Michael Dowling,
Founder and Artistic Director of Creative programs and Partnerships
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Michael is known as one of the Commonwealth’s most innovative and courageous artists who produces visually stunning, ambitious public works of art that serve and inspire communities on many levels. His work stems from his heartfelt desire to beautify and make life better for all. Michael holds a BFA and MFA from Boston University, where he studied with Philip Guston and James Weeks.
L’Merchie Frazier
Executive Director of Creative Strategies
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L’Merchie Frazier, visual activist, public historian and artist, innovator, poet and holographer, is Director of Education and Interpretation for the Museum of African American History, Boston/Nantucket. Currently she is Director of Creative Engagement of the Transformative Action Project,/Violence Transformed in the Public Health Advocacy Institute at Northeastern University. Her work highlights the reparative aesthetic approach to expand the historical narrative, diminishing erasure, responding to trauma, violence and crisis through artistic activities. Her work is based on authentic evidence, providing place-based education and interdisciplinary history pedagogy, programs and workshops, projects and lectures. She delivers and manages Faculty/ Teachers’ Institutes and its extension, the Cross Cultural Classroom, marketed to independent education entities, municipalities and corporations.
She has served the artistic community for over twenty years as an award winning national and international visual and performance artist and poet, in one life work “Save Me From My Amnesia”, with residencies in Brazil, Taiwan, Costa Rica, Africa, France, and Cuba. Her works mirror community. Her artworks are collected by the Smithsonian Institution, the White House, Museum of Arts and Design, the Minneapolis Institute of Art and the Dallas Museum of Art. As a lecturer and workshop presenter, her audiences include youth and adults. She is a Boston Foundation Brother Thomas Fellow and Massachusetts Historical Society Fellow and is a member of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts and has recently been appointed to the Massachusetts Arts Commission and was recently awarded for the first Museum Educator Award by the Massachusetts Council on Social Studies. Newly Executive Director of Creative Strategic Partnerships for SPOKE.
Susan Krause,
Director of Development
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Susan is a passionate advocate of the arts. For over thirty years she has taught painting or literature and writing in settings as varied as Lehman College in the Bronx, The Boston Public Library, Pine Street Inn, The Boston Home and Medicine Wheel.
Her belief in the transformative power of the arts informs her approach to not only teaching, but to life. “Art transports us to untapped worlds. The practice of art changes lives,” says Krause. “I have experienced the joy of total immersion in creating; I have seen how people in tremendous pain, against all odds, enter a place that takes them away from their physical reality. “
Richie Dinsmore,
Director of Advocacy and Public Art
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Richie started working at MWP because of court-mandated community service hours. After showing his leadership skills and initiative, Richard moved his way up to serve in a full-time, administrative capacity. All of the youth employees look up to him as a peer role model. He has also been nominated for numerous awards for his youth advocacy work in the City of Boston.
Rob Cutler, Staff Humanitarian
Rob considers advocacy to be his life’s work. He regularly goes to the State House to advocate for those unable to speak for themselves. Since 2005, his important work has included mentoring youth who face challenges in their daily lives, meeting with them two-three times per week at MWP. Based on his own experiences and challenges, Rob is a model to these young people who accept him as one who understands pain, abuse and suffering; thus, he is able to provide the youth with support, insight, and inspiration.