Building HueSpaces is a series that centers the creation of museums and other arts enclaves founded and led by Black, Indigenous, Asian, Latine, and all People of Color. Created through partnership between Museum Hue and American Institute of Architects (AIA) NY Cultural Facilities Committee, this five-part series highlights topics such as assessing capital needs for your organization, capital fundraising, building your capital project team, accessibility as a foundation for your project, and more. Designed to provide greater insight into how these spaces were acquired and their capital projects developed, it demonstrates the critical need for greater racial equity and representation within NYC’s built environment and arts landscape. Through case studies of select NYC-based arts entities this series will provide a step-by-step toolkit to support other arts entities founded and led by arts and cultural leaders of color who are seeking guidance on how to attain a brick and mortar of their own.

Building HueSpaces stems from the research findings and recommendation in the HueArts NYC Brown Paper report led by Museum Hue, which highlights a greater need in investing in place as a long-term strategy for Black, Indigenous, Asian, Latine, and all People of Color arts stability and thrivability.

All Building HueSpaces events will have live captioning and transcripts available with the release of the recording.

Session II: Roadmap

Building HueSpaces Session 3: Designing with Care at El Barrio’s Artspace highlights Artspace Projects , America’s Leading Nonprofit Real Estate Developer for the Arts, and how HI-ARTS’ move to Artspace has helped the organization and includes how Urban Design Forum confronts issues relating to New York City’s built environment. Panelists will discuss the process of creating physical spaces, accessibility, and how best to serve our local communities.

Tickets are available here.

Speakers

Rolinda Ramos has over two decades of extensive experience in the property management industry overseeing all facets of affordable housing in low-income communities including developing programs and comprehensive support services for vulnerable populations.

Rolinda joined Artspace Projects in 2014, at the inception of El Barrio’s Artspace PS 109, an affordable housing project with 100% artist preference. As director of Operations and Programs, Rolinda manages the day-to-day operations and works with resident artist, community members, and cultural partners to implement the artistic vision and purpose of Artspace Projects.

Prior endeavors consist of working for the YWCA of Brooklyn where she served a tenure of ten years as Housing Director serving a population of 214 single women including women with histories of homelessness, incarceration, mental illness, and in recovery; and for the Violence Intervention Program where she served as Housing and Program Director at a transitional housing program for survivors of domestic violence. While at the Violence Intervention Program Rolinda was recognized for spearheading an agency-wide initiative to implement trauma-informed services; an approach that recognizes and acknowledges trauma and its prevalence, alongside awareness and sensitivity to its dynamics.

Rolinda’s passion for the arts and creative pursuits includes training with the New York Writers Coalition for whom she facilitated creative writing workshops at a residential substance abuse program, and collaborating with independent artists and arts institutions in the organizing of arts and cultural events for underserved communities.

Born on Cherokee Land (Greenville, SC) and presently residing on the Land of the Lenape people (Brooklyn, NY), Aaron L. McKinney is an Arts Administrator and Producer. Grounded in two decades of experience in the performing arts field, McKinney brings his wealth of knowledge, experience, and value-centered expertise as a collaborative innovator and producer as evidenced by positions at world-renowned institutions such as the Stella Adler Studio of Acting, Sankofa.org, 651 ARTS, Center Theatre Group and currently as Executive Director of Hi-ARTS.

Aaron obtained his Bachelor of Arts in Theatre Performance from Florida A&M University and Master of Fine Arts in Theatre Management from the prestigious California Institute of the Arts. Outside of Hi-ARTS, McKinney is the Chief Strategist/Founder of The A.L.M. Way, a performing arts & management consulting practice. McKinney’s professional leadership in performing arts and producing purposely centers the dialogue that has always existed between the arts and social justice activism, highlighting how the intersection of these worlds serves as a vessel for addressing some of our most pressing social issues.

Daniel McPhee is Executive Director of the Urban Design Forum, an independent membership organization confronting defining issues in New York City’s built environment. Under his leadership, the Forum has created new programs to support diverse and emerging leaders in design and development, such as the Forefront Fellowship and New City Critics. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he co-founded the Neighborhoods Now initiative to support New York City community organizations, small businesses, and cultural organizations to safely reopen and navigate evolving public health regulations. He is a graduate of Vassar College and a member of the Sterling Network NYC.

Series Organizers and Moderators:

Peter Zuspan is the founding principal of Bureau V Architecture (BVA), a design and architecture studio based in Brooklyn, New York. BVA and its projects have won national and international awards, including numerous AIA Awards, a nomination for the Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize, Architectural Digest Innovators, and Curbed Groundbreakers. Its work has also been listed in the top ten arts centers in the world in 2015 by Architectural Record. BVA's clients have included the Brooklyn Public Library, National Sawdust, the Bushwick Starr, Chapter NY, Atlanta's Goat Farm Arts Center, Miami-Dade County, and numerous other institutions. The studio's work has been exhibited at the Centre Pompidou, the Guggenheim Museum, MoMA PS1, the Storefront for Art and Architecture, the Smithsonian Institute/Cooper Hewitt Museum, and many others nationally and internationally. Zuspan's research project entitled “The Performance of Shame: The Desegregation Renovations of Downtown Atlanta,” won the 2021 Arnold W. Brunner Grant for Architectural Research. Zuspan holds a Masters of Architecture and a Bachelors of Arts from Columbia University. He is a licensed architect in the states of New York and Georgia. He is also the Secretary of the Board of Directors of National Sawdust, a nonprofit organization dedicated to new music. Zuspan has also taught architecture at Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania, Syracuse University, and the University of Kentucky. BVA is a certified LGBTBE.

Stephanie Johnson Cunningham is the Executive Director of Museum Hue. Her leadership has propelled the organization into a nationally recognized and trusted source with 400+ institutional members (museums and academic institutions) that utilize the organization as a resource to inform both practice and policies. Stephanie has been committed to taking up the charge to change museums to bring about greater attention and constant awareness of racial issues through arts and culture. She stresses that the best pedagogical strategies include the cultural capital of communities to deepen knowledge and understanding of art, history, and culture. Stephanie holds a Bachelor's degree in Art and Art History from Brooklyn College and a Masters degree in Cultural Heritage and Preservation Studies (CHAPS) from Rutgers University. She also received the Americans for the Arts 2019 American Express Emerging Leader Award for her work.

Sierra Van Ryck deGroot is the Deputy Director of Museum Hue. A proud alumna of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Leadership Program at Seton Hall University and Bank Street College of Education, Sierra has her B.A. in Art, Design and Interactive Media; Fine Arts; and Art History and M.S.Ed in Museum Education. A child of Guyanese immigrants, she is proudly born and raised in Central Jersey (NJ), which does exist and it is pork roll, not Taylor Ham. She is also half of the former Sierras co-presidential leadership team of the National Emerging Museum Professionals Network, a current board member for the New Jersey Association of Museums, and participating in many side quests related to advocating for change in the GLAM sector, especially in museums, around salary transparency, actionable equity in hiring practices, the abolition of unpaid internships, and the practice of rest for all museum workers.

Addison Tobias is the Programs Manager at Museum Hue. A former Schomburg Fellow at the University at Buffalo, Addison received her Master’s degree in Critical Museum Studies and Bachelor’s degree in Anthropology. She proudly brings experience expanding access to museums from her work co-developing Teen Programs at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Addison has participated in the Columbia Business School’s Executive Education Museum Leadership Program and is an advocate for amplifying BIPOC voices in arts administration. Originally from Buffalo, New York, Addison was adopted into a family of art educators and has always been interested in the use of arts as a lens for communication and expression. She is committed to implementing best practices in Diversity, Equity, Accessibility, and Inclusion initiatives across the arts and cultural field.

Koray Duman is the principal of B-KD (Büro Koray Duman), a research-driven architecture and design studio based in New York and Istanbul. Established in 2013, the firm completed projects for American Society for Muslim Advancement, Finnish Cultural Institute NY, MoMA PS1 Museum, and artist Richard Prince. In 2016, the firm won an invited competition to design an Art and Archive Building for the Noguchi Museum. In 2017, Architizer honored B-KD as Emerging Firm of the Year for ‘its forward-thinking for the role of the architect and the desire to disrupt the stigma of the practice’. Among several recognitions, the firm received the 2017 Design Award of Excellence by Society of American Registered Architects, and 2020 & 2015 Best of the Year Awards by Architects Newspaper. The firm's work has been featured in publications like the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, New York Magazine, Surface Magazine, Cultured Magazine, Interior Design Magazine and Dwell. Koray is originally from Turkey where he earned a BArch from Middle Eastern Technical University and furthered his studies at UCLA with a Master’s degree in Architecture. He previously worked as the lead architect on several US west coast museum projects. He served as the chair of the New Practice Committee at AIA NYC Chapter, and a board member of the Clemente Center in the Lower East Side. He is on the advisory board of American Society for Muslim Advancement and ProtoCinema. He is an adjunct professor at Pratt and New School and a registered architect in New York State and Turkey.