How can art contribute to healing? SaveArtSpace partnered with the domestic violence advocacy group Take Heart You Are Not Alone and curator David F. Martin to assemble a billboard campaign that brings awareness to the issue of domestic violence in Seattle, WA. Featuring the work of seven artists, this visual framework provides a means to explore community responses to gender-based violence and to showcase ways to address this violence.
On Wednesday, December 1, 2021, the Frye Art Museum and Path with Art invited four speakers for a panel discussion on this topic. Moderated by Holly Jacobson, CEO of Path with Art, this panel centered the voices of people with lived experiences with domestic violence and discussed how art can be an integral piece for people navigating their healing journeys.
As an art museum committed to exploring the issues of our time and showcasing the transformative power of art, the Frye was honored to co-host this program. In facilitating this conversation, we hope to create an inclusive and welcoming space for our local and global communities.
About the Panelists
Joan Daves has worked for Housing Hope as a Family Support Coach for over four years. She supports families who have been identified as homeless by locating safe housing and assisting them until they are self-sufficient and able to move out. She works closely with Path with Art to bring folks gently into a healing community where they can be seen and heard and can begin, or further, their process towards healing. Daves holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Sociology from Western Washington University.
Jacqueline Gonsalvez, Director of the DVHopeline at New Beginnings, has over two decades of experience working in the social work field with families, children, survivors of sexual assault, intimate partner violence, poverty, and other social injustices that disproportionally effect marginalized communities. She was the Director of Community Programs at the Renton Area Youth and Families Services where she developed performance metrics to improve and drive the program to excellence. Additionally, she is from Austin, TX where she worked 11 years at Travis County Health and Human Services as Social Services Program Manager. She is acute with program design, implementation, and execution of nonprofit programming. She is a licensed Master’s Social Worker and received her Master’s degree in Social Work from the University of Texas. She has a strong commitment to serving survivors of domestic abuse.
Nina Kuo, a SaveArtSpace artist, creates artwork about fictional and conscious historical references with an individual modern language in her expressions. Methods of painting, sculpture, multi-media, and montage have long-lasting experimental effects as she branches out in art installation, animation, videos, and book design. She witnesses and reveals discoveries of global and feminist realities while taking risks in interpreting newer art idioms.
Tracy Lester-Condé owes a lot of her emotional survival to the process of art. She started quite young, jumping into her pages of creation – a method used to escape the reality of extreme domestic violence. Having dabbled in endless types of mediums, she strongly gravitates toward painting and experimenting with complimentary and contrasting colors. For Lester-Condé, a canvas can be anybody’s therapist – someone that’s finally there to listen, with undivided attention. She has also recently begun to take her writing more seriously, and what makes it more interesting is the realization that we can ‘vent and heal’ through different characters.
About the Moderator
With a background in nonprofit management, strategic planning, and communications, Holly Jacobson’s professional experience spans both for- and nonprofit institutions. She has created strategic marketing and product solutions for Microsoft, The City of Seattle, The Seattle International Film Festival, amongst others. A passionate advocate for social justice, in 2003, Holly founded Voter Action, a national nonprofit organization focused on ensuring all had equal access to fair and accurate voting. Having studied film at San Francisco State University, she has worked as a director in documentary and commercial filmmaking. Since 2013, Holly has been the CEO of Path with Art, an organization at the forefront of connecting the arts to low-income adults living in or recovering from trauma. In addition, she serves on the Seattle Arts Commission, the Washington Women’s Foundation Impact Assessment Committee, and the steering committee of Arts & Homelessness International, based in the United Kingdom.
See more of the billboards and learn about the artists.
Additional Billboard Artists include:
Debra Lott, United
A.C. Evans, The Present of Presence
Magali Trapero, Breaking Free
Delaney George, When to say When
Mariko Passion, But…is fantasizing about killing ever okay?
Lilli Muller, Headtrippin’ 1
Leigh Legler, You Are Not Your Fear