Creative Power Awards

amara tabor-smith is an Oakland based choreographer, performance maker, cultural worker, and the artistic director of Deep Waters Dance Theater. Her performances utilize spiritual practices to address issues of social and environmental justice, identity, homefullness and belonging. amara creates performance experiences that uplift community care, collective responsibility and liberation. Her creative process includes gathering people together to be in intergenerational dialogues, story circles, grief and rest rituals, and movement-based healing practices.

Barbara Mumby-Huerta is a Bay Area figurative painter, public art practitioner, and cultural strategist. She is co-director of the Clarion Alley Mural Project and Cosecha Collective, and adjunct art faculty at San Jose City College. Descended from the Patawomeck, Pamunkey, and Mattaponi Nations, she led the mobilization that removed San Francisco’s “Early Days” statue, sparking a renaissance for the city’s Native community — co-authoring its Indigenous People’s Day legislation and driving new city funding for Native American programs.

A writer of Uruguayan origins, Caro De Robertis is the author of seven books, including Cantoras, The Palace of Eros, and So Many Stars: an Oral History of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Two-Spirit People of Color. Their works have been translated into seventeen languages, and have received numerous awards, including the Golden Poppy Octavia E. Butler Award, two Stonewall Book Awards, and the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature, which they were the first openly nonbinary person to receive. They are also a curator, a literary translator, and a professor at San Francisco State University.

Evren Odcikin is a Turkish-American director, writer, and arts leader based in San Francisco and New York City. A celebrated champion of historically excluded voices in the American theater, his work is heart-centered, politically engaged, globally minded, and centers joy.

Gabriel Cortez is a poet, educator, and organizer. Since 2009, he’s mentored hundreds of emerging writers throughout the Bay and beyond, leading grassroots arts projects that nurture voice and connection as vital forces for collective liberation. He co-founded The Root Slam and Write Home, directed Youth Speaks, served on the board of directors for the Bay Area Book Festival and Performing Arts Workshop, and has led narrative campaigns related to public health, environmental justice, and more.

Kiazi Malonga is a master Ngoma drummer, recording artist, composer, cultural educator, and community leader. A second-generation Congolese American, Kiazi carries forward the artistic legacy of his father, the late Malonga Casquelourd, while creating his own bridge between Kongo tradition and contemporary expression. Malonga uses the Ngoma drum as an ancestral communication tool to strengthen identity, connection, healing, and community across generations.

Marcel Pardo Ariza is a Colombian visual artist, educator, and activist. Their practice centers site-specific photographic installations, public programs, and gathering spaces grounded in collaboration, collective care, and intergenerational relationships. Their work has been exhibited around the world.

Taraneh Hemami is a multidisciplinary artist, organizer and educator creating research based public and collective works, installations, and collaborative projects that offer opportunities for creative exchange across communities. Her works have been exhibited and collected internationally, and her projects have received many awards. She is the founder of Makaan Arts providing a communal hub for local and visiting Central and West Asian and North African artists.

Troy Rockett is a Bay Area-based artist, writer, and a Masters in Social Work candidate at San Francisco State University. His work, both on stage and in the community, is dedicated to Black childhoods, Black kinship, and Trans futures. Offstage, Troy bridges creative practice with direct social action as a mentor using storytelling to activate personal transformation and community care.