artists
We are a community of working artists. In addition to the artists who work with our Artist Partnerships Program, we are:
Crystal Akins Meneses | Artistic Principal
Crystal is a singer, musician, conductor, visual artist, arts activist, Fields Artist Fellow, chaplain and death doula. Her main artistic practice is to bring people together through community choirs and community instrumental groups to heal traumas and to increase access to creative expression.
Joaquin Lopez | Artistic Principal
Joaquin is a performing artist, musician, and mental health counselor whose work is grounded in personal transformation, self-expression, and community engagement. He served as the Arts & Culture Manager and the Manager of Leadership Development during his time at Latino Network, and he was Creative Laureate for the City of Portland in 2021-2024.
Mic Crenshaw | Artistic Principal
Mic’s a Hip Hop artist, antifascist activist and Fields Fellow who’s mentored hundreds of youth. He’s the Lead U.S. Organizer for the Afrikan HipHop Caravan, and he uses cultural activism as a means to develop international solidarity related to human rights and justice through Hip Hop and education. Mic was the 2001 Portland Poetry Slam’s Grand Slam Champion and Willamette Week's “Portland's Best Hip Hop Artist of 2016.”
Jonny Sanders (aka Jonny Cool) | Genius Artist
Born and raised in N/NE Portland, Jonny’s on this earth to bring people together through the joy of music, drawing deeply on the traditions of Soul music – that music that speaks straight to your soul – to find a universal sound.
Lora Lafayette | Genius Artist
Lora’s memoir Possums Run Amok was a Finalist for a 2023 Oregon Book Award and a Finalist for a national Foreword INDIE Book of the Year Award. Lora’s poems and stories have appeared in PLAZM Magazine, The Buckman Journal, The Sunday Oregonian, Pen & Ink and other journals.
Jeff Beers | Genius Artist
Jeff’s art focuses on materials, the essence and dynamics of the materials he’s formulated and foraged from the rural and urban landscape. He makes his own concoctions of paints, often from raw pigments and natural materials that he collects, like volcanic soils. He does extensive experimentation with oils, resins and glues to make his own emulsions. He builds up layers of wax, papers, resins and paints and scrapes them down, and slowly the images emerge.
Ben Moorad | Artistic Principal
Ben has created and performed eight story-based shows with Hand2Mouth Theatre; The Portland Mercury called the last round of them “haunting and lyrical” and said they “just might save a life.” These shows came out of his long-term interdisciplinary study of the will to die and the will to live called The Envelope of Suicides. He’s a MacDowell Fellow, and he’s received four grants from the Regional Arts + Culture Council to produce performances of his work.