western Regional Director for Young Invincibles (YI), where he was responsible for leading YI’s California offices, including its West Coast expansion. As director, he set strategic direction and advanced YI’s policy priorities on health care, higher education, jobs, and civic engagement for the region.

Before starting at Young Invincibles, Gustavo was the Chief Operating Officer (COO) of L.A. Plaza de Cultura y Artes (LAPCA), overseeing the day-to-day operation of a county museum, including the oversight of a master plan committee responsible for strategically developing three acres of additional museum campus. From 2010-2012, Gustavo led the Maestro Foundation, a classical music and performance arts foundation, as the Director of Organizational Development.

Between 2007-2010, he assessed and recommended business growth strategies in the US marketplace for the global Fortune 500 Company, American Honda Motors, Co. Gustavo holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree from American Jewish University and a dual Bachelor of Arts in Global Studies with an emphasis in socio-politics and economics and Art History from the University of California Santa Barbara.

Gustavo served on the Board of Directors of the Create: Fixate Arts Organization (2006-2010). He is a current Strong Workforce Implementation Advisory Board Member for the California Community Colleges, Advisory Board Member for the California Physician’s Alliance and founding Board Member of Silverlake Forward.

Dr. Maria Rosario Jackson

Dr. Maria Rosario Jackson is one of our nation’s leading thinkers about the roles of art, culture, and design in building healthy communities where all people can thrive. She was the 13th Chair of the National Endowment for the Arts (2021-2025).

Her influential work has focused on quality-of-life measurement, comprehensive community development, supports for artists and creative entrepreneurs, the importance of “cultural kitchens” for social inclusion and a healthy democracy and the roles of arts and culture in community health, wellness, and resilience.

With experience in government, philanthropy, higher education, the nonprofit sector, she has served on governing and advisory boards of arts and community development organizations and institutions around the country and in Los Angeles, including co-chairing the County of Los Angeles Cultural Equity and Inclusion Initiative.

Dr. Jackson is University Professor of Creativity and Social Impact at Arizona State University and Executive and Creative Director of the Studio for Creativity and Social Impact at the ASU California Center.

Sofia Klatzker

Sofia Klatzker is a visionary civic leader with over two decades of experience advancing regional cultural policy, equitable grantmaking, and large-scale creative economies across California.

As the Cultural Affairs Manager for the City of Santa Monica, she oversees close to $600,000 in city administered grant programs, the city’s public art program, and has secured an additional $1.2 million in external funding from sources to expand programming citywide, while forming key partnerships that have streamlined civic operations and shaped the city’s upcoming Cultural Olympiad initiatives.

Klatzker’s impactful tenure includes conceiving and opening Santa Monica’s first municipal art gallery at Bergamot Station, reopening vital closed facilities like the Miles Playhouse, and launching the nation’s most expansive daily digital billboard arts program on the Third Street Promenade.

Klatzker previously served as the Executive Director of Arts for LA, where she spearheaded major voter engagement campaigns for the creative sector and championed regional arts education. Her extensive strategic experience includes leadership roles at the Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, the 99% Invisible podcast, and the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA). She holds a MA in arts administration from Goucher College and BM in electronic music composition from Oberlin Conservatory.

Samuel Lopez

Samuel Lopez serves as Development Director for the Gabrieleno San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians, where he works at the intersection of community development, cultural stewardship, and environmental engagement.

With a diverse professional background spanning land restoration, entertainment, and undergraduate admissions, Samuel brings a unique perspective to building meaningful connections between communities, institutions, and the natural world.

A dedicated member of the Gabrieleno Tongva Land Stewardship Crew, he actively contributes to the care and restoration of ancestral lands while advancing community education through presentations, cultural programming, and public events. He also serves as a Community Fellow with the Consortium for Developing Leadership in Science at UCLA, where he engages in leadership development and efforts to broaden pathways and representation in science.

Through his work, Samuel is committed to fostering connection, cultivating future leaders, and advancing a deeper sense of shared responsibility for land, community, and knowledge.

Karen Mack

Karen Mack founded LA Commons over 26 years ago based on a vision of communities where everyone has access and freedom to express themselves and the ability to tap into the power that creativity provides. The South LA–based nonprofit works in neighborhoods across the city, implementing artistic programs that foster interaction, dialogue and collaboration.

They play a unique role as a facilitator of local engagement in arts and culture as well as in other important issues like health, transportation and education, to name a few, giving residents and particularly young people, a voice and an onramp to making positive change.

Daniel Pascual

Cultural manager, entrepreneur, and consultant with 15+ years of experience leading artistic, educational, and social programs. Specialized in interculturality and creative industries, His background spans exhibition curation, scenic arts, documentary film, and immersive digital art.

He founded MAIC, a traveling museum of contemporary indigenous art and serve on the boards of Estudio Mexicano de Arte y Tecnología and Artistpace Brands. Recently relocated from Mexico City to Los Angeles, he is eager to connect with the local creative community and contribute his global vision to the cultural landscape. He holds master’s degrees in Cultural Management, and Communication, alongside leadership in creative industries training from Goldsmiths, University of London.

Victoria Perera Rojas

Victoria Perera Rojas (she/her) is the Associate Director of Learning & Evaluation at The Music Center, where she leads research and evaluation to better understand audiences and the impact of arts programming. She is particularly interested in using data to foster organizational learning, identify effective practices, and strengthen how cultural organizations serve their communities.

Before joining The Music Center, Victoria worked as an evaluator at The Huntington, and with nonprofits, philanthropy, and public agencies, including the Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture as a research and evaluation consultant.

Outside of work, she enjoys native plant gardening, exploring nature, and reading speculative fiction and manga.

Camille Schenkkan

Camille Schenkkan is Chief Operating Officer of The Ebell of Los Angeles and a cultural leader with more than 20 years of experience advancing the operations, strategy, and sustainability of nonprofit arts organizations. Previously Deputy Managing Director at Center Theatre Group, she has led portfolios spanning operations, workforce development, education, civic engagement, and organizational leadership.

She is Adjunct Faculty at California State University, Los Angeles, where she teaches arts management and theatre management.

Schenkkan holds a Master’s in Arts Management from Claremont Graduate University and a dual B.A. in Theatre and English from Scripps College. She is the co-author of Navigating a Career in Technical Entertainment (2022) and Navigating a Career in Performance (2026), published by Routledge/Focal Press.

Patrick Shiroishi

Patrick Shiroishi is a Japanese-American multi-instrumentalist, composer & poet based in Los Angeles.

Patrick will be joining Jay Carlon for the HARNESS performance.

Supervisor Hilda Solis

Hilda L. Solis serves as Los Angeles County Board Chair and First District Supervisor, representing nearly 2 million residents across East Los Angeles, Northeast Los Angeles, Downtown Los Angeles, the San Gabriel Valley, East Hollywood and Pomona.

Raised in La Puente, California, Solis is the daughter of immigrants from Nicaragua and Mexico and a first-generation college graduate. She earned a bachelor’s degree from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, and a master’s degree from the University of Southern California. Her commitment to public service was shaped by her family’s belief that government should expand opportunity for working families.

Solis has dedicated more than four decades to public service at the local, state and federal levels. She began her elected service on the Rio Hondo Community College Board of Trustees before serving in the California State Assembly and California State Senate, where she became the first Latina elected to the State Senate. In 2000, she was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, serving four terms and championing environmental justice, workers’ rights, public health and economic opportunity. In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed her as the nation’s 25th Secretary of Labor, making her the first Latina to serve in a U.S. presidential Cabinet.

Following her service in the Obama administration, Solis returned home and was elected to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors in 2014. As Supervisor and Board Chair, she has led efforts to expand affordable and supportive housing, strengthen the County’s behavioral health infrastructure, advance environmental justice, improve public health outcomes, preserve open space and parks, support immigrant communities, and invest in arts and culture.

A longtime advocate for cultural equity, Solis has helped advance policies that expand access to arts and culture across Los Angeles County. She co-authored the motion that launched the County’s Cultural Equity and Inclusion Initiative and authored the motion establishing the Countywide Cultural Policy, which integrates arts, culture and creativity into County services and programs while promoting equitable access to cultural resources for residents throughout the region.

In 2022, President Joseph R. Biden appointed Solis to the Board of Trustees of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in recognition of her longstanding commitment to public service and expanding access to the arts.

Solis resides in El Monte with her husband, Sam, and their dog, Lisa.

Urban Voices Project

The Urban Voices Project Performance Choir is a non-audition choir composed of artists, performers, and advocates from Skid Row, the epicenter of the homelessness crisis in Los Angeles.

The UVP Performance Choir meets weekly for rehearsals and vocal instruction. Throughout the year, the UVP Performance Choir performs for audiences across Los Angeles county, raising awareness on the conditions of homelessness (including mental health and socio-economic inequities) and sharing the healing power of music.

The choir’s performances showcase both the individual stories of the ensemble and a collective voice on experiences of homelessness.

Hamza Walker

Hamza Walker is a curator, writer, and Director of The Brick.  Walker has curated dozens of exhibitions ranging from solo to thematic exhibitions; from the production of new work to career surveys.

Prior to his role at The Brick, Walker served as Associate Curator/Director of Education at the Renaissance Society, a non-collecting museum of contemporary art on the University of Chicago campus.

Recent exhibitions and installations at The Brick include Kara Walker Unmanned Drone, which is part of MONUMENTS (2025), Elizabeth Paige Smith: Unshade Me Of You (2025); Gregg Bordowitz: This Is Not A Love Song (2025)

Sya Warfield

Sya Warfield is a multidisciplinary artist based in Los Angeles. She is the founder of Upward Together, which partners with schools, nonprofits, public agencies, and cultural organizations to design arts-based experiences that foster belonging and resilience.

Her personal art practice, spanning mixed media and public art, explores the beauty of becoming – the fleeting moments between states, and the subtle shifts in perception that change how we experience the world.