Abagail Fritz and Mohamed Lamine Bangoura (Afrique Sogue Percussion and Dance) � www.afriquesogue.com
Abagail Fritz and Mohamed Lamine Bangoura, dancers and choreographer are looking to create a collection of African ballet pieces with Afrique Sogue Percussion & Dance to create �a Precious Drop.� The works are choreographed by East Bay artists, originally from Zimbabwe, Congo, Senegal, Guinea, as well as the United States. The artists portray their unique perspectives and cultural identities that unite to tell the same story: Our Relationship to Water. A Precious Drop draws on the importance of water in reference to the Liberian/Sierra Leone civil conflict, as well as from the traditional water deities and water rituals of African tribes.
Speaking Tributaries - www.speakingtributaries.com
Speaking Tributaries is made up of the artist team of Ana Labastida, Jesus Landin-Torrez, and Sadie Harmon, with support from Kate Lee Short. Speaking Tributaries is a year-long, collaborative project grounded in the memories of elders at Salem Lutheran home and in the waters of Oakland’s Sausal Creek. This project employs poetic, aesthetic and phenomenological strategies to give its audience an intimate experience with populations and issues that are subtle, hidden, or overlooked. Loss and forgetting occupies a complex space, comprising both the freedom and fear of non-being. The artists wish to humanize that space, populating it with personal memory and known landscapes. There are partnering with Salem Lutheran Home, Friends of Sausal Creek, Oakland Parks and Recreation and the Oakland Dimond Library.
Debby Kajiyama (Navarrete x Kajiyama Dance Theater (NAKA)) - www.nkdancetheater.com
Debby Kajiyama, along with NAKA Theater co-founder Jose Navarrete, creates interdisciplinary performance works for the stage, street corners, and site-specific environments. Their work incorporates movement, theater, art installation, multimedia, and live music, and has been influenced by ritual, cultural studies, and the political and environmental concerns. OCF supports �The Anastasio Project,� which examines racial equity.
Favianna Rodriguez - www.favianna.com
Favianna Rodriguez�s work follows, documents, critiques, and reinterprets the larger discursive immigration narratives that are shaping the lives of people around the globe, especially in the United States. OCF funding will support CultureStrike, a collective art exhibit where artists collectively create cultural products that challenge hate, anti-immigrant sentiment, and exclusion, and instead promote values of fairness, dignity, equality, and justice.
Jake Schoneker - www.musevideo.net
Jake Schoneker is an artist creating mixed media films utilizing video, animation, music, and motion graphics to create films that promote food justice and awareness of the connection between climate change, the environment, and food politics. These videos will be released on Muse Video. OCF supports �We Are What We Eat.�
Josh Healey - www.joshhealey.org/tag/oakland
Josh Healey is a writer, performer, filmmaker, and creative activist in Oakland who works towards environmental justice and exposing and exploring the connections between the social world (especially issues of race, class, and culture) and the natural world. OCF supports �When the Environmental Goes Viral�� which combines political comedy, spoken word, and multi-media performances in a series of short films to creatively call attention to the most pressing urban environmental struggles of Oakland and Richmond
Mira Manickam
Mira Manickam is the creator of a diverse body of work ranging from lyrical documentary film, to a creative non-fiction book. Themes running throughout this work are an expression of joy for life, a celebration of nature and an examination of how it is used and abused, and the value placed on community. She is collaborating with several other artists to create series of songs, raps, poems, and word sketches, as well as facilitating a series of workshops with Galen Peterson at Oakland Roots. OCF supports hip hop workshops in parks.
Mirah Moriarty and Rodrigo Esteva (Dance Monks) - www.dancemonks.wix.com/dancemonks
Mirah Moriarty and Rodrigo Esteva are environmental dance, costume designer, and installation artists. OCF supports �Conversations with Trees,� which highlight three internationally traveled performing artists living in the East Bay whose work focuses on the intimate and ancient relationship between people and nature. These site-specific performances will be presented in May 2014 in several natural sites throughout Berkeley.
Los Cenzontles - www.loscenzontles.com
Los Cenzontles is a grassroots artist-driven organization committed to amplifying the roots of Mexican culture through classes, events, media and performances. Founded in San Pablo, CA in 1994 by musician and educator Eugene Rodriguez, Los Cenzontles provides the local community with a family-friendly setting for traditional arts education and cultural events.
MOCHA - www.mocha.org
MOCHA develops interactive spaces where children and their families create, share and connect through art. They reach 35,000 children and families each year through the museum�s interactive exhibits, artists-in-residence, open studios, art parties, field trips, and art camps; MOCHA teaching artists lead residencies in Bay Area schools, libraries and after-school sites through our School and Community Program.
Oakland International High School - www.oaklandinternational.org
Oakland International High School is a full service community school that strives to provide quality alternative education for recently arrived immigrant students in English language acquisition and in preparation for college. Their diverse students become active participants in our community while learning in small groups through hands-on, interdisciplinary projects and collaboration. OCF supports the Raised Beds School garden.
Oakland Leaf - www.oaklandleaf.org
Oakland Leaf cultivates community transformation through creative education for youth and families. Oakland Leaf strives to give students and their parents the resources they need to become agents of positive change in their community.
Urban Tilth - www.urbantilth.org/
Urban Tilth cultivates agriculture in west Contra Costa County to help the community build a more sustainable, healthy, and just food system. They work with schools, community-based organizations, government agencies, businesses, and individuals to develop the capacity to produce 5% of their own food supply.