Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts (Omaha, NE)
Chris Cook, Executive Director
In 2015, Chris Cook moved to Omaha, Nebraska from Miami, Florida to join the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts as the Executive Director. In this role he drives Bemis’s long-range strategies, provides creative direction, and oversees the financial advancement and operations of the 41-year old artist-founded nonprofit. In 2019 he launched Bemis’s Sound Art+Experimental Music Program with lead support, now totalling $1Million, from the Mellon Foundation to advance the creation and presentation of new forms of sound and music by today’s leading composers, sound artists, and musicians. In addition to growing Bemis’s annual operating budget and professional staff, along with expanding its Board of Directors nationally, he rebooted the voice and identity of the organization through a multiyear rebranding project and is now embarking on a campus-wide facility master planning project to reimagine Bemis’s physical plant and impact in downtown Omaha. He brings to Bemis 20 years of curatorial and non-profit management experience. Previously, Chris was the Executive Director of the experimental arts organization Cannonball in Miami and he served as the Executive Director and Curator of the Salina Art Center in Salina, Kansas. He has held curatorial positions at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, Missouri, and Sioux City Art Center, Sioux City, Iowa. As a curator he organized exhibitions, commissions, and special projects with artists Paula Wilson, Mary Reid Kelley, Stephen Vitiello, Adam Pendleton, Chakaia Booker, Julian Dashper, and Fred Sandback, among many others. He holds a graduate degree in art history, theory, and criticism from The School of The Art Institute of Chicago.
Fountainhead Arts (Miami, FL)
Nicole Martinez, Associate Director
Nicole Martinez is a veteran arts communications professional and the current Associate Director of Fountainhead Arts, Miami’s only live/work artist residency that has hosted nearly 500 national and international artists since its founding in 2008. She leads the organization’s communications strategy while overseeing its fundraising, operational, and administrative departments. Throughout her career, Nicole has worked with leading local artists, cultural institutions, and art companies on developing and implementing integrated marketing and communications strategies, with a particular focus on creative content development. Her work has supported some of Miami’s most visible organizations, including Museum of Art and Design at MDC, Perez Art Museum Miami, Bakehouse Art Complex, and the Frost Science Museum. A storyteller and critic, her writing has appeared in a variety of leading arts publications including ARTnews, Cultured, The Art Newspaper, Hyperallergic, Miami Herald, Wallpaper*, and more. In 2019, she was recognized by the Society of Professional Journalists Florida for excellence in arts reporting. She also was awarded a Special Jury Mention by Oolite Arts for her short documentary film, La Peña.
https://www.fountainheadarts.org
Headlands Center for the Arts (Sausalito, CA)
Holly Blake, Residency Manager
Holly Blake is a painter who has a BFA and MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute. She has served as Headlands Center for the Arts’ sole Residency Manager, and has worked at Headlands for 34 years.
https://www.headlands.org
Ox-Bow School of Art and Artists’ Residency (Saugatuck, MI)
Shannon R.Stratton, Executive Director
Shannon R. Stratton is Executive Director of Ox-Bow School of Art and Artists’ Residency in Saugatuck, MI. Trained as a studio artist in painting and fiber, Shannon’s practice includes 12 years in the artist-run field as a co-founder of Threewalls, Chicago and other adjacent artist-run projects, work as an independent and institutionally affiliated curator, and writer. She lives in Chicago with a senior dog and two sibling cats where she is also current Director of the Post-Baccalaureate in Painting at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
https://www.ox-bow.org