ALIVE WITH ART TUESDAY MAY 15, 2018
Cocktails | Dinner | Auction | Performances | Festive Attire
MENU
ADORNING THE TABLE
FAMILY STYLE
Tuscan Kale Roasted Mushroom, Farm Herbs, Pecorino & Lemon Vinaigrette
Goffle Road Coq Au Vin Wild Mushrooms, Glazed Carrots & Pan Jus Roasted Sea Bass Tomatoes, Olives & Capers Swiss Chard & Rosemary Roasted Fingerling Potatoes
Katchkie Farm Greens & Roasted Beets Feta & Aged Sherry Vinaigrette
VEGAN OPTION
Fava Bean Sweet Pea Pesto, Morel Mushroom & Truffle Vinaigrette
(On Request)
Vegan Torta Panzanella Roasted, Smoked & Marinated Vegetables, Herbed Polenta, Balsamic Glaze & Basil Oil
Tomatoes, Right Now, From the Farm Katchkie Peppers & Chiles, Tomato Water, Basil Oil, Herbs & Blossoms
DESSERT Brooklyn Blackout Cake Redux Chocolate Crémeux, Malted Milk Chocolate Custard, Katchkie Beet Devil’s Food Cake
Selection of Artisanal Rolls Cultured Local Butter & Sea Salt
Coffee & Tea Brooklyn Coffee Roasters Selection Organic Tea Selection Assortment of Petits Fours
Catering by Great Performances
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PROGRAM
WELCOME
TONI BLACKMAN MC, Hip-hop Artist & Cultural Ambassador THOMAS F. SCHUTTE Chairman of the Board, Brooklyn Arts Council CHARLOTTE A. COHEN Executive Director, Brooklyn Arts Council
INTRODUCTIONS & HONOREES DAN MARKS Board of Directors, Brooklyn Arts Council
SUGAR HILL CAPITAL PARTNERS Jay Solomon, Chief Creative Officer & Sustainability Director COURTNEY BRENNAN & LISA DOLBERRY HANCOCK Board of Directors, Brooklyn Arts Council LAURIE A. CUMBO NYC Council Majority Leader
PERFORMERS DJ OP!
BROOKLYN RAGA MASSIVE PRESENTS: WOMEN’S RAGA MASSIVE
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WELCOME TO ALIVE WITH ART!
Our work is wide-ranging but with the focus on changing people’s lives, by ensuring that people in all communities across Brooklyn have access to locallybased arts and cultural resources that enhance their lives every day. We know that the arts improve peoples’ lives in ways that are broader in scope than aesthetics—the arts exist as part of a vital ecosystem contributing to the security, health, education, social connections, and civic engagement of a community. This is important work, and we could not accomplish it without everyone in this room tonight–-your support is essential to our success.
Tonight, we are thrilled to celebrate our wonderful honorees, New York City Council Majority Leader Laurie Cumbo and Sugar Hill Capital Partners, who share our organization’s values and have committed themselves to supporting the city’s artistic community through their work.
I want to thank BAC’s extraordinary Board of Directors, for guiding us every step of the way with their leadership. And of course, boundless gratitude to Brooklyn Arts Council’s staff, who make every day joyful and rewarding by bringing such exceptional integrity and commitment to our work. I couldn’t be prouder of this organization and hope everyone is as excited as I am to see where we take BAC in the years to come!
Brooklyn Arts Council (BAC) is proud to sit at the center of Brooklyn’s dynamic artistic communities, and we want art to be at the center of everyone’s universe, because we know that art is community. For over 50 years, we have remained a steadfast source of information, expertise, and support for the arts; facilitating equal access to artistic and cultural resources throughout the borough.
Charlotte A. Cohen Executive Director
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HONOREES
NYC COUNCIL MAJORITY LEADER LAURIE A. CUMBO
SUGAR HILL CAPITAL PARTNERS
New York City Council Majority Leader Laurie A. Cumbo, the first African-American woman to serve in this capacity, represents the 35th District. She is proud to have worked and contributed to the growth and development of Prospect Park, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The High Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum and The Brooklyn Children’s Museum. Moreover, she enjoyed serving as a Graduate Professor at Pratt Institute for a decade in the Arts and Cultural Management Program.
Sugar Hill Capital Partners was founded in 2009 and is a vertically integrated, real estate investment management and operations company. The company leverages a scalable and repeatable business model of acquiring, repositioning and profitably exiting middlemarket, multi-family buildings across New York City. Sugar Hill Capital Partners prioritizes sustainable design practices across its building portfolio in an effort to minimize its environmental footprint and positively impacting the communities in which it invests. The company’s major divisions include investment management, property management, architectural design, and energy management. Now, with more than $250MM in assets under management, Sugar Hill Capital Partners creates customized portfolios for the world’s most sophisticated investors.
In the past four years, Majority Leader Cumbo has been a staunch advocate for women and families, seniors, and tenants. She has championed pay equity, the implementation of the New York City Paid Family Leave policy, increased procurement opportunities for minority and women-owned businesses, raising the minimum wage to $15, pushed for comprehensive sex education in City public schools, sponsored legislation that will enable New Yorkers to ‘text 911’ for assistance in emergency situations, advanced cultural development by tripling the city’s budget for the Percent for Art Program, worked alongside city agencies to break the cycles of domestic and gun violence through increased investments in supportive services and by creating the first-ever Mayor’s Office to Prevent Gun Violence.
Sugar Hill Capital Partners founded its Studio Program in 2013 as a social impact initiative that supports New York City’s artist community. The Studio Program converts unutilized multi-family building area into affordable art studios. This initiative provides local artists the ability to both work, live and create in their local communities, and has served over 30 artists across 11 properties since its inception.
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PERFORMERS TONI BLACKMAN, MC
Toni Blackman, a highly respected artist and social entrepreneur, is the first Hip-Hop artist selected to work as a Cultural Ambassador with the U.S. Department of State. She is currently an artist with the Carnegie Hall Weill Music Institute and a fellow in the Echoing Green Foundation’s Thought Leadership Cohort. Creator of Freestyle Union Cipher Workshop and Rhyme Like A Girl, for which she was awarded a prestigious Open Society Institute fellowship (Soros Foundation), Toni is one of the world’s foremost Hip-Hop activists. This influence led to Toni being selected as a 2012 DOVE soap Real Woman Honoree. Working in over 34 different countries, touring Africa, Southeast Asia, Europe, Canada, and Brazil has positioned Toni to consult for festivals and conferences. She most recently curated SOURCE 360’s International Hip-Hop Show as a part of the Barclays Center programming in a partnership with BAM. She has spoken at ASPEN Institute’s World Summit on Creativity in Oman, the Pio Manzu Conference in Italy, the World Social Forum in Barcelona, as a featured speaker at Chicago Ideas Week, at TEDx UMass at Amherst, and most recently at Rockefeller Plaza for NBC Universal’s B.P.A. Conference.
DJ OP!
OP! is the founder of The Definitive Sound, a music specialty company. OP! is a talented DJ and tastemaker who has over 20 years of experience as a DJ. Since the age of 14, he has perfected the skill of playing music for crowds from New York to Johannesburg and many points between. As a multi-genre DJ with an eclectic taste in music, OP!’s sound ranges from hip-hop, r&b, reggae, pop, rock, and classics to house, future soul, and various electronic genres from around the world. OP! is a partner and lead DJ at the New York City monthly parties I Love Vinyl and Afrokinetic. OP! holds residences at the award winning speakeasy Bathtub Gin in Manhattan and the Royal Palm Shuffle Club in Brooklyn. In addition, he has opened for Q-Tip (A Tribe Called Quest), Questlove (The Roots/Jimmy Fallon), Afrika Bambaataa (godfather of Hip-Hop), Shuggie Otis (70’s legend) and Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton. Whether playing for 500+ people at NYC hotspots or DJing for thousands of people at Prospect Park (The Pop Up Dinner) or Central Park (Summerstage), OP! has the taste and skill to get any dance floor and audience moving in a frenzy.
BROOKLYN RAGA MASSIVE PRESENTS
WOMEN’S RAGA MASSIVE
Women’s Raga Massive (WRM), a Brooklyn Raga Massive project, explores and makes visible the diverse creative work of female-identified artists in a world where those voices are a minority. WRM uses Indian Classical music as a framework to improvise and collaborate while bringing in influences from the diverse cultures of Brooklyn. They seek to create an inclusive platform for individual artists and female-led ensembles to engage in musical conversations highlighting original works, gender issues, cross-cultural dialogue, and achievements of women from the past, whose stories are often untold. WRM hopes to inspire and empower young women of all backgrounds to freely express themselves as creative artists in contemporary America.
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BAC BOARD & STAFF Brooklyn Arts Council exists at the center of Brooklyn’s vibrant artistic communities; serves as a vital source of information, expertise, and support; and facilitates equal access to artistic and cultural resources throughout the borough. All proceeds from Alive With Art support BAC’s programs and services and help keep the arts alive in Brooklyn today, tomorrow, and for years to come.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Honorary Chairman Eric Adams Brooklyn Borough President Chairman Thomas F. Schutte, Ph.D* Vice Chair Antonia Yuille Williams* Treasurer Frazier Holloway Secretary Michael A. Armstrong Audrey Frank Anastasi* Michele Arbeeny, Esq.* Courtney Brennan* Julia Chu Jennifer L. Davis Jack Esterson, AIA Ellen Gottlieb* Lisa Dolberry Hancock* Sidney R. Jean, Esq Alan Ket* Dan Marks* Theresa Schieber Jennifer L. Smith Karen Stone* Valerie D. White Jesse Alden Williamson*
DIRECTORS EMERITI
Peter Aschkenasy Theodore Gunn Susan Rowland
STAFF
Surina Gangwani
Charlotte A. Cohen Executive Director
Ayoka Wiles-Abel
Development and External Affairs Assistant
Director of Programs and Strategy
Veasna Has
Christopher Mulé
Wéma Harris
Folk Arts Director
Edgardo Rivera
Finance Director
Jilian Cahan Gersten
Director of Development and External Affairs
Philip A. Alexander
Arts in Education Director
Ester Kwon
Grants Coordinator
Farrah Lafontant
Community Initiatives Associate
Kendra Williams
Executive Assistant
Lissette Martinez
Arts in Education Assistant
Marissa Shadburn Arts in Education Coordinator
Molly MacFadden Grants Manager
*Alive With Art Committee
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Communications Manager
Arts in Education Manager
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