Advisory Team

AdvisoryTeam

The PhotoForward Advisory Team works as a community to build on the success of past programs and point us in new directions, while challenging all involved to maintain the integrity of our approach: creating an environment where everyone’s voice can be heard and making sure that the product of our programs never becomes more important than the process or the people we serve.

THERESA WU

Theresa Wu is a Philadelphia native who spent her childhood in her immigrant parents’ Chinese restaurant, writing stories. Theresa earned her BA in Film at the Pennsylvania State University and her MFA in Film/Directing at Columbia University in New York City. While at school she was awarded the Carmen Finesta Award, the Filmmaker of Color United in Spirit Fellowship, the Digital Media Fellowship and the Columbia University Merit Fellowship. Theresa is a filmmaker who writes and directs. Her films are an emotional take on the honesty and humor within the hybrid of East and West in America.

Her latest narrative film, Smoke and Mirrors, has won the Director’s Guild of America Best Film Award (Asian American/East Coast) as well as the CINE Golden Eagle Award, the James Bridges Award, the Denali Award and much more. Smoke and Mirrors has gone on to screen across the United States including NYC, Los Angeles and Washington DC. Her other narrative films include, Fallen Yellow Tears, Going Home, Jeh-Jeh, and Silent Reminders. Her documentary works include: A Tribute to Bill Watanabe, CRCD Youth Workforce Development Program, and When the Heart Catches a Cold: Depression.

Her passion to tell stories is combined with her passion for arts education. Theresa has worked as teaching artist with at-risk students for over 8 years in both NYC and LA. She is committed to helping youth find the power within themselves and their voices.

She is currently working on a narrative feature script and resides near Los Angeles, CA. Learn more about Theresa's past and present projects at www.theresawu.com.

CAITS MEISSNER

Caits Meissner is a poet, storyteller, and arts educator and is currently the Education Programs Manager at Tribeca Film Institute in New York.

Caits was the winner of the OneWorld Poetry Contest and attended the 2008 Pan-African Literary Forum in Ghana, studying under Pulitzer Prize Winner Yusef Komunyakaa. Caits has been published in various journals and anthologies including The Feminist Wire, The Literary Review and Saul Williams’ CHORUS anthology. Her poetry/music album, the wolf & me, was released in 2010 to acclaim on platforms such as Okayplayer. In 2012, The Letter All Your Friends Have Written You, Caits’ collaborative poetry book with poet Tishon, arrived on the Well&Often imprint, a press where she also served as Education Editor.

Caits has performed at venues such as Joe’s Pub, Nuyorican Poets Cafe, Highline Ballroom, NYU, Columbia University, The Kitchen and the Blue Note Jazz Cafe. As an educator, Caits has extensively taught youth and adults in poetry and multi-media expression through organizations including Urban Arts Partnership, the Facing History School, New York University, Urban Word and The Brooklyn Musuem. She has worked long-term instituting innovative arts education programming at cultural institutions such as Tribeca Film Institute and the Lower Eastside Girls Club. Currently, Caits delivers an intensive online course, Digging Deep, Facing Self, designed to uplift, heal and transform women into their boldest selves. Learn more at www.caitsmeissner.com.

DUR MONTOYA O & LUIS BARRETO

Dur Montoya O and Luis Barreto are a multi-media savvy couple who are passionate about exploring the world and sharing the lessons they learn along the way.

Dur and Luis were born in Colombia and have traveled around the world helping community-based organizations and NGOs spread their message using multi-media, videos, photography and online/print advertising material through their their online magazine Look At the World (www.lookattheworldmagazine.com) and their consulting company Zoom In Projects (www.zoominprojects.com).

Luis and Dur are currently based in Siem Reap, Cambodia where they have provided youth media workshops in partnership with Pepy Cambodia and coordinated a collaborative youth photography project for Anjali House in partnership with UNICEF Cambodia. They have also helped to develop, design, and launch the trailblazing online resource Learning Service: Improving Volunteer Travel Through Education that works to prevent ineffective and damaging volunteer travel practices through educational resources for travelers and would-be volunteers (www.learningservice.info)

Luis Barreto’s photography project Faces of the Road has been featured multiple exhibitions including Kensington and Chelsea College, London – UK 2010, Botanical Garden of Medellín, Colombia 2011, Café Zorba – Medellín, Colombia 2012, and as part of a collective exhibition in New York – Art Takes Time Square 2012. View Luis' work at: www.luisbarreto.com.

KA XIONG

Ka Xiong is a Lao photographer and filmmaker who continues to contribute his talents and guidance to PhotoForward through guest facilitating workshops for the Stitching Our Stories program and providing cultural and technical insights on all aspects of our programs in Laos.

Ka's work has been exhibited around the world, including the 2nd Biennale Internationale de L’Image de Luang Prabang 2010 and the Photoquai 2011 3rd biennale des Images du Monde in Paris, and he was selected as one of the five young photographers in five countries along the Mekong River to exhibit in Phnom Penh Photo Festival December 8th – 13th 2012. His work is also part of the permanent collection at Project Space Gallery in Luang Prabang, Laos.

Ka currently works with Big Tree Gallery and is a production assistant for Adri Berger Films and Photography where he has contributed to a wide range of productions, including Portraits from Luang Prabang for the Laos Tourist Office Department and Song of the Lao Elephant for Korea Broadcast Systems. Ka also worked with @My Library in Luang Prabang for four years where he created and facilitated computer tutorials in Lao, participated in the photography and digital media program, and helped liaise with other libraries supported by the Language Project. He is still a part of the @My Library community where he hopes to facilitate film production workshops for the library’s members.

MARIANNA LUNA

Marianna Luna is an alumnus of PhotoForward and is currently a student at Hampshire College, where she is pursuing an interdisciplinary and intersectional degree in Media Studies, Critical Race Theory, Latina Feminism, and Gender Studies.

Marianna was born and raised in New York City, and as a young person, she has engaged in community grassroots organizing and has a passion for working with youth in low-income urban communities. She has worked for Nuestras Raices, an environmental justice community based organization in Holyoke, MA as the youth program coordinator for their youth program. Marianna has also worked with Third Wave Foundation as the Emergency Abortion Fund (EAF) intern and with Civil Liberties and Public Policy (CLPP) where she gave a talk as the student representative at the CLPP conference plenary. In the summer of 2013, she taught a performance and visual arts summer camp at Rumble Arts Center in Humboldt Park, Chicago, IL.

Marianna loves to write about media and technology and also enjoys engaging in work with other scholars, activists, and artists who focus on media based work. Aside from writing, she enjoys talking, teaching, and learning about Hip Hop and engaging with young people and women of color and well as low-income LGBTQ communities in the 'hood.

NATASHA MBABAZI

Natasha Mbabazi is an independent consultant with extensive experience in international and domestic development with a focus on foreign policy issues, women’s empowerment, media and arts, global health, and innovation in the humanitarian aid sector.

Prior to consulting, she was based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia as the Technical Officer for the trailblazing, anti-trafficking organization AFESIP. Natasha also worked in the U.S. Senate where she helped draft legislation, manage constituent affairs and craft consumer protection policies under the leadership of the Commerce Committee Chairman. Additionally, she conducted research with Uganda’s Finance Ministry and investigated efficiency and sustainability in health, industry and energy sector projects. Based on her field work in Uganda’s health sector, she was later awarded a research fellowship examining human rights implementations in Kenyan and Ethiopian health systems. Natasha is service-oriented and has volunteered with refugee assistance programs and served as a Young Professionals in Foreign Policy public service delegate to Haiti. In her spare time, Natasha is an avid photographer and traveler. Some of her favorite places are Rio de Janeiro, Istanbul, Paris, and Bangkok.

SHIRLEY SALOMON

Shirley Salomon is an innovative and forward-thinking social worker who has been coordinating mentoring services for foster care youth in group residence, foster homes, and transitional programs in New York City for over eleven years. In 2005, she helped to integrate PhotoForward into the enrichment and therapeutic programming for youth residents at Good Shepherd Service and has been an enthusiastic champion of the program ever since.

Shirley is a strong believer in positive youth development models, creating opportunities for mastery and healing through art, movement, and creative expression. Shirley earned MSW at Hunter College School of Social Work and began working as a social worker at Good Shepherd Services where she created the mentoring program that connects youth with adult volunteers who commit to developing and modeling healthy relationships. Although not an artist herself, Shirley has created several partnerships with other arts and volunteer based programs bringing photography (through PhotoForward), dance, cooking, and other creative programs into the fabric of everyday life. She has also helped develop a crochet and youth entrepreneurship program through Foster Pride, an organization dedicated to providing arts opportunities to youth in foster care. Shirley has co-chaired the New York Mentoring Partnership’s Provider Council, since 2011. She is also part of an advisory committee with the Felix Organization, an organization founded by adoptees that seeks to support youth in foster care through summer camp programs and scholarships for creative and educational opportunities

Shirley was born in Israel and has also lived in France, California, and New York. She is a mother of four children at home but has had the privilege of been a parent figure to many youth through her work.