Gail Trapp Bohner

Featured artist * Workshop designer and leader

Gail became an elementary classroom teacher in 1968 upon graduating from Michigan State University. In 1985 she returned to school, subsequently obtaining a Bachelor’s and then Master’s in Art Education from Eastern Michigan University. She began teaching elementary art for the Brighton Area Schools in 1987, retiring in June 2010.

Gail works in many different mediums, but especially enjoys mixed water media and collage. Over the past nine years, she has created a series, Earth Memories, about her eldest daughter Samantha who had Bipolar Disorder and passed away by suicide in 2002.

Kate Darnell

Featured artist

Kate studied art at the University of Michigan School of Art in Ann Arbor, where she received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1978. And since then, she has never stopped learning. At her studio in East Lansing, Michigan, she has completed countless calligraphy projects and a plethora of pictures since 1981.

Kate also is a board member of the Peace Education Center. Her art work for this exhibit looks at how violence disrupts and destroys lives and cultures, while unearthing the hope hiding in the confusion of violent events.

Melissa Dey Hasbrook

Project coordinator * Workshop designer and leader * Exhibit curator * Featured artist

Melissa is a writer, artist, and community organizer based in Lansing, Michigan. She is inspired to bring word-art alive through varied media: spoken word, multimedia, and collage. As a survivor of violence, she draws upon her healing journey to inspire others along their own.

Melissa launched the small press Femestiza with “Circle…Home” (2011), her collection of poetry and prose supported by a grant from the Arts Council of Greater Lansing. This exhibit is her first venture into mixed-media collage. Words & Afterwards marks her creative focus on stories about healing, which she writes about on her blog: http://deyofthephoenix.com.

Jen Loforese

Featured artist * Workshop designer and leader

Jen is a queer, activist, artist, mother, partner, survivor, advocate, friend, counselor, and human being. Previous works to Words & Afterwards include community and educational art installations, and other initiatives that utilize art as a means of healing.

Collage has always been her favored medium for creating a visual story – one that shapes, rather than determines, meaningful dialogue. Jen finds that the elements and techniques of this medium – fragmented pieces, found objects, half-hidden images, mistakes-turned-beautiful, creases and folds – are like the layers of our own lives.