Kerri Mubaarak (Board Director / Executive Committee / Board Secretary)

If you encounter Kerri Mubaarak, it won’t take you long to figure out that her perspective is different. The way she approaches a subject—any subject— whether it’s an artist’s proposed work that she evaluates or a socio-political paradigm addressed in her performances is different. In fact, it’s difference that underlies all her works of theatrical art.

Kerri chose theater as a medium to express what she sees and senses interacting with “people in the periphery” a term she uses to describe those who are often marginalized by race, gender, religion or cultural norms. “The gift of this medium,” she says “is that the raw emotion of human experience can be shared openly and in the safety of an audience.” She considers the craft a practice of both art and healing that pre-dates modern theater.

Programs 2016-2019

Gui Villalba Portel is a Greensboro-based storyteller, theatre artist, and arts organizer from Buenos Aires, Argentina. An indigenous latinx and undocumented queer, Gui often thinks about visualizing: the amplification of marginalized narratives, collective deviation within social constructs, and "new" recipes.

Mitchel Oliver

Documentary Curator (2014-2015)

Mitch works on visuals, audio, food and land with his cat Mica.

Patrick McDonnell | Education Curator and South Elm Projects Coordinator (2015)

Patrick McDonnell has worked in government, nonprofit, and start-ups and has a breadth of understanding about how to navigate the different sectors of city building. He holds a Master’s degree in Urban Planning and Master’s in Higher Education from the University of Michigan. Prior to joining Elsewhere he worked at Dallas City Hall as an Urban Designer for a year, and freelanced for two years consulting on creative placing making projects and youth education programs with nonprofits in the Dallas area. In 2012, Patrick was named to the Next City Vanguard class as one of 40 under 40 urban leaders in the county. He serves on the Association for Community Design board (2012-present), including a term as President from 2013-2014. As South Elm Projects Coordinator, he works closely with Elsewhere’s curators to launch and oversee the call for South Elm artist portfolios, articulate public place-making practices as well as expand relationships with local community stakeholders, businesses and partners.

Program & Productions Curator 2013-2015

Jennie was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and came to North Carolina by way of New York, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania.  Her writing and curatorial work focus on the relationship between art and cultural politics in the 21st Century.  She aims to lend ideas a social form by bringing people together to participate in conversations that shape social conditions and the physical and psychological spaces where ideas are shared.  

Jennie oversees Elsewhere’s residency programs and directs artistic processes and project production at the museum.  Additionally, she acts as a liaison between artists and communities and coordinates the production of public programs at the museum.  She is a curator and art historian focusing on situation driven aesthetics and radical ampersanding.  Jennie received a BA in Anthropology and Biology from Mount Holyoke College in 1999 and completed PhD course work in Art History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2011. Her curatorial projects have included contributions to “More Love: Art, Politics and Sharing,” “Counter Lives: Portraiture in Contemporary Art” and “John Wesley’s Boeing in Context” at the Ackland Art Museum.

Favorite Elsewhere collection:  The Chicken Nuggets.

Emily Ensminger, born in Durham, NC, is a conceptual artist and advocate for independent multi-use live/work organizations. Through programming, textiles and functional systems, Emily’s work addresses necessity as a creative practice operating at the intersection of admin, art, and daily life. Curatorial, project coordination and presentation focus is on experimental production and organizations outside art centers.

Emily led the organization as Creative Director (2018-2020).

Chris Kennedy is a teaching artist and curator living in Greensboro, NC.  He makes place-based projects that experiment with social learning, queer identity, and civic play. His process is research-based and collaborative. He is currently working through education and the rise of academic capitalism by playing inside a living museum Elsewhere, and pursuing a PhD at the University of North Carolina. At Elsewhere Kennedy directs CoLab a youth-led platform for media experiments and digital storytelling that speaks to peers. His previous projects include an intergenerational free school in an abandoned park in North Brooklyn (School of the Future), a movement research platform exploring fungi as metaphor for connectivity (StrataSpore), and an ongoing investigation into queer identity (Queer Explorer's Club).

Valerie Wiseman

Communications Curator (2012-2015)

Valerie is an artist and administrator interested in the intersection of public programs and creative fields. She also worked with the North Carolina Entrepreneurship Center at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and holds a BA in Communications & Media and focus in Arts Administration from Goucher College in Baltimore, MD.

Valerie also worked as Operations Curator from 2011-2012 and as a Documentarian Intern and Assistant to the Directors from 2010-2011.

August 28 - September 30, 2010

Resident

blog | cyrus smith dot vox dot com

Portland, OR

An artist and producer in numerous collectives and collaborations, Smith was a cofounder of the Pancake Clubhouse Historic Township and Activity Destination for the Living Arts (welcomes you), an alternative arts space in Portland, Oregon where he coordinated an active exhibition schedule and residency program from 2008-2009. Recent independent projects include The Christmas Time Radio Hour, a weekly program on KPSU dedicated to Christmas and Holiday Music, “Art  Talk AM on the Radio,” a weekly interview show which focused on local, national and international artists and curators, and Neighborhood Projects  Media, which was featured as part of a collaborative project for the 2008 Time Based Arts Festival, sponsored by the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art. Smith is a recent graduate of Portland State University, where he received an MFA in Art and Social Practice. 

2014-2015

Building Curator

Cyrus is an interdisciplinary artist with a background in sculpture, interactive art, radio, publication, and performance. He was part of the first graduating class at Portland State University to receive an MFA with a concentration in “Social Practice,” a form of art that encourages interactivity, communication, and social engagement. Cyrus also worked on the exhibitions team for the Portland Art Museum and Tacoma Art Museum as an exhibit installer and designer. When he is not making art, you may find him playing music, taking the long way home, or sleeping under the stars.

Ian Gamble is a multimedia artist with strong ties to artists, farmers, and old time musicians in Rockingham County, NC. He hosts visiting artists and facilitates their work for the rural outreach project at Reckon Holler, a creative site and art project within his family home in Rockingham. Gamble curated the 2018 Rural Residency, facilitated on-the-ground work, and was a lead artist of Elsewhere Goes To Madison-- an off-site Elsewhere Elsewhere project in partnership with Reckon Holler.As a maker, Gamble toggles between carpenter, potter, sculptor, and tailor. Gamble was also an Elsewhere Curator in 2007 & 2008. While at Elsewhere in 2007, he produced The Skyscraper.

Jay Gamble is a longtime Elsewherian and outsider artist who enjoys speculating on agriculture and architecture while tubing down the Dan River. Working situation and site-specifically, participation and collaboration are integral to Gamble’s practice.

In addition to being a staff curator in 2005, 2007, and 2008, Gamble was a production and studio assistant for the Rural Residency: Elsewhere Goes To Madison— an off-site Elsewhere Elsewhere project in partnership with Reckon Holler.

George Scheer (Co-founder / Board Director) is Co-founder and former Executive Director of Elsewhere. George is a writer, scholar, and artist who fosters creative communities at the intersection of aesthetics and social change. George is also the grandson of Elsewhere proprietress and puzzle maker Sylvia Gray, whose stuff he has been moving around for years! George holds an MA in Critical Theory and Visual Culture from Duke University and a BA from the University of Pennsylvania in Political Communications.