Instructor Archives - CreativeSonoma.org

Dani Burlison Fiction, Literature, Non-Fiction, Other Dani Burlison (she/her) is a mom, writer, teacher, and activist. She is the creator/editor of “All of Me: Stories of Love, Anger and the Female Body” (PM Press, 2019), and the author of “Some Places Worth Leaving” (Tolsun Books, 2020) and “Dendrophilia and Other Social Taboos: True Stories,” a collection of essays which first appeared in her McSweeney's Internet Tendency column of the same name. She is co-editing an anthology about Northern California fires which will be published by Heyday Books in 2023. Dani has been a staff writer at a Bay Area alt-weekly and a regular contributor at Yes! Magazine, Chicago Tribune, KQED, and elsewhere. Her journalism, fiction and personal essays can also be found at Ms. Magazine, WIRED, Earth Island Journal, The Rumpus, Portland Review, Hip Mama Magazine, and in various anthologies and zines. She studied Activism & Social Change as well as Culture, Ecology & Sustainable Community at New College of California and lives on unceded Southern Pomo and Wappo land in Sonoma County, California. You can find out more at daniburlison.com

Mari Capon Acting, Artisan, Arts Administration, Ballet, Ballroom, Children's, Choreography, Dance, Directing, Fiber Art, Fiction, Folk Art, Hip-Hop & Funk, Illustration, Improvisation, Improvisation, Latin, Literature, Media, Modern, Muralist, Music, Non-Fiction, Other, Other, Other, Painting, Performance Art, Poetry, Printmaking, Puppetry, Sculpture, Storytelling, Teacher/Instructor, Teaching Artist for Adults, Teaching Artist for Youth, Theatre, Video, Visual Arts, Vocal Mari has been professionally involved in the arts world for over twenty years. As a child, she was a creative dancer at Virginia Tanner's Children Dance Theater, and she oil painted and sang in choirs. As a teen she acted, and was a make-up artist, poet, essayist, and ballroom dancer, and in young adulthood, she was a tango dancer and professional performing artist as an Art Model for artists working for Disney, EA, and countless Universities, Ateliers, Institutes, and Studios, and especially enjoyed set, costume, and lighting designs for painters and illustrators. Upon realizing that she most enjoyed coaching artists through their process, she began teaching, first creating art curriculum for a K-12 after-school program while becoming bilingual in Peru, before returning to the U.S. to become a certified cognitive movement, creative dance, and preschool music instructor. She began providing, teaching, and consulting for bilingual preschools and Summer Camps, tutoring, and coaching gymnastics, and continued to teach the arts and sports. She also taught inclusive sex education and spiritual development for children at interfaith, non-denominational churches, and facilitated somatic processing, while attending weekly classes in various forms. As an undergrad, Mari authored an Interdisciplinary Arts Curriculum Program for Pre-K through 12th Grade and became credentialed. She will research, publish, and offer her program while continuing to teach Interdisciplinary Arts.

Leilani Clark Literature, Non-Fiction Raised in Hawaii and Los Angeles, Leilani Clark received a bachelor’s in English Literature from the University of California San Diego. She played in indie bands and traveled for a few years, before settling down to teach middle and high school English in New Mexico and Oakland. In 2008, she received an MFA in Writing and Consciousness from the California Institute of Integral Studies. Her writing has appeared at The Guardian, Mother Jones, Civil Eats, The Press Democrat, The Rumpus, and other publications. A former staff writer at the North Bay Bohemian, she was a 2014 California Endowment Health Reporting Fellow, and her feature story about a federal crackdown on Northern California cannabis dispensaries won a California Newspaper Publishers Association award. She currently makes her living in nonprofit communications and as the editor of a regional food magazine. She lives in Santa Rosa with her family.

Jason Cool Acting, Architecture, Artisan, Arts Administration, Ballroom, Ceramics, Children's, Choreography, Composition, Crew, Dance, Design, Directing, Equipment, Fashion Design, Fiber Art, Fiction, Film Office, Folk Art, Functional Art, Furniture, General Services, Glass, Hip-Hop & Funk, Illustration, Improvisation, Improvisation, Instrumental, Interior Design, Jewelry, Literature, Media, Mixed, Modern, Multi-Media, Music, Non-Fiction, Other, Other, Other, Other, Other, Other, Other, Other, Other, Painting, Performance Art, Photography, Poetry, Production, Professional Performance, Puppetry, Sculpture, Storytelling, Talent, Teacher/Instructor, Theatre, Visual Arts, Vocal, Woodworking

Jason Cool/Henson

Raised by musical and artistic tallent. from my grandfather Walter cool.writing and composing set designs on and off Broadway as well as music teacher. He tought me many things about music ,set design ,and writing stories making songs.mom colleen cool was a d.j for many years growing up .her morning talk show won an addy award. experience of the evolution of radio stations format from vinal,reel to reel,8 track,cassette,cd,to digital.learned lots about the insider secrets and politics , selling air time ,being a paid musical artist.and much more.on my dad's side .the "story family." his grandmother had 21 kids .4 sets of twins ,all natural birth!all musicians playing together ofton..on ed sullvon show and groucho marks.this popular family band and I would practice at grandma's regularly. As a kid growing up. i would try many instruments pianos ,drums,accordion ,banjo ,mandolin etc. I have been in theater,loved the arts, music ,writer. open to everything since i was a young kid.arts and music are my life!if i dont know how to do something,i will be honest!i ask,try and will do all things of interest with love !and any collaboration with heart.I Compromise to learn others perspectives because im always learning. preforming on and off stage.jamming with the public.sharing what i know. Learning what others are willing or able to teach.I loved all the music,art,storys,I have been a part of, or experienced 1999 to current over 15 countries I visited. World Share

Kate Foley-Beining Improvisation, Instrumental, Mixed, Music, Painting, Printmaking, Teacher/Instructor, Teaching Artist for Adults, Teaching Artist for Youth, Theatre, Visual Arts, Vocal I am a musician, artist, and professor of German Language and Literature. Music: I am a singer, performing the works of Joni Mitchell, backed by a jazz trio. I have developed music enrichment programs for elementary schools in Healdsburg and Geyserville where I have taught vocal music for over 10 years. Working with children in music is its own reward and I am aware of the rare good fortune I have to also be paid to do it. I am a classically-trained pianist, currently pursuing challenging selections from the repertoire of Schubert, Chopin, Liszt, and Bach. Art: Sight-size realism is the method I use in painting my oil still lives. I would call my work domestic realism since my favorite subject matter is my 1940s era chrome coffeepot in which my domestic surroundings are reflected around me as I paint. Decay, in the form of rusted objects and old leather books, is set against the sharp convex images reflected in the chrome globe, offering a visual irony that I find endlessly intriguing. I have shown and sold my pieces in juried shows. Language and Literature: I am an adjunct professor of German with an emphasis on women writers in German literary history. My doctoral research, using a feminist literary perspective, was published in my book The Body and Eucharistic Devotion in Catharina Regina von Greiffenberg's Meditations. Teaching German brings me joy and of course my college students are constantly engaged in music, art, and theater as they become speakers of German

Ernesto Garay Literature, Poetry, Teacher/Instructor, Teaching Artist for Adults, Teaching Artist for Youth Ernesto Garay is a poet, performer, teacher, and social justice activist. Ernesto is a bilingual teaching artist, offering residencies to students in grade 4-12. Mr. Garay holds two Masters Degrees: one in Comparative Literature and the other in Ethnic Studies. He is a poet in Residence at Creative Sonoma, California Poets in the Schools, and Azures Acres, teaching poetry as a form of healing to children, teens and adults living with intersectional vulnerability in schools and organizations in Sonoma County. Currently Mr. Garay is finishing his book of poetry: Reverberating Voices. It speaks about the experience of immigration, racism, healing the spirit, displacement and love while living in San Francisco, California, Mexico, Nicaragua and El Salvador during Central American Civil Wars of the 1970s and 1980s. His poetry has been published in the DI-VȇrRSέ-City Anthology of the Austin International Poetry Festival, Pterodáctilo, La Revista, The Ethnic Studies Journal and Desde el Epicentro. Mr. Garay has also performed and read his poetry in the Bay Area for venues such as MAPP (Mission Arts and Performance Project), Mama’s Art Café, and the University of California at Santa Cruz. He’s also read his poetry in North Bay venues like the Salon for the Arts, the Arlene Francis Center, the De Turk Round Barn, the Finely Center, the Sonoma County Museum, and in Southern California, at the Pitzer College at Claremont University. He is passionate about justice and advocating for the Latino immigrant community. Immensely creative and accomplished, he inspires us and moves among us with unfailing humility, generosity and grace.

Jen Hyde Creative Sonoma Grantee, Literature, Media, Non-Fiction, Other

Jen Hyde is a writer, editor, and storytelling expert. Her essays have appeared in The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, Longreads and elsewhere.

A 2016 finalist for the Creative Capital Grant in Literature, and Jen has received fellowships from Yaddo, The Millay Colony, and the Asian American Writer's Workshop. Most recently she has been a 2023 scholar at the Sonoma County Writer's Camp and a 2023 Creative Sonoma ACE grantee. She is currently at work on a memoir about chronic illness and Chinese diasporic identity.

Chelsea Rose Kurnick Creative Sonoma Grantee, Literature, Non-Fiction, Performance Art, Photography, Poetry, Visual Arts Chelsea Rose Kurnick (she/her) is a writer and artist from southern California living in Sonoma County. She earned a BA in Linguistics in 2010 from the University of California Riverside, where she was also editor-in-chief of Mosaic: A Journal of Literature and Art. In 2013-14, she created and hosted The Casserole, an online literary reading series that aired live on Youtube featuring remote guests from all over the world. Chelsea began studying the craft of poetry at age 15 and began curating literary arts events at 20. She attributes most of her education in writing to community workshops and weekly open mics, which she has sought out since 2005 in every city she’s lived. Chelsea believes that poetry and storytelling are powerful tools for building empathy and are at their most vital when experienced in person. Chelsea’s work explores longing and loss, sometimes personal and sometimes global in scope; she writes of messy partnerships and humankind’s tenuous relationship to the material world we inhabit.

Eileen Nagle Acting, Artisan, Children's, Choreography, Directing, Fiction, Film Office, Folk Art, Improvisation, Jewelry, Literature, Non-Fiction, Other, Other, Other, Other, Performance Art, Poetry, Puppetry, Storytelling, Talent, Teacher/Instructor, Teaching Artist for Adults, Teaching Artist for Youth, Theatre Eileen Nagle M.Ed is an elementary/ middle/ high school teacher who specializes in Children's Theatre. A native of West Sonoma County, Eileen writes and directs children's plays and teaches acting classes. Shakespeare for Children; Musical Theater, Improv and Playwriting all for children are at the center of her creativity. She would love to go to your space and direct during school, after school drama clubs, teach playwriting and work with the home school community, having homeschooled her own children. At the university level she taught teachers how to integrate the arts into their regular lesson plans; enhancing the enjoyment and retention of the core subjects. Eileen leads workshops for adults and older children to teach Script and Text Analysis based on Character Roles, a way to look at your own or other's work and evaluate how sound the structure of the story is. Playwriting/ Screenwriting At the University level Eileen taught Public Speaking, Interpersonal Communication and Theater For Elementary Teachers courses. She was the Outreach and Workshop Coordinator for the Noorda Theater for Children and Youth. Eileen would love to partner with home school groups, afterschool programs; mixed adult children groups would be fun. She has worked in most locations so a 'stage' is not necessary. The time of day and week is workable.

Roy Parvin Fiction, Literature, Non-Fiction Roy Parvin is the award-winning author of two books of fiction, The Loneliest Road in America and In the Snow Forest. He has recently completed a memoir entitled My Year of Sleeping Dangerously and is also the author (under the nom de namaste of Yoga Matt) of Yoga for the Inflexible Male, forthcoming this fall from Ten Speed Press, a division of Penguin Random House. His work has been selected for inclusion in the Best American Short Stories series, has been nominated many times for the Pushcart Prize, and has been widely anthologized. He has also been awarded a National Endowment for the Arts grant, a Bread Loaf Fellowship, the Katherine Anne Porter Prize in fiction, and a Ucross fellowship. Roy is an accomplished teacher, having taught in the MFA program at San Francisco State University and at numerous workshops around the country.

Elizabeth Stark Literature, Media, Teacher/Instructor Elizabeth Stark co-directs and teaches at BookWritingWorld.com and SonomaCountyWritersCamp.com, co-hosts Story Makers Podcast (StoryMakersShow.com), is author of the novel Shy Girl (FSG, Seal Press), and co-director and co-writer of several several films, including FtF: Female to Femme, a creative documentary and Little Mutinies, a short (both distributed by Frameline). She earned an M.F.A. from Columbia University in Creative Writing and has taught at the Pratt Institute, UCSC, St. Mary’s, where she was the visiting distinguished writer, and elsewhere. She is currently producing a feature film called Lost in the Middle, and finishing a novel.

Ellen Sussman Fiction, Literature Ellen Sussman is the New York Times bestselling author of four novels, A Wedding in Provence, The Paradise Guest House, French Lessons, and On a Night Like This. She is the editor of two critically acclaimed anthologies, Bad Girls: 26 Writers Misbehave and Dirty Words: A Literary Encyclopedia of Sex. She teaches through Stanford Continuing Studies and in private classes and she is the co-founder and co-director of Sonoma County Writers Camp. www.ellensussman.com

Nicholas Valdez Fiction, Literature, Non-Fiction, Teacher/Instructor I write and edit for those who need help finding their way through words. As an editor, I specialize in developmental editing, helping writers create, organize, and improve their work. Whether I'm writing or editing, I infuse my work with the awe I feel when I consider the structure, the complexity, and the beauty of the English language. I hold a Ph.D. in English from UC Riverside, where I studied film and visual culture, American literature, and rhetorical theory.

Amy A. Whitcomb Artisan, Fiction, Functional Art, Holidays Shop Local, Literature, Non-Fiction, Other, Other, Poetry I create fine art, functional art, and opportunities for myself and others to observe, reflect, discover, and build community through the written word. Please consider supporting my paper and book arts by purchasing blank journals for yourself and your loved ones. Each journal is unique -- made from repurposed, locally sourced materials -- to encourage reflection and creative expression. Please visit www.amyawhitcomb.com/artist to learn more about me.

Nicole R. Zimmerman Creative Sonoma Grantee, Fiction, Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Teacher/Instructor, Teaching Artist for Adults, Teaching Artist for Youth

NICOLE R. ZIMMERMAN is a recipient of the 2019 Discovered Award for Emerging Literary Artists Grant, made possible, in part, with funds from Creative Sonoma and the National Endowment for the Arts.

She holds an MFA in Writing from the University of San Francisco, which nominated her essay to the AWP Intro Journals Project. Her literary work is published in Creative Nonfiction, The Best Women’s Travel Writing, Los Angeles Times, The Rumpus, Hypertext Review, Sonora Review, The Dewdrop, About Place Journal, Halfway Down the Stairs, Toho, Cagibi, Ruminate, Noyo River Review, Birdland Journal, Origins, and South Loop Review, which nominated her work for a Pushcart Prize.

Nicole has freelanced as a reporter for Petaluma Patch, as a Towns correspondent for The Press Democrat, and as a copywriter for Viator/TripAdvisor. She is an alumna of Lit Camp, a juried writers conference. She designed curriculum and taught in K-5 at Sonoma Country Day School and led creative writing workshops in after-school programs in Petaluma.

Born in Brazil and raised (mostly) in Northern California, Nicole lives with her wife in Penngrove where she hosts Shut Up & Write!™ sessions and facilitates creative writing workshops (see Writing From Memory or Imagination on the creative calendar). She is an AWA affiliate, certified to lead workshops in the Amherst Writers & Artists (AWA) method.

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