2025 Year in Review

December 18, 2025 Blog, Documentary Filmmaking, Updates documentary, graphic design, ithaca

This past year has been one of continuity and placemaking. In a chaotic and unjust world, I believe in creating the reality we want to see – a world of mutual aid, human dignity, self expression, and ecological stewardship. To that end, it is an honor to deepen connections in Ithaca, where I have now lived for almost 20 years (not including my undergrad years at Cornell) and have had the privilege to work with numerous nonprofits, activists, artists and educators to help deepen the impact of their work. Here are some highlights from 2025…

Photo by Shira Evergreen – Ithaca’s Inaugural Mural Jam artists and organizers on the roof of Southworks, October 2025

I finished a documentary for Smart Energy Choices of the Southern Tier exploring the barriers encountered by low to moderate income people as they struggle to keep their homes livable. The film has been shared with numerous stakeholders with a goal of improving housing and energy efficiency for our most vulnerable community members at a time when energy prices and other costs are rising.

I had the pleasure of reconnecting with my old friend Amie Hamlin, Executive Director of the Coalition for Healthy School Food, as we visited public schools across the state to test out plant-based recipes in real lunch rooms and get the reactions of students. The videos, along with interviews with nutritionists and doctors, were shared in a webinar series with Food Service Directors across the country. These are the people who decide what gets on public school menus and many of them have been persuaded by the health, cost, and environmental benefits, to offer more plant-based options in their school districts.

Open Doors English is a vital local nonprofit offering English as a second language classes to adults in the Ithaca area. With this project, I was given someone else’s footage and asked to make a compelling short video that would inspire participation and donations. I learned in the process about how the organization goes beyond literacy and verbal competence to build community, and to create opportunities for participants who come from diverse educational and economic backgrounds. I encourage locals to volunteer and/or donate.

As part of my ongoing collaboration with Visit Ithaca, I was hired to film highlights of Ithaca Pride, which is a mighty, volunteer-led effort by Ithaca Pride Alliance including multiple days of festivities. This time around I enlisted a volunteer to be in the Rainbow Fabulosity puppet so that I could film the family parade.

In 2025, I continued my unofficial role as documenter of Ithaca’s murals. Sometimes I feel like “mural Batman” – if there’s a mural being painted, off I go to capture the ephemeral process. I have a longtime goal of editing a feature-length film about Ithaca’s numerous and profound murals with the footage I have gathered since 2018 and the plan is to fundraise for editing in 2026 – stay tuned! One of my favorite local artists is definitely Josh Swartwood (aka Bear), whose minimalist style along with the layers of meaning he puts into his work is highly impactful.

Ithaca Murals got a large grant from New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) administered through Community Arts Partnership of Tompkins County (CAP) to fund the creation of murals in Ithaca and the surrounding areas including in “Mural Deserts,” areas with very few murals that could really benefit from the addition of public art. As part of the NYSCA grant, I was hired to make short films about the projects with a focus on highlighting their impact on the communities in which they were created. This mural was created at the home of my friend Amanda David who recently had to relocate her homestead and BIPOC Community Garden as a result of racism and negligence by the criminal justice system in the Town of Caroline. Her new location features a beautiful mural by artist Maryam Adib highlighting local floral species that have medicinal properties and which are significant to Amanda.

The second “Mural Deserts” project was by Via Carpenter of Via’s Cookies fame, who painted this sweet mural with her sister on the side of the barn at Namaste Montessori School in rural Trumansburg with some help from some preschool painters.

Margalo Guo‘s piece for the “Mural Deserts” project was a collaboration with homeowner and filmmaker Thomas Hoebbel who wanted to highlight bird species – native and extinct – on the two doors of his garage to raise awareness about habitat preservation.

In another first for Ithaca, the NYSCA/CAP grant enabled Ithaca Murals to organize the Inaugural Mural Jam, in which local and visiting artists were commissioned to create large-scale pieces and community members could contribute to a sprawling collective wall. All of this was hosted by Southworks, a dynamic development project using an adaptive reuse model to bring new life to the long closed Morse Chain Factory on South Hill.

The crown jewel of the NYSCA/CAP grant is this four-story masterpiece on the side of the Community School of Music and Arts in downtown Ithaca by artist Nico Cathcart, featuring local arts heroes including my friend, hip-hop dance teacher G-Quan Booker.

This year marked the return of Planning to Change the World, an annual planner created by Education for Liberation Network. I have been designing the cover and doing the interior layouts for almost two decades.

After a two year hiatus it was great to come back to the process with fresh energy. I decided that pencil and paper would be the best way to bring the concept to life. After doing the hand drawing, I scanned the artwork and added color and background digitally.

Much love and respect to educator Carla Shalaby who leads a team of writers and editors in researching and curating the content each year. The planner is distributed by Rethinking Schools and would make a great holiday gift for educators, activists and community leaders.

My passion for documentary stems from the power of film to educate, inform and inspire action. This year I had the pleasure to do graphic design for a K-12 curriculum for the documentary Move When the Sprit Says Move written by Leslie W. Bray, M. Ed. The film was directed by my local colleagues at Photosynthesis Productions and produced by the Dorothy Cotton Institute. If you don’t know about Dorothy, you should watch the film, and if you’re an educator you should download the curriculum and use it in your classroom!

This year’s design for T’ruah‘s annual gala was inspired by the art of paper cutting and tessellating patterns, a callback to my lifelong love of MC Escher.

When Joey Gates asked me to paint the Dish Truck logo on her newly acquired used truck, I consulted with Caleb R. Thomas of Ithaca Murals who helped me get the right paint and use a projector to project the design on to the truck for tracing (a super helpful hack.)

Joey provides real dishes and cutlery to festivals and events, greatly reducing the use of disposables. I designed the original logo for Joey when she first started the business, and it feels great that I am still her go-to designer and that she trusted me to paint her baby!

As a lifelong activist and homeschooling parent, it brings me particular joy to introduce kids (mine and others) to the power of public art to reflect and influence culture. For several years, I’ve lead a “Social Justice Murals” class as part of our homeschool cooperative where I take kids on mural walks around town, especially to lesser known spots.

This year, my daughter Keshet and her friends (ages 8-10) made their own activist stickers that they put up around town, after we discussed the politics and etiquette of putting up art without permission (hint: put up stickers were there are already stickers, not on blank surfaces).

I also spearheaded an effort by homeschool kids to repaint not once (but twice) an electrical box in Collegetown that was continuously defaced by anonymous haters. Left: After first repainting

After the box was defaced again, the kids decided to come back and repaint again, this time adding heartfelt messages to whoever the defacer(s) may be. The electrical box has been untouched since then – long live gay kermit! Left: After second repainting

“Destroy our art we will rise!”

Last year, I got a grant from Community Arts Partnership for a documentary about iconic queer, feminist publisher Firebrand Books and the fight to get a historical placard honoring its legacy on the Ithaca Commons. The film features interviews with Nancy K. Bareano, Founder of Firebrand, queer historian Jeffry Iovannone, Alison Bechdel (Dykes to Watch Out For, Fun Home), and Brenda J. Marston, curator of Cornell University’s Human Sexuality Collection, which houses Firebrand’s archive. In 2026, I will be fundraising for editing and distribution funds with hopes of completing the film and having a premiere at Ithaca Pride ’26.

I contributed some parking garage and bathroom footage to this rad music video for The FMs. This very queer band includes local music legend Bubba Crumrine of Ithaca Underground. The band has had an explosive rise since rebuilding their Bushwick based band here in Ithaca after frontperson Frankie Rex passed away from Fentanyl poisoning in 2022 (in whose honor they have created an annual music festival called Frankie Fest.)

An unexpected delight of 2025 has been leading a series of monthly “Sing-a-long for Sanity” events with the support of my friends Rachel and Jeanette. Locations and turnouts varied but we kept it going all year and had some great moments of catharsis. We do a wide range of genres from Cat Stevens to Cat Powers and I feel honored to create a space where people feel comfortable singing.

Next year I am hoping will be a year of securing funding and completing longform films about Ithaca’s murals and Firebrand Books. Do you want to be involved? Get in touch!

2025 Year in Review

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