Cynthia Amoah
Creative Writing: Poetry & Spoken Word
Cynthia Amoah is a spoken word artist, educator, and mentor originally from Ghana. Since the onset of her career, Cynthia’s dynamic voice has captured diverse audiences and her authentic stage presence has left them inspired after every performance. Her literary pieces often highlight the forgotten stories of the world, while transcending the oftentimes marginalized groups she delineates in her work.…
BalletMet inspires and educates Central Ohio youth to excel – in school studies including dance, health and wellness, and in life. Dance-in-Schools programs invite students and teachers to experience dance in meaningful and culturally relevant ways through:
The Wiggle Jig PreK classroom residencies with professional development for teachers
Moving Into Literacy grades 1-5 classroom residencies
Yoga, Meditation and Mindfulness classes for middle and high school students
Together We Dance interactive, in-school lecture performances
Morning at the Ballet theatre performances for K-12 students and teachers
Other Partnership Opportunities – BalletMet will design programming to fit your needs
RECENT PROJECTS: Adapted Wiggle Jig program for Columbus City Schools’ Special Needs Preschool classrooms.…
Miriam Baranov
Visual Arts: Drawing, Painting, & Portraiture
Miriam is a visual artist specializing in classical realist painting and drawing, with additional expertise as a portrait artist, muralist, and educator. She has had multiple apprenticeships with amazing artists, including a rigorous atelier program at the Golden Gate Atelier, which focused on classical training for realist artists. Miriam’s work spans various genres, including still life, landscape, portraiture, and figurative art.…
Ginny Baughman
Visual Arts: Drawing, Painting, Sculpture, Chalk, Ukrainian Egg Decorating, Scenic Painting, & Fiber
Ginny Baughman was born and raised in Dayton, Ohio. She received a BFA from the University of Dayton and an MA in art education from the Ohio State University. Ginny has also attended a variety of professional workshops, seminars, and conferences including the Kennedy Center’s National Seminar for Teaching Artists in Washington, D.C.
Ginny has been a teaching artist for more than 25 years.…
Andrea Belser
Musical Theater, Dance/Movement, & Acting
Andrea Belser is a performing artist and instructor from Cleveland, Ohio who has received her Bachelor of Arts from Wright State University in Theatre Studies, with an emphasis on Dance and Applied Voice. Beginning with ballet at three years of age, she also continued her studies in various dance forms, including tap, African folk dance, liturgical/spiritual, jazz, musical theatre dance, modern/contemporary, hip hop, and Latin ballroom.…
Michelle Boerio
Visual Arts: Drawing, Painting, Collage, Printmaking, & Bookbinding
Michelle Boerio is a visual artist and educator with over a decade of experience working with arts learners in museums, schools, community centers, libraries, and other arts organizations. She loves to make art that combines multiple mediums to highlight the weird, wonderful parts of the natural world. In 2012, she earned a BFA at The Ohio State University with a focus in painting and drawing, and in 2018 earned a MA in museum education at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.…
Terry Boyarsky
Music, Dance/Movement
With over 45 years of experience as a teacher of Dalcroze Eurhythmics and a lifelong performer of chamber music, pianist Terry Boyarsky believes that every person is musical. Her thirst for musical collaboration led to chamber music, choral singing, improvisation, folk dance, accompaniment, and creating ceremony. She specializes in integrating music and movement into the curriculum.…
Richard Duarte Brown
Visual Arts: Design, & Creative Writing
Richard Duarte Brown, known as Duarte, is a master artist with the TRANSIT ARTS Youth Arts Program and the Ohio Alliance for Arts Education’s Art in the House program. For more than 30 years, Duarte has dedicated his talents to helping young people in Columbus, Ohio, through countless programs including CAPACITY (CAPA’s youth arts program), the Short Stop Youth Center, the King Arts Complex, Ohio Alliance for Arts Education’s (and formerly GCAC’s) Artists-in-Schools program, GCAC’s Children of the Future, Ebony Boys, Art Safe, and VSA Ohio.…
Joanie Calem
Interactive Music & Storytelling
Joanie Calem has been a performing musician, music teacher, and storyteller since 1983. She graduated from the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem, Israel, with a major in piano and went on to study music education at the Levinsky Teaching Seminar in Ramat Aviv, Israel. She studied composition with Israeli composer Hagar Kadima in Tel Aviv, Israel, and completed her degree, Music in Community Building, at DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois.…
Sara Caplinger
Visual Arts: Drawing, Painting, Sculpture, & Printmaking
Sara Caplinger lives in Northeast Ohio and is a multidisciplinary artist that is continually seeking out new forms of expression through the visual arts. Sara’s background as a teaching artist is in the area of trauma. Sara has several years under her belt teaching grades K-12 through the trauma informed lens and working with at-risk youth.…
Malik Carrington
Visual Arts: Painting & Mixed Media
I’m a mixed media artist with a passion to showcase feelings of togetherness and family. My parents, born and raised in the US Virgin Islands, instilled this foundational core value into my siblings and me early in our development and it’s stayed with me ever since. Growing up in Columbus, Ohio has encouraged my love for the arts in many ways through working with the community for the past 8 years.…
Diana Chittester
Music, Singing/Songwriting, & Guitar
Diana Chittester has been building a reputation as one of the area’s most gifted guitar players, intimate songwriters, and forceful vocalists over the past decade, releasing a series of albums that display her growing confidence and ability to communicate feelings that are deeply personal yet universal.
Diana has shared the stage with Lyle Lovett, Gin Blossoms, The Accidentals, Joan Osborne, Peter Mulvey, Chris Trapper, Lisa Loeb, and Colin Hay; performing at PACs and venues across the Eastern US & Canada including Kent State PAC, Stocker Arts, Showplace Centre, Evening Muse, Music Box Supper Club, and The Ark.…
Risa Cohen
Music & Dance/Movement
Risa Beth Cohen, M.S.Ed. is an educator, singer/songwriter, speaker, and storyteller. She works with people of all ages and abilities, leading music circles and storytelling workshops. As the Founder and Creative Director of Sing into Reading, Risa is passionate about teaching literacy through music and movement. Risa holds a B.F.A. in acting from Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, and an M.S.Ed.…
Griset Damas-Roche
Dance/Movement, Flamenco
Born in Havana, Griset Damas-Roche studied ballet from a very young age at the Instituto Superior de Arte de Cuba before joining the world-famous National Ballet of Cuba. Then she achieved the Soloist spot in Ballet Espanol de La Habana. In 1998 she moved to Bogotá, Colombia, where she opened the doors to flamenco dance for more than 3,500 students as a teacher and choreographer.…
Sheela Das
Music: Multi-Instrumentalist & Songwriting
Sheela Das is the artistic director and founder of Creative Concepts in Music. With more than a decade of teaching through the arts, she has directed, produced, and delivered compelling workshops and original stage and video productions for students, community members, and professional venues alike.
From songwriting workshops, instrumental music, playwriting and puppetry camps to classroom residencies, Sheela brings her multi-instrumental talent to the joy of hundreds of audiences each year.…
Richelle Denes
Visual & Traditional Arts: Printmaking, Illustration, & Ceramics
Ricki Denes is a printmaker and illustrator whose work reflects her life, mostly pertaining to health and illness. She graduated with her B.F.A. in printmaking and a B.S.ED. in art education from Ashland University. Denes is currently on the Ohio Arts Council’s Teaching Artist Roster and has worked with both Ashland High School doing print demonstrations and a 4-week teaching artist placement at East Knox Elementary School.…
Jerzy Drozd
Visual Arts, Comics & Graphic Novels
Jerzy Drozd leads cartooning workshops for children and teens in libraries and schools, as well as for teachers who want to bring comics to the classroom. He wrote and drew Science Comics: Rockets with his wife, Anne Drozd, and is one of the artists of The Warren Commission Report.
Jerzy has drawn special projects for Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, Marvel Comics, VIZ Media, and others.…
Lori Esposito
Visual Arts and Multimedia
Lori Esposito is an artist and educator who has taught in higher education, museums, community centers and social organizations for over a decade. She earned her MFA from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and her PhD from The Ohio State University in Art Education, with a focus on making sensory-led practices that can incorporate naturally occurring processes toward diverse results.…
_ ESQYRE
Music, String Quartet, Classical Music, & Orchestral Performance
The Escher String Quartet has received acclaim for its profound musical insight and rare tonal beauty. A former BBC New Generation Artist and recipient of the Avery Fisher Career Grant, the quartet has performed at the BBC Proms at Cadogan Hall and is a regular guest at Wigmore Hall. In its home town of New York, the ensemble serves as season artists of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.…
Tom Evert
Dance/Movement
Tom Evert has been a creative force in creating and performing original choreographic works with a company of dancers, working intensively in arts-education programming and creating festival-like community events in Ohio for 38 years.
Tom currently serves as artistic director of DANCE EVERT, which he founded in 1986. He holds BFAs in both painting and dance from Ohio University and has enjoyed a world-class touring career with the Paul Taylor Dance Company in New York City.…
Lynette Ford
Storytelling & Spoken Word
Fourth-generation storyteller Lynette (Lyn) Ford is a teaching artist with the Ohio Teaching Artists Roster and the Ohio Alliance for Arts Education, a Thurber House mentor to young writers, a storytelling and story-writing coach, a certified laughter yoga teacher, and a great-grandma. Lyn has also offered storytelling/story-writing residencies for the Ohio Arts Council’s Creative Aging Ohio Initiative.…
Jennifer Hambrick
Poetry
A poet hailed for her “brilliant” imagery, “masterful” craftsmanship, and “uniquely musical voice,” Jennifer Hambrick is the six-time Pushcart Prize- and Best of the Net-nominated author of the free verse poetry collection In the High Weeds, winner of the Stevens Manuscript Award of the National Federation of State Poetry Societies; the haibun collection Joyride (Red Moon Press), winner of the Marianne Bluger Book Award from Haiku Canada; the collection of avant-garde haiku and short prose poems, a silence or two (Red Moon Press), acclaimed as “a stunning collection … destined to become a haiku classic;” and the free verse poetry collection Unscathed (NightBallet Press).…
Dara Harper
Multimedia and Visual Arts
Dara Harper M.Ed., a passionate, creative entrepreneur, artist, and educator, is a true testament to the power of art and education. Her academic journey at the University of Akron, where she earned a Master’s in Curriculum and Instruction, a Bachelor’s in Studio Art with a focus on Painting and a Minor in Art History, has significantly shaped her artistic prowess.…
Jessica Held
Visual Arts: Painting & Photography
Cincinnati native Jessica Held is an artist, a teaching artist, a small business owner, a festival coordinator, and an art editor living in Athens, Ohio. She earned her Bachelors of Fine Arts in painting and photography at Ohio University. Jessica has exhibited nationally and internationally with her first exhibit in Prague, Czech Republic while studying abroad.…
Polina Isurin
Visual and Multidisciplinary Arts
Polina Isurin is an artist-teacher with over 15 years of experience in museums, schools, organizations, and universities. She holds an MFA in Studio Art from Tufts University, a PhD in Arts Administration, Education, and Policy from The Ohio State University, and is both committed and interested in how creative and pedagogical practices can coexist. Polina has taught a variety of visual art/culture courses (e.g.…
Kimberly Jarvis
Dance/Movement
Kimberly Crislip Jarvis is an educator, choreographer, and administrator, known for her exceptional contributions to the creative arts. With an impressive educational background, Kimberly holds degrees and certifications from respected institutions such as the Scandinavian Institute for Physical Culture in Denmark, the American College of Sports Medicine, Malone University, and the University of Akron.
Throughout her career, Kimberly has collaborated with Kent State University, Ballet Magnificat!…
Douglas Laubacher
Visual Arts, Comics & Cartooning
I’m a cartoonist from Northeast Ohio. My comic strip “Unbound” runs in a handful of papers spanning Stark, Carroll and Tuscarawas Counties. I have nearly a decade of experience teaching every age group the art of cartooning and cartooning adjacent classes. I’ve taught students as young as 3 and as old as 93. I’ve taught in libraries, senior centers, museums, schools and community centers.…
Sara Lawrence-Sucato
Dance/Movement
Sara Lawrence-Sucato (BA Dance & MS Organizational Leadership from Mercyhurst University, Erie, PA) hails from Columbus, Ohio and lives and works in the Cleveland, Ohio area. Sara has worked in various capacities with The Dancing Wheels Company & School since 2006. She danced in the company for sixteen seasons performing works by noted choreographers Marc Brew, Nai Ni Chen, David Dorfman, Christopher Fleming, Catherine Meredith, Stuart Pimsler, David Roussève, Ginger Thatcher, Mark Tomasic, Michael Uthoff and Robert Wesner as well as by internationally renowned choreographers Donald McKayle and Dianne McIntyre.…
Sierra Leone
Entrepreneur, Poet, Wholistic Urban Creative Arts, & Theatre
Poet, producer, activist, educator, and entrepreneur Sierra Leone captivates audiences with her unassuming ingenuity, profound insight, and comedic sense of “knowing.”
A Governor’s Award winner and writer, Sierra is the president and artistic director of OFP Theatre and Production Company. For more than a decade, Ohio has benefited from Sierra’s vision of creative urban arts as a powerful artistic medium to bring communities together across racial, cultural, ideological, and economic divides.…
Ami Majmudar
Dance/Movement: Classical Indian Dance, Creative Writing, & Storytelling
Ami Majmudar inhabits many crossroads: Indian-American, first generation, multilingual, cultural, and ethnic minority. Ami’s work as dancer, teacher, storyteller, and author is an ongoing effort to connect her many paths and to share her experiences, her art, and her stories with others.
With a degree in English Literature from the University of California-Berkeley, followed by a Master’s degree in Education, Ami began her career as a high school English teacher.…
Jim McCutcheon
Music: Guitar
Jim McCutcheon, `The Guitar Man,’ earned the Ohio Governor’s Award for the Arts in Arts Education (2017) as well as two awards from the Parents Choice Foundation for his recordings for children. With teaching experience ranging from Montessori (24 years) through colleges (he teaches at the University of Dayton, Wright State University and Miami University), Jim has presented his interactive `Fretted-Instrument Family’ programs for decades to audiences of all ages.…
Ray McNiece
Drama/Theatre: Performance Poetry & Storytelling
Ray McNiece is the author of eight books of poems and monologues, most recently Breath Burns Away, New Haiku. He has created two solo theatre works: Dis – Voices From a Shelter and Us? Talking Across America; two music/poetry collaborations: “Mouth Music” and “A Rust bowl Hootenanny;” and an autobiography on stage: The Lives of A Poet.…
Vicki Murphy
Visual Arts: Mosaics
Vicki Murphy is a mosaic artist who works primarily in Ohio and New Orleans. She has trained extensively with master mosaic artist Laurel True of True Mosaics Studio for many years focusing on studio work and professional development in large scale public art. She worked with True on multiple projects in New Orleans including the Global Mosaic Project and Universal Garden’s Lotus Fantasy Bench, the Green Project, and the Edible Schoolyard murals.…
Pamela O’Loughlin
Multidisciplinary: Dance, Creative Writing, & Visual Arts
Pamela O’Loughlin is a gifted creative, avid learner, and passionate teacher.
She is an innovative, thoughtful, and skilled educator; from budgeting supplies for activities to last-minute changes that tend to come up when dealing with multiple groups, classes, and organizations, Pamela handles any adverse situation seamlessly.
Pamela is passionate about brainstorming with teachers, students, and administrators.…
Meghan Patijarevich
Dance/Movement: Ballet, Modern, & Jazz
Meghan Patijarevich is an imaginative and energetic dance educator. She is a native Ohioan and currently resides just outside of Columbus with her husband and daughter. Meghan enjoys bringing creativity, energy and a love of dance into each class she teaches. Her goal is to provide quality dance instruction while maintaining a positive and encouraging learning environment.…
Brianna Rhodes
Dance/Movement, Visual Poetry, Modern, West African, Afrobeats, & Hip Hop
Brianna Rhodes is an Ohio native and graduate of The Ohio State University Department of Dance. She formally danced as a fellow with Dayton Contemporary Dance Company. Currently, she is working with Dianne McIntyre and serving as a freelance dancer and dance teacher. Her talents span concert, street, and commercial dance. Primarily, she works with the youth teaching dance, along with dance history, in many corners of Columbus, Ohio.…
Marlene Robbins
Dance/Movement: Creative Movement & International Folk Dance
Marlene Robbins is a dance educator/dancer /choreographer who has been sharing her love of dance with people of all ages for over 40 years. Marlene was fortunate to serve as the Dance Specialist at Indianola K-8 for 23 years, teaching thousands of students and developing an integrated curriculum K-5 as part of a full-time arts program.…
Rikki Santer
Creative Writing: Poetry, & Film Studies
Rikki Santer has worked as a journalist, magazine and book editor, co-founder and managing editor of an alternative city newspaper in Cleveland, poet-in-the schools, high school teacher of English and film studies, and director of a student writing center. Currently she is serving as a vice-president of the Ohio Poetry Association, education consultant for Film Columbus, member of the performing poetry troupe, Concrete Wink, and she holds an Ohio Department of Education Lead Professional Educator teaching license as well as National Board teacher certification.…
Mansee Singhi
Indian Dance/Movement
“To dance is to express!” is the mantra of Mansee’s life.
Mansee Singhi is a Columbus, Ohio-based South Asian dancer, choreographer, and teacher. Her artistry has been shaped profoundly by renowned teachers from India since the age of seven, performing experiences in various countries such as Singapore, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and various places in the U.S.…
Marquette Stankowski
Drama/Theatre: Theater Arts and Public Speaking
Marquette Stankowski has worked as an actor, teacher, and director for more than 20 years. He is currently the artist-in-residence at New Albany Primary School. In his role, he develops and leads two signature experience programs in which all students in two grade levels participate. The Carnival of the Animals is the first grade experience that culminates in a dance and poetry performance.…
Stephanie Stewart
Visual Arts: Acrylic, Mixed Media Collage, & Bookmaking
Stephanie Stewart is the multimedia artist and owner of P31 Art & Design. She has been a contributor to the arts and culture sector for many years and has built a creative business from the ground up. Stewart consistently produces original works of art that are used as a central point of inspiration for all of her handmade products and print goods.…
DaShika Street
Visual Arts, Painting, Sewing, Candle Making, Murals, & Digital Art
Da’Shika A. Street is an Akron-born creative, wife, and mother of three whose enterprising spirit and artistic influences are shaped by her faith and the legacy of entrepreneurs and artists who preceded her.
Da’Shika’s most recent endeavors have blossomed from Project Sew United, a home-based facemask sewing initiative that she started in 2020 at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic to produce a proprietary 3-layer CDC-approved facemask.…
In Harmony Therapeutic Services
Music & Music Therapy
In Harmony Therapeutic Services harnesses the power of music as a vehicle for children and adolescents to process information and emotions, express themselves, learn, create, and heal. As an organization, they believe in teaching through a therapeutic lens and use musical interventions and experiences linked to Ohio Content Standards to address academic and social-emotional goals. Their services are provided by highly qualified, board-certified music therapists, and their programs are developed so that children and adolescents are able to achieve individualized goals and live in harmony with themselves and the world around them.…
Demetrius Thomas
Music, Rap & Hip-Hop
I am Demetrius Thomas, also known to the world as Nova The Rebel. I am a Cleveland native and active hip-hop artist signed to the legendary rap group Bone Thugs N Harmony (BTNH). I have been actively creating and recording music since I was seven years old.
Traveling with BTNH, I’ve been on tour with musical legneds including Snoop Dogg and TLC, as well comedian Dave Chapelle.…
Shannon Timura
Visual Arts: Sculpture, Collage, Fiber Arts, & Kinetic Art
Shannon Timura is a mixed media artist, educator and public art creator who lives and works in Medina, Ohio. Her whimsical work is found in over 20 galleries and shops throughout the US and in two shops abroad. Shannon was featured in Oprah’s O Magazine as a “Fearless Female Artist” and has recently completed the Artist Launchpad workshop through Summit ArtSpace.…
Kerri Wilde
Dance/Movement
Kerri Wilde firmly believes that dance builds community and that each dancer brings energy and creativity to each class, allowing them to collaborate to create a dance that is uniquely theirs. Kerri views her role in the dance process as to encourage the development of ideas, to encourage dancers to tell their stories through movement, and to provide a safe environment where all ideas are welcomed and encouraged.…
Tiffany Wilson
Film/Video/Media: Video Production & Photography
Tiffany Wilson has taken a unique approach to finding her life’s purpose and has sought to find ways to constantly reinvent herself. She has held positions from working in the news industry to owning a business, to now her current passion of being an educator.
Raised in a military family, Tiffany understands what it means to be resilient and wants to inspire her students to do the same as life can be challenging.…
George Woideck
Visual Arts, Ceramic Tile & Glass Tile Mosaics
George Woideck trained as a painter and took time off to tour and record as a rock musician before launching a career as a ceramic artist, learning from national master ceramic artists. Since then he has been an artist-in-residence in schools throughout Ohio and Michigan.
George has been named a National Young Audiences Artist of the Year and his work as a teaching artist has been recognized by the Ohio Art Education Association.…
