Axis 1: Creating Peace

Mohamed Q. Amin

Mohamed Q. Amin (he/they) is an Indo-Caribbean, Queer, and Muslim immigrant rights activist, a native of Guyana, who currently resides in Richmond Hill, Queens, NY. On the eve of the 2013 NYC Pride Parade, Amin, his partner, and his siblings survived a vicious attack for being members of the LGBTQ+ community in their Caribbean-centric Southeast Queens neighborhood. In response to the anti-LGBTQ hate violence, in 2015, he founded the Caribbean Equality Project (CEP), a non-profit organization that advocates for Caribbean LGBTQ+ voices in New York City. His transnational advocacy and community organizing are rooted in gender equity, racial justice, dismantling and decolonizing systems of oppression, healing, and ending anti-LGBTQ hate violence in the Caribbean diaspora. In 2022, Amin was named one of New York’s LGBTQ+ Power Players by amny, PoliticsNY, and Gay City News. Amin holds a BA in Economics, has over fourteen years of management experience in retail banking and financial literacy program development in immigrant communities, and is currently pursuing a Master’s in Mental Health Counseling at his alma mater, Queens College.

Joo-Hyun Kang

Joo-Hyun Kang is former Director of Communities United for Police Reform (CPR) and executive director of CPR Action (CPR’s sibling c4 political organization). CPR is a multi-strategy, multi-sector campaign to end abusive policing in New York and reduce reliance on policing for community safety. CPR works to build and redefine community safety, strengthens community-based infrastructure to prevent and challenge police violence, and has organized coalitions of 200+ organizations to secure landmark policy and organizing victories in New York. Joo-Hyun joined CPR’s staff with two decades of experience in social justice work as an organizer, trainer, and strategist with racial justice, LGBT rights, gender justice, immigrant rights, and police accountability projects. In prior lives, she has been an acupuncturist; consultant to social change organizations and philanthropies; served as the Astraea Lesbian Foundation’s director of global grantmaking for LGBTI rights; was the first Executive Director of The Audre Lorde Project, where she developed organizing programs for LGBTST communities of color; and has been a member and on the board of various organizing groups.

Kimberly Powell

An educator and intersectional activist, Kim is a first generation born in America from a Chinese mother and a Welsh-German father. A New York native following in their grandparents’ footsteps, Kim is seeking to empower the AAPI community and fight the injustices that plague our society. They are a mom, daughter, student, and artist determined to see society become a better place for the next generation.

Rohan Zhou-Lee

Rohan Zhou-Lee (They/Siya/祂 (Tā)/Elle) is a Black Asian author, dancer, and organizer based in New York City. Founder of the Black-Asian solidarity group the Blasian March, they have been featured on AJ+, CNN, NBC Chicago, WNYC, USA Today, and other news outlets. Their writing on Black Asian solidarity can be found on them, Truthout, Mochi Magazine, Pigment International, Mixed Asian Media, Prism Reports, NextShark, Reappropriate, and Newsweek. 祂 has spoken at Northwestern University, University of Michigan, UCLA Berkeley, New York University, Harvard University, Radio Lora, The University of Tokyo, and the 2022 Unite and Enough Festivals in Zürich, where they also performed poetry and a contemporary ballet that they choreographed. Siya entered the Avengers of Colour writing programme in 2020 under the mentorship of Terry J. Benton-Walker and became a 2023 Open City Fellow at the Asian American Writers’ Workshop. Zhou-Lee holds a Bachelor of the Arts degree in Ethnomusicology from Northwestern University.

Photo Credit: Josh Pacheco

Joe Tolbert

Joe received his B.S. in Communications from the University of Tennessee Knoxville and completed his M. Div. with a concentration in Social Ethics from Union Theological Seminary in the city of New York. As a Cultural Organizer and Consultant, Joe is the founder and lead cultural strategist of Art at the Intersections where he is a sought after facilitator and cultural strategist that works with communities to help them harness the power of art and culture through the building, implementation, and evaluation of cultural strategies. As a writer, he has contributed articles to Alternate ROOTS, Arts Black, and Quiet Lunch, among others.

Ishmael Thaahir

Ishmael Thaahir is a producer, performer, and educator born in Harlem, NY. He currently serves as the Producing Director at Kyoung’s Pacific Beat and was both an actor and assistant director in KPB’s NERO. Ishmael has also performed in A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Triad Stage), toured with KPB’s PILLOWTALK (Victory Gardens), and worked as an educator both for high schoolers (North Carolina Governor’s School West) and middle schoolers (Hunts Point Alliance for Children). Currently, Ishmael is a member of the Transition Committee for the Mosaic Network & Fund and has served on grant panels for the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC) and South Arts.

Hope Ghazala

Hope Ghazala (no pronouns, name only) is a Licensed Social Worker, facilitator, and organizer. Hope has grounded Hopeself in fostering leadership development, particularly for youth of color. Experiences working as a popular and political educator in museums, domestic violence, consent campaigns, and the youth climate movement have expanded Hope’s passion for making information accessible and spaces value multicultural experiences. As a proud Muslim and self-proclaimed “Egypt-o-Rican”, Hope receives power and guidance from Hope’s spiritual and cultural identities. Hope finds purpose in cross-pollinating and uplifting the needs and voices of disinvested communities. At PeoplesHub, Hope focuses on connecting people with each other and with the knowledge to sustain and thrive. Hope is a native New Yorker who loves exploring NYC, traveling internationally, dancing, and reading cross-cultural fiction.

Jess Applebaum

Jess Applebaum is a dramaturg-scholar whose practice is rooted in contemporary performance and social action. As a dramaturg she works collaboratively with performance makers, academics, and activists to develop and facilitate creative processes. Her work pays particular attention to lifting up the cultural and political context of each project: identifying how the content developed serves both its creators and its audience in a shared, live moment. As a PhD candidate in CUNY’s Theater and Performance program, Jess’ scholarship focuses on the labor of dramaturgy: pushing the perceived boundaries of how research is performed and applied in both creative and academic work. She believes that bodies perform knowledge, process activates power, and that, together, they can inspire new pedagogical and civic practices.

Joe Tolbert

Joe received his B.S. in Communications from the University of Tennessee Knoxville and completed his M. Div. with a concentration in Social Ethics from Union Theological Seminary in the city of New York. As a Cultural Organizer and Consultant, Joe is the founder and lead cultural strategist of Art at the Intersections where he is a sought after facilitator and cultural strategist that works with communities to help them harness the power of art and culture through the building, implementation, and evaluation of cultural strategies. As a writer, he has contributed articles to Alternate ROOTS, Arts Black, and Quiet Lunch, among others.

Kyoung H. Park

Kyoung H. Park is a North Korean playwright/director, born and raised in Santiago, Chile, currently living in unceded territory of the Lenape. As Artistic Director of Kyoung’s Pacific Beat, he has devised three full-length plays — disOriented, TALA, and PILLOWTALK — and created over 35 community-based, experimental projects including performances for new media. His work centers stories of (im)migration, queerness, trauma, identity and the ways these intersect in communities of color; it’s described as “intensely personal” by American Theater Magazine and “very much of this moment” by the New York Times. He holds an MFA in Playwriting from Columbia University and an MA in Peace and Global Governance from Kyung Hee University’s Graduate Institute for Peace Studies.

Eric Lockley

Eric Lockley (Producing Artistic Leader, The Movement Theatre Company). Originally from Baltimore, MD, Lockley is an award-winning actor, writer, comedian, producer, and a founder of two Harlem-based organizations: The Movement Theatre Company and Harlem9. With these organizations Eric has produced critically acclaimed productions and festivals, published anthologies of new plays and created initiatives that highlight the complexity and diversity of people of color. The Movement Theatre Company’s digital programming, “1MOVE:DES19NED BY…”, which commissioned 30 designers of color in the midst of quarantine, recently received a Drama League award nomination. And the company’s production of What to Send Up When It Goes Down by Aleshea Harris is presented this Fall at Playwrights Horizons. Eric is a part of the 2022 Devised Theater Working Group and will have a presentation of his Afrofuturistic play Sweet Chariot at the Under The Radar Festival at The Public Theater in January.

Joo-Hyun Kang

Joo-Hyun Kang is the Director of Communities United for Police Reform (CPR) and executive director of CPR Action (CPR’s sibling c4 political organization). CPR is a multi-strategy, multi-sector campaign to end abusive policing in New York and reduce reliance on policing for community safety. CPR works to build and redefine community safety, strengthens community-based infrastructure to prevent and challenge police violence, and has organized coalitions of 200+ organizations to secure landmark policy and organizing victories in New York. Joo-Hyun joined CPR’s staff with two decades of experience in social justice work as an organizer, trainer, and strategist with racial justice, LGBT rights, gender justice, immigrant rights, and police accountability projects. In prior lives, she has been an acupuncturist; consultant to social change organizations and philanthropies; served as the Astraea Lesbian Foundation’s director of global grantmaking for LGBTI rights; was the first Executive Director of The Audre Lorde Project, where she developed organizing programs for LGBTST communities of color; and has been a member and on the board of various organizing groups.

Jason Wu

Jason Wu is currently a co-chair for GAPIMNY-Empowering Queer & Trans Asian Pacific Islanders, a queer and trans AAPI organization that focuses on community building, political education and mutual aid. Wu is also Attorney-in-Charge of The Legal Aid Society’s Harlem Community Law Office. Their writing on abolition, intersectionality and social movements has been published in Teen Vogue, Truthout, Refinery 29, Gotham Gazette, NY Daily News, and more.

Joyce Adewumi

Joyce Adewumi is the founder and president of the New York African Chorus Ensemble Inc., a 501 (c) 3 nonprofit organization located in NYC. Under her leadership, the organization presents programs that seek to change the erroneous and racist perceptions about Africa. These programs include “The Gathering” concert series; the international conference and festival “Dialogue: Africa Meets North America in Harlem;” The Space Speaker Series and the annual “NYC Multicultural Festival,” the largest showcase and celebration of cultural diversity in New York City which is a collaboration between her organization and the NYPD. Ms. Adewumi has received local, national and international recognition for her work. She has received awards from Nigeria, Germany including many New York City based Elected Officials and organizations. Ms. Adewumi founded the “We Are Endless Roar Nigeria Tour” and executively produced the “We Are The Endless Roar” feature film. Ms. Adewumi serves the New York City community in various capacities.

Conrhonda E. Baker

Conrhonda’s passion for the performing arts is grounded in her dance background, sparked by taking after-school classes at a county-wide recreational facility in rural northeast Georgia. She founded The Bese Saka in 2018 as a way to live out her Christian faith by actively intervening and building equity into the process of securing institutional funding support. She currently also serves as the Communications Officer at the Howard Gilman Foundation. Her professional experience developed through work with South Arts, Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts, Alabama Dance Council, Vulcan Park and Museum, Birmingham Museum of Art, and Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation. In addition to being a member of Women of Color in the Arts, she serves as the Fundraising Chair for SOLE Defined. She holds a Master of Arts Management from Carnegie Mellon University and a Bachelor of Arts in African American Studies with a minor in Dance Education from The University of Georgia.

Carolina Đỗ

Carolina Đỗ is a storyteller and community organizer. She is a first generation Việt born in America, the child of refugees and descendant of freedom fighters. Her work centers around community building, transgenerational healing, diasporic longings, and collective storytelling. She is a founding Artistic Leader of The Sống Collective whose mission is to nurture a community of artists whose work explores questions of identity, race, intersectionality, immigration, and the refugee experience. She’s an organizer with @Asians4Abolition. She’s spoken about abolition and the solidarity needed in the fight for liberation on numerous panels, including a recent one organized by the Dianne Morales mayoral campaign, alongside Jason Wu (GAPIMNY, Truth Out), Rohan Zhou-Lee (Blasian March), Linda Sarsour (Women’s March & Until Freedom), Frederick Joseph (NYT Bestselling Author of The Black Friend), Pastor Samuel Cruz , PhD (Trinity Lutheran Church), Moumita Ahmed (candidate for NYC Council District 24), Kei Williams (Black Lives Matter Global Network), Emerald Snipes (daughter of Eric Garner, sister of Erica Garner, founder of We Can’t Breathe).

Ishmael Thaahir

Ishmael Thaahir earned his B.F.A. in Theatre from North Carolina A&T State University and is Assistant Director of Kyoung’s Pacific Beat’s NERO, where he is also Arts Management Fellow. When not working at KPB, he teaches theater with the Hunts Point Alliance for Children. Ishmael believes art is an invaluable component in community building. He aims to make theatrical arts accessible for children & young adults alike. When not working, Ishmael can be found reading, going on walks, and endlessly quoting memes.

Rohan Zhou-Lee

Rohan Zhou-Lee (They/Siya/祂 (Tā)) is dancer, writer, and organizer. Previous credits include a soloist role in the Off-Broadway revival of Over Here! The Musical, West Side Story [New Bedford Festival Theatre,] and The Bluebird from Sleeping Beauty [Victoria Ballet Theatre.] They also trained at the Dance Theatre of Harlem and Ruth Page Center For the Arts. Their short act play, The Soldier’s Home, was produced in 2015 by Circa Pintig, Chicago’s premiere Filipino theatre company. Zhou-Lee is the founder of the Blasian March, a solidarity movement for Black, Asian and Blasian [mixed] communities through education on parallel struggles with racial injustice and mutual celebration. Independent of the Blasian March, they organised a rally for Asian American communities on February 20th with a team of women of color. Through the Blasian March, they have co-organised events to continue to uplift Black, Asian and Blasian communities. They hold a BA in Ethnomusicology from Northwestern University.