Join us for an engaging webinar that explores the critical role of advocacy and public policy in advancing arts and health initiatives. As the connection between the arts and well-being gains recognition, what are the systemic barriers that need transformation to support and expand these efforts? Our panel of experts will discuss effective advocacy strategies, the importance of cross-sector collaboration, and ways to influence public policy.

We will start off the session with a creative moment led by Natalie M. Godinez. If you would like to participlate, please bring a sheet of blank paper and some coloring utensils of your choice.

This program series is sponsored in part with support from The Music Man Foundation.

Meet the Speakers

As the CEO of California’s statewide arts advocacy organizations since 2018, Julie has worked to increase the legislative clout and visibility of the arts and culture communities by building coalition across the for and non-profit sectors of California’s creative industries, producing a month-long arts awareness and advocacy campaign every April, and fighting for resources and legislation to serve and protect artists and cultural workers. She was recently appointed to the Board of the Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF).

Julie has served as the California State Captain to Americans for the Arts’ National Arts Action Summit, as the recent co-chair of the Western Arts Advocacy network for WESTAF, as well as co-chair of the creative economy working group at the CA Economic Summit. She is the Board President of California Heritage: Indigenous Research Project and was elected to the Nevada County school board in November of 2020. She is also an appointed member of the State of California’s 2022 Entrepreneurship & Economic Mobility Task Force (EEMTF) and the Creative Economy Working Group under the California Arts Council. Julie is the recipient of the 2021 Americans for the Arts Alene Valkanas State Arts Advocacy Award that honors an individual at the state level whose arts advocacy efforts have dramatically affected the political landscape.

Over the years, Julie has owned a fine arts gallery for emerging artists, co-founded Flow art fair — a satellite to Art Basel Miami Beach — opened a consulting firm, Julie Baker Projects, and curated an annual music series at the Crocker Art Museum. Earlier in her career she was President of her family’s arts marketing firm in New York City and worked at Christie’s Auction house before moving to California in 1998. Julie also served for eight years as the Executive Director of The Center for the Arts, a non-profit performing arts venue and California WorldFest, an annual music and camping festival located in Grass Valley, CA. She is also the recipient of the inaugural Peggy Levine Arts & Community Service Award from the Nevada County Arts Council.

Julia Hotz is a solutions focused journalist based in New York. Her stories have appeared in The New York Times, WIRED, Scientific American, The Boston Globe, Time, and more. She helps other journalists report on big new ideas changing the world at the Solutions Journalism Network. THE CONNECTION CURE is her first book which chronicles the science, stories, and spread of social prescribing.

Kristin Sakoda is Director of the Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, the local arts agency with a mission to advance arts, culture, and creativity throughout the most populous county in the U.S. The Department's programs include grants and technical assistance to nonprofit organizations; creative career pathways including the nation’s largest arts internship program; public-private arts education initiatives; commissioning artists for the LA County Civic Art Collection; professional development; research and evaluation; and cross-sector arts strategies to address civic issues—all with a lens of cultural equity and inclusion.

Ms. Sakoda is an arts executive, attorney, and performing artist with over 25 years in the field. As an artist she appeared on stages around the world including with dance and social justice company Urban Bush Women, in Rent and Mamma Mia! on Broadway. Prior to her work at LA County, she served at New York City Department of Cultural Affairs overseeing a $200M portfolio of strategic, programmatic, policy, and legislative projects on diversity and inclusion; public art; creative aging; cultural facilities; grants; and affordable workspace for artists. She holds a J.D. NYU School of Law with honors in Entertainment Law, and B.A. Stanford University with a specialization in Race and Ethnicity and secondary major in Feminist Studies. Visit www.lacountyarts.org and follow @_kristinsakoda on Instagram.

Originally from Los Angeles, soprano and Teaching Artist Nicole Taylor is a graduate of the Masters program at The Juilliard School in New York. As a cultural envoy of the United States Department of State since 2010, senior US Arts Envoy Nicole Taylor has traveled through Europe and the Middle East, offering concerts, masterclasses and educational outreach programs with the aim of promoting understanding and building intercultural bridges. In this capacity, Ms. Taylor has offered more than 150 music education outreach programs in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, India, France, Denmark, Morocco, Libya, Hungary, Austria, Slovakia, Czech Republic, sharing her expertise as a musician, teacher and wellness educator.

Ms. Taylor is CEO & Founder of Creativity Through Music LLC, cultural consulting & creative strategies (CTM). The primary mission of Creativity Through Music is to uplift communities and build cultural bridges using arts & culture as a medium for joy, innovation, education, creative placemaking, connection, and conflict resolution.

Ms. Taylor is the Director of the Arts In Schools program for Oxnard Performing Arts Center, an innovative youth enrichment initiative focused on visual/performing arts education and access, funded by CA Arts Council. She is Co-Coordinator of Teaching Artists Guild of CA, a member of the TAG National Advisory Committee, and a US Hub liaison for the International Teaching Artists Collaborative (ITAC). She was selected for the 2024 cohort of the Global Leaders Institute MBA in Arts Innovation. She is California Creative Corps Artist-In-Residence for County of Ventura. In this role she has developed worked extensively with the County of Ventura Offices of Arts & Culture and DEI, as well as the VC Family Justice Center. She is also a proud member of the board of Bridges Charter School in Thousand Oaks, CA.

Natalie M. Godinez (she/her/ella) is a Los Angeles-based artist, educator, and community advocate raised in Tijuana, México. Godinez explores memories, identity, and relationships to places and language through textiles, printmaking, process-based art, text, and collaboration. Her work aims to be a tool for conversations about our shared experiences, the possibilities of our imaginations, and our desires to create change in the world.  

Godinez is an artist collaborator of AMBOS Project (Art Made Between Opposite Sides), a platform for binational artists to speak on border issues. She has performed artist interventions, led education projects, and coordinated humanitarian aid efforts there. Her work has been exhibited at the Hammer Museum, the Sun Valley Museum of Art, the San Diego State University Gallery, Angel's Gate Cultural Center, the Mexican Consulate in Los Angeles, and the Vincent Price Art Museum. Godinez holds a Bachelor of Applied Design from San Diego State University.