Established Artists

Allison Beula holds an Honours B.A.A. in film and is a recipient of the “Norman Jewison Filmmaker” Award. She furthered her training at the Randolph College for the Performing Arts, for whom she currently Directs, Choreographs, and Instructs, for both the College, and the Kids Program, where she has also held the title of “Head of Triple Threat-Kids Division” She is also currently on faculty for The Avenue Road Arts School, The Institute for the Performing Arts (“TIFTPA”), and VIBE Arts. She has lead workshops and classes for dozens of institutions including: Mirvish (Lion King),The Toronto and Catholic School Board, OISE, Show Choir Canada, and The Ontario School of Ballet, to name a few. She trained with Upright Citizens Brigade and Dance Manhattan (NYC), and is a graduate of the Second City Conservatory Program. Allison is a two-time recipient of an Ontario Arts Council grant for “Artists in Education”. Allison’s musical “The Tiki Bikini Beach Paradise Party A-Go-Go!” which she wrote, directed, and choreographed, made its debut at the Toronto Fringe Festival where it won “Patron’s Pick” and “Best of the Fringe” and then continued on to be in the curated “Next Stage Theatre Festival”. Her choreography (and performing) can be seen in the video “Hypnotized” (Jeffery Straker) which hit the “MMM” Top 10 as well as Kat Goldman’s “Release Me” (Choreographer, Performer).

Astrid Ho is a visual artist focusing on abstract art and the personal narrative in printmaking. She co-founded Propeller Centre for the Visual Arts (1996) and is an artist member of Open Studio. She has taught at Centre3 (Hamilton), McMichael Canadian Art Collection (Kleinburg) and Open Studio (Toronto) among other locations. She was a recipient of Ontario Arts Council Access and Career Development Project Grant (2009) and is the board chair at Cultural Pluralism in the Arts Movement Ontario (CPAMO). Her various exhibitions include Harbourfront Centre, Open Studio (Toronto) and Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Art Gallery (Newfoundland). Her works are represented in various corporate and private collections including the Bank of Montreal, The Canada Council Art Bank, Global Affairs Canada and National Bank of Canada. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from OCAD University and studied in Florence, Italy under the OCAD Study-Abroad Program.

Azadeh Pirazimian is a multidisciplinary artist using visual arts and performance to express herself. Most of her works are based on her life experience. She offers a critical view of socio-political and cultural issues. While she uses different mediums and various techniques for each project, her methodology is consistent. She believes as an artist this is her responsibility. And her intention is shifting her audience’s attention to these subjects. Azadeh holds a BA in painting and a MA in Visual Communication and have been teaching visual arts for more than one decade while she keeps developing her artistic practice in painting and performance.

Frances Potts is an emerging visual artist who is deeply inspired by the captivating night sky and universe, which surrounds us each night. She tries to incorporate the vast sea of stars into her works in unusual and surreal ways, to provoke thought and creativity. She is 20 years old and grew up in Scarborough, Ontario, where she works as an artist today. Frances enjoys working with the community wherever possible in her career. She found that are and the community have a symbiotic relationship; the community benefits from art opportunities through the revitalization of their neighbourhood, participation and/or collaboration, while artists benefit through compensation, promotion and gratification. She relishes in the positive interaction with people of all ages during these times.

Isiah Lea is an Artist, Activist, and Community Leader who channels his passion, drive, talent, and purpose in life into Art, Community Building and Social Justice. These things are the pillars and foundation of everything Isiah does, is, and creates. Isiah was born in Toronto, Canada, and is a proud resident of Jane-Finch living in Toronto Community Housing. Social Justice is at the core of Isiah’s approach to Art, Community Building and Leadership. He views each one of these elements as necessary components for creating positive and sustainable social change. As an artist Isiah channels deep expressions of his soul through various artistic mediums of Performance Arts as well as Visual Arts; including Spoken Word Poetry, Rap, Theatre, Painting/Drawing, Piano, Guitar, Dance, and Photography/Graphic Design. Though the artistic mediums may vary, the contents of Isiah’s creations all have one thing in common, they are messages molded with consciousness, awareness, and purpose, rooted in honest storytelling, empowerment, and community building.

Jasmine Wemigwans currently attends Wexford Collegiate School of the Arts for the advance visual arts program. She is set to graduate in 2016, and hopes to find a satisfying career in the fine arts since it has always been her passion. Currently she is an emerging artist at VIBE Arts. She believes her passion for the arts was greatly influenced by her Aboriginal heritage and being surrounded by family members making a living in the fine arts. She hopes to continue working with VIBE and continue gaining more professional experience in the art community.

Jennifer Chin is a visual artist and educator based in Toronto. She holds an Associate’s Diploma from the Ontario College of Art and Design and a Masters in Fine Art from the University of Windsor. She has exhibited her multi-disciplinary work across Canada and the U.S, and has been an instructor and lecturer at various universities, independent schools and youth outreach programs since 1999.

Jordan Laffrenier is a multidisciplinary director, writer, community builder and photographer.  He is the artistic director of Then They Fight Theatre. Through his work Jordan creates theatre that is socially and stylistically relevant. He is an advocate for theatre that supports the local community on and off stage. Recent creative credits include: Amelie on Broadway (Lyric Theatre), Sousatzka (Tiberius Entertainment), Carbon (Little Black Afro) and The 101010 Project (Then They Fight Theatre).

Keisha James is a multi-disciplinary artist with 6 years of experience in the community arts sector and 4 years of experience in the film and media industry. She values social welfare programs, and using the power of media to highlight issues and bring about change. Having obtained her Bachelor of Film (honours) from Humber College, she hopes to use her education to continue storytelling through filmmaking and create engaging works of art, along with facilitating future opportunities for youth in Toronto to be able to achieve their goals.

Lucia has had numerous solo and group exhibitions in Toronto and Sault Ste. Marie. She has also live painted for the ROM during the Anishinabeg art and power ongoing exhibition. Her work also includes mural painting and running mural workshops for children. Most recently she painted 4 murals for the Fort York Indigenous Festival and created the painting used for promotional material for the annual Native Child and Family Services Pow Wow.

Maureen Da Silva is a Toronto-based artist committed to an intersectional feminist practice. Her practice focuses on silk screen, lithography and relief, with forays into bookbinding. She has taken her love of print into the founding of the not-for-profit artist group, The inPrint Collective, of which she is the Managing Director. Through this collective, Maureen has been proud to showcase work in Scotiabank NuitBlanche (2012), Printopolis (2010), Culture Days (2010-present) and other spaces across the GTA. With inPrint, Maureen has also developed a number of projects with various community organizations across Toronto. A 2008 graduate of York University’s B.F.A program, Maureen has also completed her Masters of Arts at the University of Toronto (2009), as well as her Certificate in Museum Studies from the Ontario Museum Association (2013), and is the recipient of two OAC Exhibition Assistance grants. Her research in her Women and Gender Studies Master’s program focused on the politics of inclusion within feminist art collectives, an interest which brought Maureen into the Feminist Art Collective (FAC). Her own practice in feminism and printmaking, as well as the artistic wealth of her print community has inspired Maureen to a lifetime of creativity, non-stop learning and sharing.

Mirka Loiselle (she/they) is a visual artist and arts educator for children & youth. She works primarily in digital illustration and other drawing media, but also dabbles in painting, printmaking, and puppetry. Mirka is passionate about creating art for and with children of all ages (including those adults who enjoy being children every now and again!), and always strives to imbue her work with a certain amount of joy and whimsy, even while tackling tough subjects like anxiety and depression. Her work has recently been featured in Ossington Subway Station and at the Scarborough Civic Centre, and she is the illustrator behind Camp Coup, a children’s webcomic about rebellious animals at a summer camp. Find her work online at mirkaillustrates.com and on Instragram @mirkaillustrates.

Nyaomi is an artist from Toronto with experience shooting and exhibiting in North and South America. Her artistic practice can be defined as personal narratives that explore subjectivity, the body and challenging issues. She aims to bring awareness to what's been repressed and show alternative ways of thinking.

In recent years, she has worked with Airbnb, WeWork, Maclean’s, LinkedIn, and more. Inspired by her thesis–research on alternative perspectives on depression–she continued creating with transformation in mind. Nyaomi has since expanded into textiles to further explore the connections between our mental health, our environment and the power of creating something tangible. She is an OCAD University graduate with years of experience as a freelance photographer, entrepreneur, and facilitator.

Paddy Leung is a Toronto-based multidisciplinary artist and community arts facilitator. They are known for creating whimsical large-scale installations and window displays throughout the city. Paddy also seeks to introduce people of all ages to the joy of creating through D.I.Y. crafting workshops and community events.

Pamela Schuller is a visual community artist, her concept of working with community is aligned with her personal art practice. In community arts, she is responsive to the needs of the participants as appropriate to each unique moment. Through the art making process, Pamela engages people with rhythm, rhyme, humour, and questions that generate imagination and creative action. Her intention is to cultivate a creative experience that engenders a sense of curiosity, trust, and joy. She feels that everything has a sound or a song. Combining visual arts, sounds, and songs together through the form of community arts is a collaboration that inspires.

Sandra Tarantino, a resident of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, received a Bachelor of Fine Arts through Ontario College of Art and Design, as well as a Bachelor of Education. She has actively participates in the artistic community as Founder and Director of C1 art space (2004-10), Co-founding Director of AWOL Gallery and Studios Co-operative (1996-2012) and as a Visual Arts Instructor for organizations and schools including Vibe Arts (formerly AFCY, 2008- present) and Avenue Road Arts School (2012-present). She is a recipient of the Visual Artist Grant (2007, 2005, 2003), Exhibition Assistance Grant (2006, 2005) and Artist in Education Grant (2008-12) from the Ontario Arts Council. Tarantino’s artwork incorporates elements of both painting and sculptural modes through her shaped canvases, ceramic figurative pieces and other mixed media works. Her artwork is in private and corporate collections across Canada, U.S.A and Europe.

Toronto born and raised self-taught emerging artist that creates anything from small crafts to large scale paintings experimenting with many types of mediums. She is an arts educator who works within many communities throughout the GTA such as Urban Arts and VIBE Arts in schools and community centres. Shashann’s work is heavily influenced and inspired by Toronto culture, music, social issues, and her environment. She is a 2014 graduate of Seneca @ York’s Art Fundamentals program and is currently studying Visual Art and Digital Art at Humber College Lakeshore.

Sylvie Stojanovski (@anepicenigma) is a Scarborough-based, emerging artist, creative facilitator, and project manager, with a passion for community art-making. She believes that art has the power to heal, connect people across difference and create social change. Her personal creative body of work is largely pattern-based, and created through a process of intuitive mark-making. Sylvie is inspired by the myriad of relationships we have with the contemporary natural world, and is interested in helping people reconnect with their child-like sense of wonder.

As an arts entrepreneur, Sylvie has founded successful collectives, and played roles in program development, research, and outreach for established arts organizations, including: Mass Culture, Scarborough Arts, and the Coalition for Music Education in Canada. In the community, she is known for her exceptional leadership, and dedication to supporting arts initiatives at the intersection of creativity, mindfulness, and play. In 2019, she was awarded the Rising Star in community leadership award from Dancing Damsels Inc. for her work with the youth-led multidisciplinary arts festival, ARTSIDEOUT. Recently, she was one of 5 artists selected from across Canada to be a part of the Youth Climate Lab’s Virtual Gallery and #MoveTheNeedle campaign on climate conversations.

Tara is a visual artist passionate about arts education, collaborative art making, and murals, practices that bridge her backgrounds from a Bachelor of Fine Art in Drawing & Painting from OCAD University and a Community Arts Practice Certificate from York University. Tara loves to use storytelling, brainstorming, and playful art techniques like collage to encourage conversations, confidence and to bring many ideas together into action. Since 2011, Tara has worn many hats from artist, arts educator, facilitator, curator, arts administrator and project manager. She has had the opportunity to work and learn from art making experiences in libraries, schools, art galleries, community centres, seniors centres, skate parks, abandoned storefronts (you name it!) through projects in Toronto through opportunities with Vibe Arts, Nuit Blanche, Lakeshore Arts, Platform A, and East End Arts and in London, UK with groups like Entelechy Arts, Brockley Street Art Festival, Art Mongers and Lewisham Education Arts Network. Tara is currently the Program Director at Mural Routes.

A Poet

A Singer

A Thunder Bringer

Thunderclaw Robinson is a Jack of all trades, master of some

Super Powers Include Lyricism, Vocal Proficiency, Enhanced reflexes, super strength, access to unlimited Knowledge of science facts that nobody needs, and a super human level of awkwardness

Promises you he won’t lie and neither will his hips.

Once Managed to win 3rd Place at an Open Mic (“How does one win an open mic?” You might ask? Ask him!!!)

He Is the Co-Captain of the 2018 BAM! Toronto Youth Poetry Slam Team that represented Canada in the International Spoken Word Slam and Festival; “Brave New Voices” in Houston Texas this year

He has traveled to a variety of locations across the continent to Share Light through Poems and Praise Thru Song

And believe it or not, his name does not have any affiliation with the “Thundercats”

Based in Toronto, Vero Díaz is an artist that works in the realm of magic realism and indigenous futurism. She believes in the power of finding our ancestral aesthetic and crafting our own stories, especially to process and heal from ancestral wounds and present day urban realities. She believes in the decolonization path and the power of radical imagination as a force that brings collective actions and personal transformation. Her practice is grounded in her mixed roots from México. She integrates Maya, Mexica, and Cora indigenous art forms and ancestral knowledge with contemporary folklore in film, photography, performance, writing, and installation.

Her work has been shown in Harbourfront Centre, Gallery 44, Toronto Public Library, Artscape Youngplace, Sketch, World Pride, York University, Waterloo University, and Kitchener City Hall. Díaz mounted her first solo photography exhibition Inner Blooming at the Arcadia Gallery in 2017. She completed her Masters in Environmental Studies (MES) at York University in Latinx Transformation & Decolonial Art Practice. She is developing Red Surrender, a multidisciplinary bio-mythic piece created and performed in Watah Theatre. Her practice has been shared locally and internationally for 10 years in Canada, Costa Rica, and México.