Act Issue 5.3

c

featuring:

sj ca

Chris Block_AMerican Leadership Forum Cathy Kimball _ICA Raj Jayadev_Debug

2013

Montalvo Art Center Brohter Grand GOVOLUNTR

CONTENT Issue 5.3_act Aug/Sept 2013

act 5.3

jennifer Anderson

Metro News

SAN JOSE’S

INNOVATIVE & CREATIVE www.content-magazine.com

content magazine, san jose

act 5.3 $9.95

CULTURE

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CONTENT Issue 5.3 “Act” Aug/Sept 2013 The Makers: Sarah Garcia Marketeer

Jeff Gardner Designer

Flora Moreno de Thompson Managing Editor

Sean Lopez Designer

Gillian Claus Writer/Editor

Brian Jensen Designer

Alyssa Byrkit Publishing Consultant

JP Costanzo Designer

Lynn Peithman Stock Contributing Writer/Editor

Brian Gomez Designer

Sarah Hale Distribution

Britt Clyde Proofreader

Mark Haney, Kat Bell, Kathyrn Hunt, Brandon Roos, Jennifer Elias Contributing Writers

Kristine Young Design Intern Stacy Ernst Maternity Leave

SPECIAL THANK YOU TO OUR 2013 INTERNS Jonny Keshishoglou, Raymand Eugenio & Evalyn Dickerson Daniel Garcia Cultivator Acting up, acting out, taking action or acting, we all reap the benefits of those who “do.” This issue we look at those who are taking action, whether it is volunteering to mentor school children to read or spending time on a board or giving financially to an arts organization, we all have the potential to affect lives and our community. We hope that as you get to know these “actors” featured in this issue, you too are inspired to find your passion and talent and then go take action.

Enjoy.

Daniel Garcia

IN THIS ISSUE Jennifer Anderson / Connie Martinez / Go Voluntr / Cathy Kimball / Raj Jayadev / Renegade Theatre Experiment To participate in Content Magazine: editor@content-magazine.com Subscription & Advertising Information available by contacting sarahg@content-magazine.com

Content act 5.3

Aug/Sept 2013 San Jose, California

Non-stop 8

SJC to AUS

Feature

11 Digging Through Homeless Data

Design

14 Interior Design, Steve Polcyn 18 Production Company,

Paul Bradshaw

Film

22 San Jose Short Film Festival, Bill Hargreaves & Sinohui Hinojosa

profiles 24 26

30 34 38 42 46 50

54

Save Faber’s, pg. 38

Exorcism, Father Gary Thomas Renegade Theatre Experiment, Sean C. Murphy Reading Partners, Carla Neumann C2SV, Jennifer Anderson Save Faber’s, Justin Triano DeBug, Raj Jayadev Valley Verde, Raul Lozanoo Civic Entrepreneur, Connie Martinez

American Leadership Forum of Silicon Valley,

Chris Block 58 GoVoluntr, Young Han, MJ Fogelstrom, and Kevin Zittle

ART

62 ICA, Cathy Kimball 66 Giving as Art, Montalvo Art Center 70 Artists in Residence

Interior Design, Steve Polcyn, pg. 14

Music

76 Brother Grand 78 Hurricane Roses 80 Blackford Hill 82 Local’s Choice,

Susannah Greenwoord 84 Contributors

Content Magazine is a bi-monthly publication about the innovative and creative culture of San Jose. To participate in the production or distribution contact: editor@content-magazine.com

Hurricane Roses pg. 78

Montalvo Arts Center, pg. 66

Hop on a plane tomorrow and explore with reckless abandon or plan every last detail—whatever your mood, here’s our take on one of many non-stop destinations served by our very own Mineta San Jose International Airport.

Now boarding!

AUSTIN Written by Paul Bradshaw

Austinites are an outdoorsy bunch, so start your visit by joining the locals on Lady Bird Lake, which runs right through the heart of downtown. The hike and bike trail that circles the lake is a fantastic way to start the day. You get a great perspective on the city and its denizens.

As you pass the Texas Rowing Center, maybe indulge the temptation to take a paddle board or a kayak out for a spin.

Now that you’ve worked up an appetite, you’ll want to try an Austin staple, the breakfast taco.

Arturo’s Café and Jo’s are two favorites. Far less daunting than the breakfast burritos here in San Jose, these tacos will change your life. Breakfast tacos are basically their own food group in Austin, along with barbecue and Tex-Mex.

Austin may be known as the “Live Music Capital of the World,” but it is also a burgeoning foodie capital and home to some of the coolest, friendliest folks you’d ever want to meet. And did I mention the breakfast tacos?

The hot barbecue joint in town right now is Franklin. People line up for hours to try their famous brisket, since only a limited amount is made each day. Once they’ve run out, Franklin closes its doors, usually leaving hungry, hot, and disappointed folks out of luck.

If you happen to be one of these people, head to Ruby’s instead. Spicy brisket, sausage, ribs, and the most amazing macaroni and cheese are offered in this divey joint.

flight time Flight Time: Southwest Airlines operates daily nonstops between SJC and AUS. Flights last approximately 3½ hours.

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There are loads of good Mexican food spots in town, from offbeat Chuy’s, where the ceiling is covered in hubcaps and Elvis is still king, to upscale spots like Manuel’s and Fonda San Miguel.

A great way to start a conversation with a stranger in Austin is to ask, “Where’s your favorite place for Mexican food?”

Literally everyone will have an opinion.

An equally lively conversation starter is asking where to get the best margarita in town. All three of the aforementioned spots have excellent ones, but make time to stop by the Cedar Door for a Mexican martini or two. Make sure to bring a designated driver.

Hungry for something more chefdriven?

Wink is a tour de force of intimate, farm-to-table cooking. Also worth checking out is Top Chef winner Paul Qui’s newly opened spot, Qui, on Austin’s up-and-coming East Side. The Rainey Street neighborhood on the edge of downtown is blowing up with new eateries, too.

If you really want to feel like a celebrity (and maybe even run into one), try Hotel Saint Cecilia down the block.

Named for the patron saint of music and poetry, this sequestered property feels like the middle of nowhere, but it’s only steps from the action. If you prefer a larger hotel, the W Austin is always a see-and-be scene, located right in the middle of the hopping warehouse district.

When the inevitable Texas heat starts to get to you, head over to Barton Springs, one of the largest spring-fed swimming pools in the world. Nestled into a corner of verdant Zilker Park and with a constant temperature of 68 degrees, there is nothing more refreshing in the Texas summer than a plunge into the crystal clear water.

Then it will probably be time to find another good margarita, before you say adios to Austin.

Texas Rowing Center 1541 W. Cesar Chavez St. Austin, TX 78703 512.467.7799 texasrowingcenter.com

Arturo’s Cafe 314 W. 17th St. Austin, TX 78701 512.469.0380 bit.ly/ArturosCafe

Jo’s coffee Three locations: Downtown, South Congress & St. Edward’s Campus joscoffee.com

Franklin Barbecue Counterpoint 900 E. 11th St. Austin, TX 78702 512-653-1187

franklinbarbecue.com

Ruby’s BBQ 512 W. 29th St. Austin, TX 78705 512.477.1651

But if you really want the soul of Austin, head to South Congress. South Congress Avenue is the essence of what makes Austin special. An extremely walkable area of town, you’ll find great shops that sell everything from folk art to high fashion. It’s also the home to The Continental Club, a classic Austin honky tonk where live music drifts out onto the sidewalk every night of the week.

rubysbbq.com

Counterpoint Chuy’s 1728 Barton Springs Rd. Austin, TX 78704 (512) 474-4452 chuys.com

Stay at one of hotelier Liz Lambert’s amazing boutique properties to really soak in the experience. The Hotel San Jose and its pared-down Texas aesthetic is effortlessly cool.

Fonda San Miguel Counterpoint 2330 N. Loop Blvd. W. Austin, TX 78756 512.459.4121

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Content Magazine iPad App Available in Apple App Store $3.99 Single Issue $22.99 Yearly Digital Subscription

(Print Subscriptions Include Digital Edition)

Digging Through Data

to Help the Homeless Written by Leslie Griffy

If poverty and homelessness are big data problems, will Silicon Valley step up to solve it?

W

hat if poverty was one big data problem—the kind of question that could be answered with reams of data and analytics?

And this data can make a difference. In fact, it may have already.

An argument over subsidized phone service sprung up this year. Phone records showed that the phones were mostly used to call friends and family, not to look for work or housing. That, opponents said, isn’t the point of the subsidies.

Shouldn’t we have the answers right here in the Valley?

In the same way that Facebook, Google, and others use information to sell advertising based on our web browsing, information could help the homeless, experts hope.

We already have the data. At least the Community Technology Alliance does. But can we use it?

But information gleaned from an alliance program showed that homeless people with strong connections to friends and family are more likely to find housing.

Since 2004, the alliance has helped Santa Clara County nonprofits collect and store information about the homeless. It includes answers homeless people have given to questions about addiction, abuse, employment history, war-related injuries, and successes they’ve experienced.

“When you hear that, you can say ‘I understand why that would be the case,’ but would strong connections to friends and family come to the top of your head when you think about ways to fight homelessness?” says the alliance’s director of operations Julia Burkhead.

In those answers, combined with hundreds of thousands of others pieces of information, could be the answers to other questions—including what works to end homelessness. Adding up those experiences could show what best helps people with specific challenges. And a coalition of nonprofits called Step Up Silicon Valley wants to expand that potential adding data on poverty, not just homelessness.

Armed with that information, alliance officials testified before a state committee considering cuts to the phone program.

“It turns out that connecting to friends and family is a good thing,” Burkhead says.

But the alliance lacks the manpower and the money to dig into the answers potentially already sitting in their databases.

But without the data, no one would have known that.

This key piece of information was uncovered independently in alliance data by both an intern from San Jose State University and a Master’s of Public Administration class.

“What we need is the support of the people who believe that innovation can solve big, real-word problems like homelessness,” says the alliance’s executive director Jen Padgett. “This is Silicon Valley. We should be doing it.”

While the policy debate continues, the information tucked into alliance databases could be providing even more answers for the more than 18,000 homeless people in Santa Clara County.

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HOMELESSNESS by the numbers

“That’s very transactional,” says Gregory Kepferle, CEO of Catholic Charities, which uses the alliance’s Homeless Information Management System (HMIS) system. “We want to expand that. We want to go beyond and report on what works for getting people out of poverty.”

Numbers represent clients served by nonprofits and other groups that used CTA’s database in 2012.

HUD also wants the systems in use around the country to go further than simply providing a better headcount, says Ann Oliva, Director of HUD’s Office of Special Needs Assistance Program.

“Some communities use their HMIS to help with what we call centralized or coordinated intake, which helps them to match the needs of those presenting for assistance with the housing and services they need,” Oliva says.

Groups helping the homeless store their information about their clients in the Community Technology Alliance’s servers. CTA manages the databases, helps create software, run reports, and more. Outside of data collection, CTA helps homeless people access technology, including phone services and personalized check-in to shelters.

For that to work in Silicon Valley, Padgett’s team would need more code to dig deeper into the alliance’s servers and to search for connections between outcomes—like being moved into a house—with services, such as provided career counseling.

79,655 16,215

Some communities have implemented pieces of what Padgett wants to create—a system that allows the homeless to advocate for themselves, using the information in her databases to find the best solution for themselves.

people served

In one Illinois community, officials set up terminals for homeless people to access the system and search for resources. Eventually the terminals were abandoned because the community couldn’t maintain them, HUD officials said.

people reached out for help for the first time

18,743

But that futurist system—a world where those in need could access information about programs that would work best for their specific needs with a few keystrokes —isn’t so far away.

families

25,079

“It could be an online system that is client friendly, user friendly, so that a person who is in poverty doesn’t have to travel to multiple agencies,” says Catholic Charities’ Kepferle. “I call it the Holy Grail.”

children

7,698

With cloud-based technologies, like email that stores information in a remote server that you can access from anywhere, there’s no need to maintain expensive hardware for direct public use like in the Illinois case.

people over 60, including one over 100 years old

1,778

Any computer—those at libraries, part-time jobs and on campuses—could serve as the gateway to a targeted plan out of poverty. But the barriers to doing so are many.

disabled people

“To some extent, it will always be that we need partners to come and either analyze portions of the data or give us the funds to analysis portion of it,” Burkhead says.

“When the community does pull together to help, things can change very quickly.”

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On top of staffing and funding issues, nonprofits would need to agree to share information. And then there’s another speed bump, privacy.

NUMBERS cont.

8,869

Simply imagine if one agency had access to all of your mental health, financial, and health information and then shared it with others. Data gathering by the federal government certainly made many uncomfortable this spring when it came to light that phone records for hundreds of thousands were accessed.

young adults (between 18 and 25 years old)

12,747

But the biggest problem remains money and manpower.

people with jobs

7,768

“I think resources are the biggest challenge—it is hard to invest in technology or data entry when that money could be spent on serving more people. Obviously, there are lots of benefits that come with using technology and data that many communities understand and realize,” Oliva says.

receiving social security benefits

7,708 2,804

“The other challenge is that homeless services providers often don’t have data analysis capabilities—so they have to partner with others to build that capacity.”

on public assistance

The alliance is lucky. It also provides other technology assistance to the low-income and homeless. It’s working on swipe-card check-in to clinics and shelters as well as providing telephone services to the homeless.

veterans

355

Through these programs, it won innovation grants allowing Padgett to hire more people to work on those programs and freeing up other staff for the data project.

A recent fundraising drive brought in $20,000. And computer coders at a hackathon helped create what could someday become an app to help people help the homeless.

receiving Veterans’ Administration benefits

2,068

“When the community does pull together to help things can change very quickly,” Burkhead says. Still, it hasn’t been enough to conquer the data or to build on its potential.

addicts

3,448

If groups that help with hunger, abuse, or other issues in poverty added data to the system, Kepferle and Padgett imagine discovering new solutions to old poverty-related problems.

mentally ill

68

“Once we have the data, there are a couple of things we can say,” says Kepferle. “We can say what interventions work. We can match a client to a particular intervention.

We can find out how long it takes to move someone out of poverty.”

HIV-positive

50,745

In the end, the question remains, if poverty and homelessness are big data problems will Silicon Valley step up to solve it?

with no income (includes children)

ctagroup.org

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Steve Polcyn

Designed to WORK Written Written by

by Steveyann SteveyannJensen Jensen Portrait Portrait photography photography by

by Daniel DanielGarcia Garcia Interior Interior images images courtesy courtesy ofof Whitney WhitneyPolcyn PolcynArchitects, Architects,Inc. Inc.

Steve Polcyn is using his knowledge of interior design to make his community a better place.

“Our address is in San Jose — that was important important to to me.” me.”

14 14

Steve Polcyn loves San Jose. He wants to see this city thrive as the design hub of the Bay Area, and it’s moving in that direction. Polcyn is a local business owner and certified interior designer. When he isn’t redesigning local office spaces, you will find him racing his sailboat. In fact, by the time you read this, Polcyn will have chartered a 52’ sailboat, along with his wife and experienced crew of ten, across the Pacific Ocean from Long Beach to Honolulu in the 2013 Transpacific Yacht Race. He will be racing with 59 other boats across 2,225 nautical miles and will then spend a few days relaxing on the beautiful beaches of Hawaii.

2008 we had this grand business model with office space, plotters, staff, and phone systems. Then the economy tanked. After that, we kind of waited it out and then in early 2010, we didn’t want to wait any longer so we just went for it.

You were originally working in product design.

How did you get your start in interior design?

I went to the University of Kansas and obtained my undergraduate degree in industrial design. I started my career in Chicago as a product designer working on security exchanges and trading floors. We created custom floor systems and did site line studies; we essentially designed the whole exchange. I also designed a lot of custom trading desks and office spaces for big trading firms in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, and that’s how I got into office interiors.

Instead of the grand plan we had started out with, we ended up bootstrapping it and started it up in my garage with a couple of laptops. I’m glad we did it that way though because it really made us think about all of our decisions carefully. We really took the time to consider how we would make it work. After a year and a half in my garage, we moved to an office space on the Alameda. Our address is in San Jose—that was important to me. Now we’ve grown; it’s the two of us, five staff, and we’re getting ready to hire one more. David is a licensed architect, I am a certified interior designer, and between the two of us and our staff we cover a lot of ground. Our projects are mostly commercial interiors; office interiors, technology and tenant improvements.

What was intriguing to you about interior design as opposed to product design?

I love buildings and environments and the way people interact within their environments. As I began to work more on office interiors, I found that there was a lot more to it in terms of the overall environment. Product design, on the other hand, is very specific and I felt at times that the level of detail was limiting. I discovered I’m definitely more of a big picture person. In interior design you have the ability to go down to the details and then zoom out and you get results really quick. It’s a quick turnaround, it’s fun, and I just enjoy it.

Getting involved in the local community is really important to you. What types of volunteer organizations are you a part of?

Aside from my philanthropy work through the International Interior Design Association (IIDA), I work with the San Jose Women’s Club a lot. I’ve done design work for them as well; some paid, but I also volunteer a lot of hours. I also have this whole other part of me that loves to do historic preservation. I was involved in the Historic Landmarks Commission for four years, I was the chair for two years. I still like to do that type of work.

And now you own your own firm, Whitney Polcyn Architects. How did you launch your business?

My business partner, David Whitney, and I had worked together for about ten years at a different firm. We started discussing the possibility of starting our own firm and in

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You mentioned the philanthropic part of IIDA earlier, tell me more about that.

Our motto is “Connect. Inspire. Transform.” That’s really our focus. Last year, we worked on a design-build project for a local shelter and our next project is going to help renovate the local YWCA Emergency Shelter. We want local firms to be aware of these projects and thinking about how they can get involved. I would even love to see other organizations like the American Institute of Architects and US Green Building Council partner with us on these projects. I think there is potential on the whole for IIDA to do more in this community and for there to be a greater focus and greater participation for designers across the board.

What do you think is unique about San Jose?

There is history here, but it’s combined with this sense of the potential of what can be. A lot of cities across the US have a strong sense of history, but they aren’t necessarily looking to the future. This city is different. It has this tremendous potential because of its connection with Silicon Valley. It combines the old, the current, and the future; it’s all there. Another thing that makes this city so great is its diversity. It’s accepting of other cultures and of new ideas. This is the place everyone comes to be creative. If you have an idea, put it out there and we’ll work with you to make it happen.

I don’t know if I would have started my own business if I didn’t live in San Jose. It is such an open, embracing, forgiving environment that I think it fosters people willing to take risks. I felt like even if I failed, there would be people to support me and other opportunities to pursue.

It’s definitely unique to the Bay Area. We are innovators and risk takers. I think that San Jose is becoming more design focused and edgy, I think it has the potential to be the epicenter for design in the Bay Area. There are so many design opportunities that are close to San Jose, and it’s a great Northern California base of operations for this region.

Recently, I’ve gotten involved with Docomomo. It’s a great organization that focuses on the preservation of mid-century modern buildings, which is of great interest to me. I live in Naglee Park, a historical neighborhood, and I want to be involved in preservation in this community. I think it’s really important.

What messages do you want to get out to San Jose about IIDA?

That is my agenda. I want to see it as the center in the Bay Area; I want to go for it and see who jumps in alongside and gets involved.

I would like to raise awareness so that people can get more involved in IIDA. I want to raise general design awareness in this city, whether it’s products, graphics, building, etc. I want to promote the urban fabric and potential of San Jose. The second thing is the philanthropy and education part of this organization. IIDA can help bring students along so that they don’t feel like they’re working in a vacuum with no support, so that they don’t finish school and feel like they need to leave San Jose and go to San Francisco to find a job. So that they think, “I can stay here, work for a cool firm, and stay connected.”

I’m just eager to bring more exposure to what people are doing in IIDA, particularly the philanthropy.

whitneypolcyn.com Whitney Polcyn Architects, Inc. 2185 The Alameda Suite 100 San Jose , CA 95126

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SOMETHING

to do with

STUCTURE Being the owner of a commercial film and video production company has given Paul Bradshaw the flexibility to relocate to San Jose from Austin, Texas.

With experience as a writer and ad agency creative director, Bradshaw is never short on opportunities for work. For him, the struggle is not the coming up with ideas, but rather creating the structure to allow him to be as creative as he needs to be.

Written by FLora moreno de Thompson Photography by Daniel Garcia

Tell me about your work.

Seven years ago I started a commercial film company. It was in Austin, Texas. Austin was an emerging market and we had a lot of great people there, but almost everyone in Austin did their production out of town. My thought and my philosophy was to not try and keep business at home, but to try and generate business outside of the market and bring them to Austin. What ended up happening was that we were successful in generating that business, but we weren’t successful in always bringing them to Austin. We started off slow, but we were in the black our first year. Business has been increasing ever since. I feel good about that.

Before that, I was an agency creative director, and a writer, and so those sorts of things didn’t go away. My phone was ringing as much, if not more, for other projects. I was constantly doing that too. This fall, we were lucky to get an enormous contract in 2006 with the American Heart Association. We produce training material for anyone who wants to learn CPR. I was on the verge of signing this contract when my partner, Stacy, got recruited by Apple. Do I continue to do this? Do I find a job at an agency? Being the way we were, I could do it from anywhere. I kept my office in Austin.

In the last year, we shot a viral video for Mommy Juice.

It was a series of six web films for Pure Matter’s client.

We’ve done a fair amount of work with Pure Matter.

How is Austin different from San Jose?

“CREATIVES LACK STRUCTURE. YOU HAVE TO MAKE IT HAPPEN.”

Austin is an insanely creative city. It is a culture that is fostered. It’s not just creative industries. People value good design and good communication and good product. I joke that if a guy opens a shoe sign stand, it’s going to be the coolest shoe shine stand you’ve ever seen. There will be live music on Thursdays, great branding...It’s just that way. The food scene is incredible. Anything that has to do with creative expression.

Why do you think it’s like that?

It’s always been a hippie town, which encouraged free thinkers and outsiders. It wasn’t a town where young

because you’re always working on something new. It’s very of the moment and in the moment. It’s lovely if you create something timeless, but if you create something effective that’s sufficient.

As I get older, I’m not finding either the structure I need or the confidence to make that happen, because meanwhile I’ve got to make a living. You can choose to be starving; I did that when I was young. I still don’t know how I did it, how I managed to eat. I was determined to live in New York. For me, writing and storytelling is an extension. When I’m behind the camera, it’s still a writer’s eye I’m using. Being behind the camera and directing gets me a chance to blend those things and tell a story. Especially in our world, connecting things to a story is what makes people want to embrace a brand or experience.

people could start their careers which I did, you had to leave. There were no jobs for entry level people. A lot of people said “I don’t care about that, I’ll stay.” The biggest ad company in Austin is a group of locals who didn’t want to go to New York. ‘Let’s just start our own thing here.’

What are you working on? Are you looking to do feature films, or a novel?

You have the music...much like San Francisco. I wasn’t entirely sure that I wanted to be in the day to day hustle and bustle of the city. We thought long and hard about where we wanted to be. We ended up here. San Jose is very misleading. It’s the tenth largest city in country, right here in the heart of innovation, but San Jose hasn’t embraced it’s creativeness. San Jose, in embracing innovation, which is very smart, they missed, I think, that element of fostering and embracing the creative class. I don’t see that here.

At the moment I’m not doing anything, but that was part of my process towards the end of the year. One of the things that became important is to think without any deadline. I definitely want to work on a couple of films. I toy with the idea of directing myself. Using my company to make the film. I get distracted easily.

I haven’t set up my structure. Creatives lack structure.

You have to make it happen.

Can you talk about the dynamic of having a job and trying to write and create at the same time?

When I first arrived, it was...hello, it’s a big ass city!

There’s got to be tons of things going on. You can come across restaurants, struggling...Joe Scirone, the owner of Hay Market, is doing it in a way that people in Austin do it. It may not appeal to everyone, but it will appeal to enough people to make him a living. You go in there and there are interesting people sometimes. They’re out there, we just don’t have this sort of collective.. The other part of it is that my world, the advertising world, tends to be more tech driven. Traditionally, there are less esoteric creative executions.

Here’s the most important thing: structure is important.

Thirty minutes, four hours, whatever you feel you need to. It’s dedicating that time [to creativity]. I write. I live in this other world. Especially in today’s world, that’s the hardest thing to do. There are a billion distractions.

My advice would be carve out time, dedicate that time, and focus on finishing for the sake of finishing. Art leads commerce, but if you do things the way you believe they should be done, the money should follow. If you’re passionate, someone will pay you for it.

Even things like music and theater. We have a great short film festival in San Jose. Everything I see that is a creative execution in this town, you see the effort. None of it feels effortless. You see all these cool people trying so hard.

Aside from your advertising work, are you still writing?

I think each of us has a calling. In creative people, it’s that thing that speaks first. The thing you just started doing because you had to. And I started writing. The first time I was recognized for my writing was in the fifth grade. I won a statewide essay contest. I don’t want to say it came easy. I would see other people struggling with words and how they went together, but it just seems natural to me.

My parents were very encouraging. Our house was full of resource materials and experiences. Advertising became a very natural fit for me. It suits my undiagnosed ADD

fullorange.COM facebook: full-orange

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THE MOVIE MEN Written by FLORA MORENO DE THOMPSON Photography by Gregory Cortez

Two movie buffs turned their love of short films into the internationally known San Jose Short Film Festival.

Bill Hargreaves and Sinohui Hinojosa

had no idea they would start a film festival the first time they talked. Introduced to each other by a mutual friend, the two met for coffee at Philz to discuss their shared interests of film and filmmaking. They talked about their love of movies for three hours that day. “We found out we had a little bit more in common than that,” Hargreaves says. At the end of their conversation, the San Jose Short Film Festival was born.

“We hammered out all the logistics of the festival that day,” says Hargreaves. “I knew the marketing and business development side of a festival, but production-wise, I can’t do any of that.” Luckily for Hargreaves, Hinojosa is a producer and filmmaker who could.

The two had the perfect match of skill sets to put on a film festival.

The first year, they held it at Camera One in downtown San Jose.

The event has grown exponentially since then and is now held at Santana Row’s Cinemark Theatre.

“The programming is very strong, not only for filmmakers, but for the audience, too.”

Watching movies everyday is a huge part of the job for Hargreaves and Hinojosa. “I’m exempt from going to other kid’s birthday parties during the festival organizing,” says Hargreaves with a laugh.

“That gives me about a five hour block on Saturdays to watch movies.” Hinojosa goes to the movie theater once a week to keep afloat of the latest mainstream flicks, but his movie watching doesn’t end there. As the festival nears, both Hinojosa and Hargreaves receive many film submissions that must be reviewed. “We’ll be watching five to ten movies every day leading up to the festival,” says Hinojosa. “We like watching films.”

SJSFF focuses on shorter films lasting no longer than 25 minutes.

They accept movies of all genres, with about 60% of the films

entered into the festival coming from overseas. This year, music videos will also be included in the festival programming. Hinojosa and Hargreaves anticipate screening over a hundred films at this year’s event. “We have world class films,” Hargreaves says. Along with showing short films, they have added panel discussions and speaker sessions for filmmakers to the programming lineup.

Films are screened in ninety minute blocks organized by different genres. Festival-goers can expect to see a comedy film block, family film block, and Northern California filmmaker block in this year’s program. The rest of the blocks have yet to be determined as entries are still being categorized. The organizers are anticipating about 60 film submissions to come from Northern California alone.

Awards are given out at the four day film festival for the best films in categories such as Best of the Fest, Audience Award, Best Comedy, and Best Animation. Winners receive cash and prizes. The ultimate prize in this year’s festival is the Screenplay Contest, being held for the first time ever. A winning screenplay will be chosen and produced by Hinojosa’s production company and will debut during the festival.

As a filmmaker himself, Hinojosa wants to make sure the festival is enjoyable for filmmakers. “They work so hard, and their crew works so hard, and they go to film festivals not knowing if anyone is paying attention to their content.”

“The programming is very strong, not only for filmmakers, but for the audience, too,” Hargreaves says. “You go there for the experience. The films that we have should be enjoyable.”

This October marks the San Jose Short Film Festival’s fifth anniversary. For Hargreaves and Hinojosa, it has been a labor of love. As the only film festival in San Jose dedicated to short films, their goal is to create a film festival with a breadth of quality content. There is a film for everyone at the festival. “We put a lot of hard work into the program,” Hinojosa says. “We want our films to speak to as many people as possible.”

SJSHORTFEST.COM San Jose Short Film Festival October 17-20, 2013

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“We want our films to speak to as many people as possible.”

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i lo he Fath u, xs To t re at Co ather. xthe s for yo and the , a F d o o r h u G s y w Jesu God o ks to ts; alwa from ive than raying in Christ the nsain heaven, g p n xWe Christ, ur faith or xall r you in rd of o f s Jesu ard of y u have n aid up fo in the wo , just o e we h which y xhope xl y xheard me to you ly e v h o t f e reviousl ch has co constant has xl i use o p beca ich you spel wh lso it is ven as it eard h e h o w g d l r a easing, y you x ruth; of he e wo a r t h, nt trut in all th and ninc ince the d f God in ur o t x s i , e n u o c s r s s a a o aithf a ou al he gr f aphr ing x bear oing in y rstood t rom xEp who is a he al f e d d , d n n t t n i e a n u e d n a b e and or th alf, serv earn of it as you l w bond- n our beh Spirit. F , xw o t o just ved fell Christ ve in the eard of i k th s f o o h o a l l e e x t o b n w x your and t day erva f Hi ful s med us of since the for you wledge o tan y infor n also, x d to pra the nxkno nd unders y h o reas not cease led with wisdom a ner wort , have ay be fil iritual x k in a man respects c you m in all sp ill xwal im in all k and nin r will at you w please H good wo rengthen t o so th ord, nxt in every God; xs orious mi t f i L Written by kat bell o u g ness ge is l the ing fr wled ng to nH eadfast o x r o a n e k Photography by SHane Hagerty b n i t x nks t ll s cord n the ing i ower, ac ning of a iving tha share i o g p 2 t a all the att yously1 ied us n ght. T f nfor ience; xjo as quali ts in xLi s fro npat er, who h the nsain rescued u erre f Fath tance of t For He nd trans wh i s a i r i e x , r s n, n s.H inh ble Ch rknes in ed So para ain of da is belov ess of s xf n m H e e o x h v d i n t g , nx th om of e for e God kingd ption, th invisibl Him all o x d y m e n e b h d a x e t n s r For h aven ge of xima reation. in the he hether xt e h c i w t t l i o , l e r b a ed, x invisibl or autho an t a e d im cr gh H le an ulers visib ions or r ed throu and in H t domin been crea l things, so xhea l nder the foggy ridges of the Santa Cruz Mountains, because you are carrying the authority of the church. have efore al . He is a he begin Father Gary Thomas can be found any given SunYou have to believe what you are saying.” Watch thenfilm xis b together He is xt at H day delivering sermons and chatting around the reand you can certainly see this earnestness playing outnhon old ch; and d, so th ryt dea hur eve freshment table with his parishioners at the Sacred screen. Thomas also assisted on set, providing feedback the c from the place in sure n e t l r s p a m, 20 a Heart Church in Saratoga. Unassuming in nature and on the authenticity of the actor’s movements and expresr bo i ve fi good genteel in greeting, most would never guess he holds a sions. to ha Fathers well in H Hi o d t e o h s t t x position few believe exists in the modern world: Thomas ess ll thing blood n l l is an exorcist.

It’s not all turning heads and pea soup, though. Thomasnfu concile a gh xthe hing u t e will be the first to tell you that performing an actual ex-xr eace thro whether h yo x g p , u x o y h A demon-binding, fear-no-evil exorcist. Not exactly the orcism is the last resort. lt I sa nm Him, en. And a hostile i r kind of job a boy grows up aspiring to, yet for Thomas v x d a n e w a nh as no ated it has been an interesting chapter in his life of faith that “The first thing I tell someone who contacts me for an alien , yet He h through has brought with it many questions, and even more reexorcism is that I don’t do them on demand,” he says. deeds body efore Hi b hly x alizations.

“There is a very long process and we exhaust every other fles ent you ch23 if ind s possible solution.” That includes mental health services, xpre d reproa establ n x “I had no idea,” Thomas says about becoming an exorcounseling, and other interventions. The exorcism cerbeyo firmly y from h cist. “People ask me, ‘Is this something that was always emony is the last tool in the box and something that is fait oved awa heard not m you have nder h one of your goals?’ and I say ‘No!’” he says, laughing. never taken lightly. that reation u minis “They actually offered [the job] to someone else and they x all c made a n yo didn’t want to do it. I just spoke up naively saying I “I have a prayer team. I do not do this alone,” Thomas r s o a f nw could be the exorcist. I could do that job.” says. In addition to a psychologist, psychiatrist, and a al rings uffe re on beh g s n medical doctor, he also gets assistance from “gifted” ina i h my s h, in fill O dividuals and others of strong faith who wish to help x c r chu ictions. di afflicted individuals. The rite is not something anyone affl er accor t e delivers alone in a room with a demon. Back-up is a reminis wed on m o o quirement of the profession. best y carry l nful hat is, x t How do you know an individual needs an exorcism? “Let God, the past m o r est me tell you what I’m always listening for,” he begins. f manif been d to ma It was a job that took him to Vatican-sponsored courses “What has brought you here? What has prompted you? e will of th in Rome and led him to an apprenticeship under Father What was the event that made it transpire? What was it y r o gl hrist Carmine, a Rome-based exorcist. Thomas’ job culminatlike growing up? Tell me about your family.” xC s i ed in Matt Baglio’s book Making of a Modern Exorcist, aim H rocl g e p and Mikael Håfström’s movie The Rite, both of which Abuse, drugs, and exposure to the satanic through witchhin teac y x are based on Thomas’ experiences. craft or cults can all contribute to a possession. His stoa m e w he nx ries are shocking: children dedicated to Satan by their To t re a “I worked in Budapest with Anthony Hopkins on the parents before birth; adults tortured by abusive pasts; who Go m o film,” Thomas recalls. “I coached him on how to wear many suffering from uncontrollable symptoms. It is not fr e the stole, how to use the holy water, how to bless. You that these things necessarily cause possession; according Fath a w l need to punctuate those prayers like you really mean it, to Thomas, demons are attracted to pain and suffering. a r in Ch l l a x for 24 xhe ha it

Excellent Day for an

Exorcism

Beyond the influence of Hollywood and even farther from the Vatican, Father Gary Thomas leads a life more unique than your average man of the cloth. He’s an exorcist and he’s here to tell us what we see in the movies is not always far from the truth.

U

“PUNCTUATE THOSE PRAYERS LIKE YOU REALLY MEAN IT.”

r, athe herin i the parable o c In m in of ma nxdo dom of g n i k tion, he edemp the r e v a ge of xima creation. in l f al d, xboth , e e t l crea d invisib n a r le so ruler In the negative environment they find the room to infect s or created l and grow. That’s where he comes in. been efore al . He r b nxis togethe He is d ld “I am a tough guy in the sense that I am very passionate,” s nho hurch; an ad, so e c d e n e h i he says. “I have very strong positions on some things. I h t e t c m pla fro am not afraid. You can’t be afraid.” born ave first ood to h thers g l in Him, el Fa Thomas recalls how shocked he was during his training. xthe ss to dw gs to e n d Until taking the courses and returning to his diocese n i full e all th the bloo l x to practice, he had no idea how widespread the issues conci through ether h e c w a x le were. “When I became an exorcist, I was shocked at the , a p y d e a n l A ti Is Him, nheaven. and hos amount of paganism I saw. I had always believed Satan n ed existed, but I had never seen Satan like I see the manings i alienat as now h h y e l mer now.” et H y throug olfestations y , s h y d d l dee hly xbo ore Him x you s s fle t you bef 23 if indeed ndOnce the book and movie came out, priests from all n a e ch s e pr d reproa ablished opover h e the country started calling him. Many individuals t n x s o e e y h x e t b y him, begging for assistance with what they s m l o m wacontacted ir fr ith f d away d, which xadescribed d of as demonic possession. It can be daunting at n r e t mov have hea r heaven, ow I but it is a role he feels he must continue for the times, N de ou y others. at y eation un inister. x ndsake in mof a m r , x c e n k , a a ll y s d e o our mad sb kingjust demons he works to eradicate. Many times, was gs for y f of xHi isItla iscnot s n l i t a r a e h I nwa or place is being occupied by a departed soul, wh ff e on be g up s churcahperson n ar i p i h l h s l hi y fi to continue to the next plane. That is where rds waunwilling Of t h, in , so for hurc tions. x the xste efiprayer t the departed comes in. f c o ffli ording t your ben eaching o as h c r r c h o p hic to, wonder as a priest, once you die, are those er a on me f out the ry“Iwused ed te ons y rati really stow ly carr xthe mys genprayers e going to help? Now, as the exorcist, I know l , s, to t nfu , that is ages and nsthey aintdo.” e h s t d t i o s x f G the pa ted to H hat is e ng th from manifes known w yHe amocites f changes in modern society as part of the o the e r e en k e e p t a b n xhofor the ow led to m his mys th ma e y cause rise in possession that has caused the Vatir t u, il ve ingtoe train od w glory of ist in yo niscan o h s many new exorcists. “We live in a very r o dom, iso n society,” he says. “People pray and, if it f the ch is xCh im, xadm l fast, xwis‘fixleittenow’ l i H a h p m en in away, they give up. That is why many s, w roclai n nwith n ndoesn’t xcom rwork ethr right p a a b m e m l y y W 28 r er u and to the occult. People do not realize you hfu oare yodrawn g eve aitpeople nt ev t e c achin y xprese nts and f xGr s tothat quick fix, and once you are in, it is a price hankfor i a : payivae t , we m the nxsa olossae every t g s i get hard out.”

W hrto C t. To are at her.x d Jesus C eard of t a F o h h r h r o e u i w do rL wh c ew st om Go her of ou ou, xsinc he xlove f the r f e o c t and t for y e Fa ause you , xth always st Jesus ints; bec f which i e a o r g 25 ayin ith in Ch ll the ns nheaven, ruth, nth all a t a n n i f x i our ve nfor for you word of t as nx ruit s f ou ha xlaid up rd in the o you, ju earing x you b t ea e in

en ,o ist faith i xW ll th eaven nthe s Chr Jesu of your e nfor xa you in nh truth, nxin all f d v o r r ha fo rd ng hea st as h you xlaid up in the wo you, ju ly beari as c i h o w t e d t n t p r i e a t s h ea ho om the x ously xh ch has c it is cons g, even a ce the i n i n prev spel wh rld also nincreasi also si and it o ou d of go the w fruit an oing in y heard of he grace d x x t t n s u e d u e o o j b y day understo n truth; arned n God i s you le om a it fr Ex

s C be al you it. F xsinc Exorcisms are not a one-time, stop-and-go procedure. not c r a i p Thomas sees the afflicted repeatedly over months,S and , you m ve o even years. Sometimes it is to make sure a demonaislsatt, xwe hask that s will in Hi of iti nd to a work, as opposed to mental illness, but other times ng, s e of ou a nowledg erstandi y of y is to free a person from possession. “(Demons) do note nxk d orth h nd un want to be seen,” he says. “They will do everythingtinwisdom a manner w spects, x e a x their power to hide from you, to convince you they arewalk in m in all r reasing i x i c n H i e n h al s d no longer there.” plea work an hened wit or t nf good treng ght, Occasionally, he will have an individual come to him God; xs orious mi nd npatie l a and it is very obvious there is serious work to be done. nHis g astness ather, w F f e e d h a “There are times when I come into the room and I have ste s to xt heritanc t k in s n i e a r h h h t not even begun the process and the person will mani- t in x rable C nes e r a fest,” says Thomas. “They’ll flip onto the floor and roll sh Incompa of dark e The domain nxHis b up like a snake and start sticking their tongue out. Dex the n ngdom of e forgiv mons often manifest through the senses: the eyes, the he ki tion, th e God, t ears, the nose, and the mouth. I can see them a lot of p bl redem e xinvisi nxby H times.” h t o F r of ns tion. he heave x a e r c t r n e i h h t This is where his former work as a mortician comes in xbot ble, whe xal i handy. “When you look into the eyes of a corpse there is invis thorities d f n an absence,” he says. “You look into the eyes of someone or au gh Him a Him u who is in a demonic attachment and it is like a set of thro s, and in xt superimposed contact lenses are covering their eyes. You thing xhead of f e also ning, xth o can see the demons in there.” c begin lf will w e t s i m n i H What does the future hold now for this binder of de.19 For thing ll xthe n mons? “We operate on terms,” he says. “A priest is asfor a gh Him t signed for six years, renewable only once. At the end of u thro g made x twelve years, you have to go and move.” n i v a h rou s; th h s o cr t r ho Although every bishop in the world is mandated to apeart erly m point an exorcist, there are few who feel up to the chalxfor eeds, d lenge, and perhaps even fewer well suited for the task. evil ly x h s e l Until reassigned, Thomas will continue his work in the f efor u community he has been sent to yo b ach o Sacredheartsaratoga.org repr bl serve. a xest th from h whic n e heav i m x n n

//: RENE

GADE$ Ă˜FA ST GE Renegade Theatre Experiment and its Artistic Director Sean C. Murphy started with the simple mission to challenge themselves and their audiences.

Twelve seasons later, the experiment is still going strong.

Written by Brandon E. Roos Photography by Scott MacDonald

“There’s something very special and tangible about the Renegade Experience.

This is a place to connect and a place you can belong.”

R

enegade is not a troupe, nor is it a company. As its name signifies, it’s an experiment, a space where audience and company come together to explore ideas and share their takes, both onstage and off, of the strangely familiar characters that populate the work of Renegade Theatre Experiment (RTE). Though the plays may at times be outlandish and explicit, they’re always human, refined by an ensemble that puts message first and recognizes the power live theatre has not just to entertain, but to challenge ideas and conventions.

attended San Francisco State with thoughts of becoming a weatherman. After he dropped out, he attended Diablo Valley College to major in political science, yet when he began to take acting classes for fun, he soon found himself hooked on the acting track. When one of his acting professors called him into their office and told him he couldn’t leave until he changed his major to theatre, Murphy finally gave in.

He later transferred to Santa Clara where he got his theatre degree. Murphy planned to attend grad school for acting and auditioned for the University/Resident Theatre Association (URTA), where he had the chance to be seen by several MFA programs. DePaul showed interest and he ended up first on their wait list. Normally a shoe-in position, he was turned away when no one dropped. Finding himself with time to kill, he began working in high tech, and when the time came to reapply—a guaranteed acceptance—he passed. Yet while he had a stable career, he and other theatre grad friends found themselves questioning why they weren’t putting their degrees to good use.

Yet as perfectly as “experiment” fits, that piece of the title was never supposed to last. As Sean C. Murphy, artistic director of RTE explains, the name was a soft open of sorts, a way to pursue the group’s dreams without stitching a long-term label. “Artistic people and actors are notoriously flakey,” he says. “It was an ‘experiment’ because it was just that—if it doesn’t work, you can move on.” If the group decided to pursue the “experiment” in earnest, the plan was to shift the name to Renegade Theatre Company. At the time, the ensemble placed emphasis on the “renegade” piece. Twelve years later, the experiment rolls on, and Murphy now believes that infamous word has come to define the company and its work. “[The name] empowers us to push envelopes or go different ways and take risks a normal theatre company wouldn’t do.”

Rising out of a desire to act before settling down and having kids, Murphy and six others formed the founding core for Renegade Theatre Experiment in May of 2001.

It was a mutual meeting of the minds, a chance for theatre geeks to get together and workshop monologues before auditioning for outside companies. They performed inside Bellarmine College Prep’s now-defunct Benson Theatre, starting with The Ives-ing on the Cake, a compilation of short works by playwright David Ives.

They’ve since gone on to re-imagine Shakespeare (2007’s Titus Andronicus conceived the title character as part of a biker gang), stage the most adventurous titles from celebrated contemporary scribe Tracy Letts, and provide a world premiere for a show with no less a shocking title than The Pornozombies.

RTE’s vision is about “joining tradition with innovation, exploring boundaries, meeting challenges—in short, about doing.” Whether this comes from finding a new angle to present a classic work or by giving contemporary voices an outlet to be heard, audiences can always count on encountering something novel.

A graduate of De La Salle in Concord—and among the first crop of guys to ever appear in every single school production during his four years there—Murphy later

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Murphy sees RTE as a gateway of sorts for those uninitiated to the theatre world. “We’re theatre for the non theatre goer,” he notes, a surprising point from the figurehead of an ensemble known for staging often little-known works. “Our value is that we create a very rounded, real experience. We allow people to get a taste of it then go find other stylized theatre.”

They may still lack a truly dedicated space—they’ve worked out of the Historic Hoover Theatre since 2005— but the company’s charm shines through in the intimacy and veracity of their work. With last season’s production of Imperial Fizz, they staged a pun-riddled joust of wit that featured a couple in Purgatory trying to concoct the perfect drink to help them break free from their eternal wait. Despite the pitfalls a cerebral, two-person script could’ve encountered, it carried on just fine. The season prior, they staged the West Coast premiere of Lia Romero’s Green Whales, which presented a particularly prickly take on self-identification coupled with the guise of pedophilia. In this production, a grown woman trapped in a child-like body is too scared to admit her real age to a suitor who may be under the impression she’s underage. When the audience finds itself rooting for the couple as they exude chemistry, they’re forced to confront the given circumstances, though artificial, they find themselves supporting. It seemed the perfect encapsulation of the work RTE strives to present.

Murphy admits there have been audience members with particularly strong reactions to their shows. In one case, a woman couldn’t stop thinking about what she had seen.

When a friend asked if she’d recommend the show a week later, she said the story continued to stick with her but that she’d never want to see it again. It’s these type of moments that show RTE fully embraces the political nature of the stage.

Theatre remains one of the rawest avenues of human expression. It can be fun and hilarious, but it can also challenge convention. Ensemble members sometimes can’t even agree on how to interpret given characters. It’s all part of the experiment. In fact, it’s evidence that it’s working. “There’s something very special and tangible about the renegade experience,” Murphy says. “This is a place to connect and this is a place you can belong.”

Renegade’s hallmark is their ensemble, an extended cast of periodic regulars who embody the collective RTE spirit. Murphy admits that he once thought no one could love the Experiment as much as he did, yet he’s come to see that by opening up the scope of feedback and responsibility, it’s created a family vibe. “We make each other better as a group compared to when we stand alone,” he says. The ensemble reads potential scripts to stage together. Each member has a say in season selection, though Murphy does have final word.

Still tied to a career outside of theatre, Murphy and the rest of the RTE gang challenge themselves and their audience while others wind down after a long day at work. “We do this for the love of the art and love of the theatre,” he shares. The point shines through when you see that they’ve never deviated from their mission to enlighten, entertain, and challenge. It’s a mission Murphy and company don’t take lightly, evidenced when he says, “I always feel that every production we’ve done is a journey worth taking.”

With their upcoming season, RTE looks to tackle the power of myth in our everyday lives. San Jose playwright Jeffrey Lo will direct the South Bay premiere of The Drunken City, which follows three female friends as they come to terms with the myth of marriage in society. As Murphy pinpoints, “Is the myth of ‘happily ever after’ something we should be pursuing?” Murphy will direct She Kills Monsters in November, which the company bills as “a comedic romp into the world of fantasy roleplaying games.” Protagonist Agnes Evans goes on a quest to better understand her sister in the wake of her death. She does so by following a Dungeons & Dragons scenario her sister created. With this production, RTE aims to tackle the myth of what’s considered normal in society by uncovering the humanity of a girl who defined herself through role-playing.

While theatre may not be his day job, Murphy does clarify it’s still his priority. “My career is as an actor, and I have a job to feed acting,” he says. “I have a career in tech; theatre will never do that. My day job enables me to create great theatre and fuel that passion.”

In this point, we see how Murphy and RTE channel the entrepreneurial streak we see often in Silicon Valley— the urge to pursue our passions once we clock out. As renegades who defy the conventional notion of a work day, they’ve been able to maintain an experiment that will soon enter its 13th season. In realizing that their convention is the unconventional, Murphy and fellow renegades push on, boats against the current, seeking fellow compatriots with an eye for a fun challenge.

With the Internet and television as the public’s primary modes of entertainment nowadays, theatre seems to be a dying art to some. Yet while the theatre median age by and large continues to climb, Renegade Theatre Experiment is a bit of an anomaly. They boast a median audience in its thirties and have been able to successfully reach a college audience. How? By finding material relevant to that audience. “It can work,” Murphy says.

“We just have to adapt and have people get exposed to it to fit the next way of doing things.”

“[THE RENEGADE NAME] EMPOWERS US TO PUSH ENVELOPES OR GO DIFFERENT WAYS AND TAKE RISKS A NORMAL THEATRE COMPANY WOULDN’T DO.” 28

Renegade Theatre Experiment 1635 Park Ave. San Jose, CA 95126 408.493.0783

renegadetheatre.com

facebook: RenegadeTheatreExperiment twitter: @RenegadeTheater

READING SUCCESS Written by Lynn Peithman Stock Photography by Danny Gaines

Carla Neumann and Volunteer Reading Partners

A

portable classroom sits on the eastern edge of Los Arboles Elementary School in the Seven Trees neighborhood of San Jose. There’s no single teacher and yet 65 students spend about 45 minutes there twice a week to work on reading skills. The youngsters are at least a half a year behind grade level in reading, and with class sizes at 30 students or more, it is difficult for teachers to give them individualized attention.

need extra help learning to read. This school year, nearly 5,500 volunteer tutors provided more than 63,000 hours of one-on-one tutoring with students reading six months to two and a half years behind grade level.

Locally, Reading Partners tutors work mostly with second, third and fourth graders. Reading center coordinators assess each student at the beginning of the school year. As Celena White, program manager for the South Bay, says, “It lets us know how far they are behind and where we should start them in the curriculum.”

But volunteer Carla Neumann can. She meets with five students two times a week at Los Arboles, including third grader Jared Recendiz Gomez. Jared happily plops down next to Ms. Carla for the day’s lesson. First, he chooses The Witches by Roald Dahl for Ms. Carla to read to him.

Next, they tackle the “ar” sound in words, such as “car,” “farm” and “bark.”

This extra help to get students reading at their grade level is crucial to their future educational success, according to Dr. Cheryl McElvain, lecturer for interdisciplinary education and basic teacher credential programs at Santa Clara University. Research shows that if a student is not reading at grade level at the third grade, it can affect his or her high school graduation rate.

“Can you think of other ‘ar’ words?” Ms. Carla asks.

“Jared...barn...card...” Jared rattles off as Ms. Carla writes them on a small white board at the table. “You do so much better when you actually look at the word you’re learning,” she says encouragingly.

Welcome to Reading Partners, a non-profit literacy program that began in Silicon Valley in 1999 and has grown to help almost 5,000 students in six states and the District of Columbia. Reading Partners pairs volunteers with elementary-age students who

“It affects their ability to keep up,” says McElvain. “Reading is a predictor of high school graduation and academic achievement, especially by third grade.” In early elementary school, a student is learning to read. Beginning in fourth grade, a student needs to read to learn. “The Reading Partners program allows the student to really learn those strategies, one on one. It’s a fabulous way for the community to connect with the schools.”

“THE ONLY WAY WE CAN PROVIDE ONE-ON-ONE TUTORING IS TO HAVE ENOUGH TUTORS.”

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“We want our films to speak to as many people as possible.”

31

“RESEARCH SHOWS THAT IF A STUDENT IS NOT READING AT GRADE LEVEL AT THE THIRD GRADE, IT CAN AFFECT HIS OR HER HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATION RATE.”

To qualify, a school must be designated as a Title One School, meaning that at least 75 percent of its students receive free or reduced lunch. In addition to the Bay Area, Reading Partners serves students in San Francisco/East Bay, Sacramento/ Chico, Baltimore, Charleston, Colorado, Dallas, Los Angeles, and New York. Each Reading Partners center is funded through private donations, family foundations and AmeriCorps grants, and schools contribute funding as well. On average, each school donates about $57,000 to each program a year. Schools also provide physical space for the reading center and library.

No matter how much funding the program has, it needs people power the most. “The only way we can provide one-on-one tutoring is to have enough tutors,” says Joe Ventura, senior communications manager at Reading Partners in Oakland.

Volunteers meet at partner schools Mondays through Thursdays during the day, and first need to go through a background check, participate in an online tutor orientation training session, and meet a Reading Partners staff member for a one-on-one tutor training session. The program provides an extensive step-by-step curriculum for each student.

Carla Neumann started volunteering as a tutor three years ago when her two children got older. “I have the time to do it and I enjoy it,” she says. Like each of the 60 tutors at Los Arboles, working consistently with students is key. “For a lot of kids, they don’t have that consistency. It’s important for someone to say, ‘You’re worthy and I’m committing my time to you.’”

And the program works. According to Reading Partners statistics, in the 2011-12 school year, 89 percent of students accelerated their progress in reading. Before enrollment last year, students gained an average of only 0.6 months of reading skills for every month in the classroom. By the end of the year with Reading Partners, the students gained an average of 1.6 months of reading skills per month, more than doubling their rate of learning and catching up to their on-grade peers.

“The volunteer tutors in our program are changing the lives of students by giving of their time each week,” says CEO Michael Lombardo. “With the support of these dedicated men and women, Reading Partners will continue to grow to reach more children in need.”

Information on how to be a volunteer readingpartners.org/SILICON-VALLEY-sign-up Email: volunteer@readingpartners.org Training continues year-round.

Tutoring runs September through mid-May, Mondays through Thursdays

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“IF I LOOK OUT AND I SEE A SEA OF PEOPLE WITH SMILING FACES, DANCING AND ENJOYING THEMSELVES, THAT WILL BE SATISFACTION FOR ME.”

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Silicon Valley’s PARTY girl Written and Photography by daniel Garcia

Jennifer Anderson

grew up in Newark and spent most of her leisure time seeking entertainment in Oakland, Berkeley, and San Francisco since BART provided easy access to those destinations. But somehow in 1999, Anderson and her friends decided to move to San Jose. In 2000 at friend’s encouragement, she landed a movie promotions coordinator position with the Metro.

After a few years of working with David Cohen at Silicon Valley Community Newspapers, Anderson has been back for three years as Marketing Manager with Metro.

C2SV is a bold venture, not only to create a profitable supplicant offering in Metro’s business, but also to develop a creative culture where technology and the arts can spur each other on to greater innovation. C2SV is looking to recognize the depth of creative professional work that comes from the heart of Silicon Valley.

Like most of us, Anderson wants her work to matter. To make a difference. Yet, at first blush, you would not expect the events director of the Metro to be a position that affects culture. But Jennifer Anderson’s job has the potential to do just that. She brings people and businesses together, generating the economical benefits to our community through the celebrated and revenue generating means of out consumer-entertainment culture.

Your title is Marketing Manager , but what do you do?

Anderson gets to have her hand on the pulse of C2SV and key in bring the music and party side our city this Fall.

I coordinate all of the events, such as Restaurant Week, which we now do twice a year. Beer Week, in the summer. And now we are launching C2SV. As well as some various Metro promotions and things.

Would you have ever expected when you moved here in ‘99 from Newark that you would be doing this job?

But before we get overly altruistic, events and festivals sponsored the Metro are a corporate strategy. Metro cofounder Dan Pulcrano has put his cultural trends and insights to work again and he knows that the changing publishing landscape needs to transform the business model of a weekly alternative newspaper in order to pay the bills. Thus events, concert and festivals are becoming an integral part of the Metro’s future.

No. In fact, I was just thinking about that recently, with some of the acts that we’re booking for an event I grew up listening to. Never thought in a million years that I would be so involved in actually going through their rider and finding out where I’m going to buy their special requested food...

What did you think? Like, the young girl of 1999 came here.

What were you thinking?

Pulcrano willingly and playfully admits that Anderson “runs the company and holds the future.”

I always had my little outlet, photography, but I did it for fun then. Now I do that professionally too, on the side.

I also manage our photo team, nightlife photographers.

I’m now doing what I love, so I really enjoy it. I really love being a part of C2SV and Restaurant Week, Beer Week. It’s exciting. It’s a big deal, you know. A lot of people actually...day‑to‑day, are touched by these events.

When I think about it...Sometimes I’ll tell people what I do for a living and they’re like, “Wow. That’s cool. You’re living the dream!”

Maybe you have been to Restaurant Week or Beer Walk or even Music in the Park. All of these events are supported by Metro staff, and Jennifer Anderson is involved with each of them.

Next to be added to their activities is C2SV, “Create.

Converge. Silicon Valley.” C2SV is described by Pulcrano as, one part concert, one part conference and one part expo.”

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Last year, when we kicked it off, it was smaller scale. I remember walking around at the end of the night and walking by all the clubs that were participating. They were packed. People were excited and happy. A couple of people from some local bands were coming up to me and saying, “Man, I wish I could have played this.” That was a good moment.

You’re throwing parties for thousands of people all the time!

Yeah, yeah. I appreciate that Dan’s (Pulcrano) giving me those opportunities.

That’s cool. You’re the party coordinator for Silicon Valley.

With the planning of this year, when things are coming together, certain sponsors, big sponsors that are coming through, that’s pretty exciting to see these big names.

Also, obviously, the bands that we’re booking are, in my world, pretty important, and I think in a lot of people’s worlds. Those are big moments for me, like our headliner that we booked and things like that.

I guess so. [laughter] What’s the transition that you’ve seen from 2000, to now in San Jose?

When we first came, I lived on Pierce Street. Back then I don’t know how I did it, but I would go out and stay out until midnight or 1:00, and still get up for work on time. It was crazy down here. We’d go to the Cactus Club but go across the street to the pool hall to use the bathroom because their bathroom was disgusting, but they had the good bands. That was my era. I know that there were some other legendary clubs in those spaces before that, but those were my stomping grounds. It was really fun and exciting, and then it seemed to die out for a while.

What bands can we expect to see at C2SV? A lot of them, actually. We have The Limousines tentatively on board. They’re always fun to see, of course.

They’re local guys. I’m a big fan of Queens of the Stone Age. We have a band, a side project of one of the members of that band. They’re playing. They’re called Mondo Generator. That’s pretty exciting. That’s a big deal. I don’t think he’s played here since Cactus Club.

In fact, during the time that I was away from Metro, I felt a little detached from the downtown scene. There wasn’t a huge live music scene. There was this perception that San Jose was losing its steam, but it’s coming back now, and I’m really excited about it.

That’s cool.

Yeah, we actually got him back into San Jose. Tommy Aguilar is helping us with some acts. Some of the names that he’s brought up were pretty exciting, too. It’s hard for me to say. I’m probably going to be pretty torn trying to see all of these great groups!

What’s most enjoyable about your job?

I think that there’s a need for live music in San Jose.

This event could help bring it back. This can really be an anchor event that takes place every year and could eventually spread out through the year. C2SV can help spark more clubs opening up and growing a need for live music. I just think it’s an important part of a community.

Why take the audacious jump to plan C2SV? I think it’s a timing thing. The approach we’re taking is a little different, too. I can’t even put my finger on it yet, but it just has a different feel to it than maybe other attempts in the past.

Like what? What’s the different feel?

There are different genres of music that do well in certain areas. There is great jazz and blues available.

There are events that surround that, and those do really well, but the one thing that’s missing is that indie, alternative music. I think that C2SV can fill that gap.

Maybe it’s because there’s a heavy technology component to it, the conference at the convention center and the new wing. It feels like a big deal. We’re showcasing our local acts and giving them the opportunity to share a stage with these names, these bands that they look up to. I think that’s really important. It legitimizes the local music scene.

What will be success for this event for you?

If I’m at The Stooges’ show, for example and I look out and I see a sea of people with smiling faces, dancing and enjoying themselves, that will be satisfaction for me. Just making sure that the people here who desire live music again in San Jose are getting what they want and being a part of it‑‑that will be rewarding for me.

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c2sv overview COnference. Creative Convergence Silicon Valley

2013 will feature more than 72 sessions on the convergence of technology and creativity in the new wing of the San Jose McEnery Convention Center. Keynote sessions will be held in the new 22,000 square foot Grand Ballroom. Speakers include: Nolen Bushnell and one for Content favorite San Joseans, Alfredo Muccino.

Expo. The C2SV expo will take place September 26-

27,2013 in the brand new wing of the San Jose McEnery Convention Center and will bring a lively mix of new products to the C2SV Conference with launches, announcements and demos. Companies like Microsoft, PayPal, Kerio, and Content Magazine will be in the mix, too.

“ONE THING THAT’S MISSING IS THAT INDIE, ALTERNATIVE MUSIC. I THINK THAT C2SV CAN FILL THAT GAP.”

Concerts. Held over four days at 12+ downtown San

Jose venues, C2SV will showcase emerging and established acts in some of Silicon Valley’s best venues. Early punk innovators Iggy and The Stooges will headline the inaugural event with additional performances by 90s alt-rock pioneers The Lemonheads, political hip-hop/funk collective The Coup, DAM Funk and, San Jose’s own, The Limousines.

c2sv.com September 26-29, 2013 San Jose Convention Center

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Saving Faber’s One Man’s Vision for the Famous Leaning Building Written by Mark Haney Group Photography by scott macdonlad Portraits by Daniel garcia

For Justin Triano, Faber’s Cyclery is much more than just an old bike shop.

“They may not know Faber’s by name, but when I say ‘It’s the building that’s leaning just south of downtown,’ everyone knows exactly where it is.”

Faber’s Cyclery is a name that’s been mentioned within the San Jose biking community since 1912. It is arguably one of the oldest bicycle shops in America. Though over a century’s worth of elemental forces and a recent fire have left the structure leaning and charred, the cultural relic still creates passion within the San Jose community. One who has recently taken up the fight to save Faber’s is current president of the Faber’s Cultural Center, 30-year-old Justin Triano.

Triano, a San Jose native, grew up on the east side.

Though he has spent much of his life in different parts of the country, he found his way back to San Jose. “My family has shomesteaded here, starting with my grandma and I’ve had multiple phases of my life here in San Jose.” But it was his family and a feeling of opportunity that brought him back this most recent time. Throughout his life, Triano rode bikes and participated in San Jose Bike Party. It was through this bike culture that bonded Triano further to the San Jose community.

When thinking back on his first interactions with Faber’s, Triano recalls that it began with a bike ride and an off-handed comment. “My girlfriend Andrea said that she liked the building. I told her I would get it for her… someday.” On another similar ride, the two decided to stop and explore what the shop had to offer. It was during this encounter that Triano met Alexander La Riviere, the bike shop’s owner of 30 years. La Riviere sold Triano a bike with a standing offer that if he didn’t like it, he had three days to return it for a full refund. Triano was touched by La Riviere’s immediate trust and began to feel a unique synergy within the place.

Following that initial meeting with La Riviere, Triano began stopping by, often to hear one of La Riviere’s many stories or just to have a beer and a conversation about bikes. The two started forming a bond.

One day, Triano decided to begin cleaning up the shop. That first day he worked for nine hours, without pay, but he didn’t mind. He loved being a part of Faber’s. “It had become a pick and pull junkyard for bikes; but I saw it as a gem.” Soon Triano began cleaning the shop whenever he had free hours. His reward? Seeing the place improving and looking better than it had in a long time. The occasional six pack of beer from La Riviere didn’t hurt either.

Using his past connections with San Jose Bike Party, Triano saw an opportunity to bring the cycling community together to restore the historic Faber’s. He told La Riviere, “I have access to the community, you have access to a great piece of land and culture, so let’s marry these.”

Faber’s began its rebirth, first by cleaning and organizing the shop and then by holding a large community urban planning meeting with city employees, bloggers, bicycle enthusiasts, and even Councilmember Sam Liccardo in attendance. The event was a success, proving the community supported Faber’s and reaffirming Triano’s belief that Faber’s is a pivotal cultural and social hub.

Before becoming a bike shop, the building was a corner saloon, built in 1884, that served as a pit stop for stage coaches traveling north and south along the El Camino Real. The city has marked the property as a historic site.

The building, however, is not registered as historic, thus not being coveted by the city to be preserved and saved. As it currently stands—overtly leaning to one side—it is red tagged by

“They may not know Faber’s by name, but when I say ‘It’s the building that’s leaning just south of downtown,’ everyone knows exactly where it is.”

“That building means a lot to the heart of San Jose.”

the city. Without a strong community voice, it could be demolished altogether. Triano admits projects like this are par for the course in this city. “It’s a miracle that place is still standing. San Jose gets rid of stuff like that.

There’s been a struggle to not let it go, with the landlord wanting to sell and re-develop it.” His voice trails off, “It would be a heart break.”

But the building draws people to it. “Everybody knows that building. They may not know Faber’s by name, but when I say ‘It’s the building that’s leaning just south of downtown,’ everyone knows exactly where it is.” It is this physical recognition, along with the communal re-birth before the fire in April of this year, that Triano sees as the most important reason to rebuild the structure in its original location.

His vision for the renewed Faber’s includes a bicycle museum, a coffee/beer/juice bar with garden seating, local art, live music, a bike shop, and a place to hold community events. Local coffee roasters and breweries have already contacted Triano about potential partnerships when the building is finished. He sees this project as one that could mimic the success of the San Pedro Square Market.

For Triano, by simply having conversations with others about the vision for the building’s future, he sees the abundance of benefits. “People love the idea of taking action. They ask, ‘We’re going to do that? We’re going to save it?’” Triano is looking to take advantage of the current exposure and recruit and enlist volunteers and garner enough money to fund the project.

What is truly heartwarming is the outpouring of support after the fire. “Everyone cares now,” says Triano. “That building means a lot to the heart of San Jose.”

With all the work Triano has contributed, it would seem like he has been at it for years, when in reality it was only a matter of months from when he bought his bike until he became fully invested in Faber’s. “I want to be a part of something challenging and in the process be able to save something that others have worked for. I want to be part of the legacy that’s going on here.”

Savefabers.org twitter: @faberscyclery Justin@savefabers.org

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de bug protect your people

When Raj Jayadev took a temp job after college to fund his world travels, he never dreamed it would morph into Silicon Valley De-Bug, a 1,000-member community support network and one of San Jose’s leading civil rights organizations.

db Written by diane solomon Photography by daniel garcia

“We’re a platform for people to tell their stories or live out their dreams.”

I

t was year 2000 and high tech companies used temporary employees to perform the low-wage drudge work that has since been shipped offshore. Raj Jayadev’s new co-workers were youths and elderly immigrants struggling to make ends meet at a Hewlett-Packard printer plant on $8 an hour, with no job security or benefits.

De-Bug Science

In Silicon Valley’s early days, temp work was a pathway to full-time employment and a ticket to the middle class.

If you worked hard, crappy temp jobs led to permanent positions with educational benefits, which qualified you for better jobs at that same company or at others. By Jayadev’s time, they had become low-wage limbos, dooming a new generation of workers to poverty.

Born in Mexico City, Avila’s mother brought him to San Jose when he was six. He discovered De-Bug when he was a Lincoln High School student working at a hot dog place. Today, he’s De-Bug’s art director, a mentor, and owns and operates After Dark Prints, a silk screening and design house. He manages De-Bug’s media-rich website, and has traveled with Jayadev and other staffers teaching video and media skills to youth around the country for the Marguerite Casey Foundation.

How are disadvantaged, underemployed youth able to do so much with so little? Adrian Avila, 28, calls it “DeBug Science.” Says Avila, “After eleven years I still don’t know how it works, but it does work.”

Talks about workplace hazards and shortchanged paychecks grew into lunchtime meetings at a pho spot on First Street, inspiring them to turn these discussions into an action group that confronted management and got them fairer treatment.

“We’re a platform for people to either tell their stories or to live out their dreams,” says Avila. “People feel like they can do it here because they see others doing it. You walk in as a blank slate and find out what you like to do—writing, design, video, music—and if it’s not here you can create it. That‘s what I did.”

Today, Silicon Valley De-Bug is located in a former speakeasy at the corner of Lenzen and Stockton Streets in San Jose. Eight paid staff and about thirty-five volunteers operate De-Bug’s Community Center where their darkroom, video production, and sound studios are available for little or no cost.

“When I came here I created a graphic design business, so I started the screen printing and someone gave me most of the equipment I needed. I also wanted to write and travel and address the immigration issue. It’s the opposite of the commercialized co-opted youth culture we see on TV, at the mall, and social networking’s fake freedom.”

Funded by the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and The California Endowment and with referrals from Santa Clara County’s Sentencing Alternatives Program, they conduct writing and media-making workshops at high schools, colleges, juvenile halls, prisons and community organizations, and provide legal aid services. They have after-school arts programs and offer computers and hangout space to anyone who walks in.

At De-Bug, it’s not what you do, but how you do it, and the “how” is collaborative and inclusive. Those hanging out soon find themselves writing for the magazine and website, creating art, producing videos, and taking part in political action as they connect their challenges to economic and societal inequities.

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Organizing marches, community meetings, and City Hall speak-outs in 2009 against the San Jose Police Department’s public intoxication arrests and profiling record won De-Bug a membership on the city task force that lobbied unsuccessfully for a community-based selection process for new police chiefs. From that collaboration with the Silicon Valley NAACP, the Asian Law Alliance, SIREN and other groups, De-Bug co-founded the Coalition for Justice and Accountability and the Santa Clara County Forum for Immigrant Rights and Empowerment, watchdogging County and city law enforcement agencies for civil rights violations.

The Invisible Become Visible Elegantly dressed and fashion model-pretty, it’s hard to believe that Steeda McGruder, 29, was plagued by drug use and spent 18 months at Elmwood Jail fighting a charge that was eventually dropped.

Today she’s founder and director of Sisters That Been There. Headquartered at De-Bug, it’s a peer lead support and re-entry program of the Santa Clara County Probation Department that helps women released from jails, rehab centers and prisons to not go back.

“I had a plan to form a support group before I got out,” says McGruder. “I saw that we needed to do better for ourselves, but we didn’t have examples. No one who had ever succeeded ever came back to jail to tell us how to do it. We only saw the failures. So I decided to be the first example and if I were to make it, I’d turn around and teach other women to do it and we’d just keep helping the women coming behind us.”

She says it wasn’t by accident that she found her herself walking by De-Bug’s Community Center on a Sunday afternoon. It was divine guidance. She noticed people inside and found herself at a meeting of De-Bug’s Albert Cobarrubias Justice Project.

“What they were talking about sounded familiar to me, because of my own incarceration. I felt comfortable. So I sat down and just listened, and then I introduced myself and said what I was doing. I had just started a weekly support group that was meeting at the Billy DeFrank Center, but I spoke about the group as if it existed the way I wanted it to. It was alive to me and they got really excited about it. It was the first time anyone acknowledged it and believed in it.”

“Most kids have people who nourish their dream. Women like me who come from the institution lifestyle didn’t get their dream nurtured. We got shot down so we shot ourselves down. De-Bug was that family unit that nourished and supported my dream.”

“What I needed at that time in my journey was someone who could see my same vision. Because at that time, it was just me and God with this business plan I was carrying around. De-Bug handed my dream back to me and said ‘It looks good, go out and do it, we’ll support you.’”

The De-Buggers About sixty people crowd into De-Bug’s Community Center on Sunday afternoons and on Tuesday evenings at the East Valley Pentecostal Church for more De-Bug Science at their Albert Cobarrubias Justice Project, a “families and folks that been there” style of peer support and free legal aid that co-founder Gail Noble says works miracles.

In 2008, Noble, Jayadev, and former Santa Clara County public defender Aram James met at a juvenile justice conference and joined forces. Noble, a medical assistant, was trying to navigate through Santa Clara County’s criminal court system to save her 17-year-old son from a first strike and long sentence at a juvenile detention facility. Multiple witnesses attested to his innocence, and James and Jayadev’s research indicated that Karim was one of many African American first-time offenders railroaded into incarceration by county and national policies that failed to consider all of the evidence. That process of helplessness inspired Noble reach out to other parents and form the ACJP. Noble says spirits are low when people find them. “We give them a game plan. They’re in overwhelm but we know the process and help them communicate with their attorneys, probation officers and judges,” says Noble.

“We help them build cases that enable the court to see a person, not a number, and we go to court together. An attorney does the best he can to represent this person but when a whole community is behind someone, that makes the outcome different.”

“We see three strikes cases going to early resolution to time at County Jail. Many times our clients face significant sentences and get probation, which is amazing. We see them walk away empowered and that’s the most exciting part.”

Jayadev calls it “time saved” versus “time served” and says 1,377 years have been saved since the ACJP began. He says by using family and community engagement to save someone from incarceration, many more people benefit.

He cites a single dad who got probation instead of jail time. His young daughters weren’t placed in foster care, which would have been catastrophic for them. Those helped by ACJP become closer to their families through its process. They get their lives back and on track and want to give back and become ACJP peer counselors.

“This is De-Bug Science,” says Adrian Avila. “People come in and we pay attention to what they’re saying and what they need. We help anybody with what we know.”

siliconvalleydebug.org 701 Lenzen Ave. San Jose, CA 95126 408.971.4965 svdebug@newamericamedia.org twitter: @svdebug facebook: sv.debug

Renegade Theatre Experiment 1635 Park Avenue, San Jose, CA 95126 408.493.0783

renegadetheatre.com

facebook: RenegadeTheatreExperiment twitter: @RenegadeTheater

The Valley of Health Helping Santa Clara County to become the healthiest region in the country, one home garden at a time.

Written by Jennifer Elias Photography by gregory Cortez

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In ten years, Raul Lozano hopes to have planted 20,000 gardens in Santa Clara County.

I

f you’ve ever sat on a project for a few years before starting it, then you’ll relate to Raul Lozano.

“I wanted something I could sink my teeth in for the next ten years,” he says about Valley Verde, the nonprofit he started in 2012 which provides low income families the knowledge and materials needed to grow their own organic vegetable gardens at no cost.

Lozano had the idea to take his pastime—gardening— and make it available to anyone. He asked Health Trust CEO Frederick J. Ferrer for $30,000 in grant money to support his idea, knowing it was a long shot. Surprisingly, and without hesitation, Ferrer not only approved the proposed amount, but offered $50,000. Ferrer thought that it was a great idea and something that hadn’t been done. Though it was a big risk, Lozano thought it just might be a big reward too.

Valley Verde’s garden program provides in-home gardens—planter boxes, seeds, soil, and drip irrigation—to low income families who want to grow their own organic produce. Valley Verde also sells these in-home gardens to the general public. For every garden sold, Valley Verde can provide one low income family with a garden and enroll them in a year-round gardening program.

Prices for in-home gardens range from $85 to $400, depending on the size of the planter boxes. “The customer gets all the soil, we put in the drip irrigation system, and we deliver and install it,” says Lozano.

You don’t need a green thumb to keep an organic vegetable garden thriving. “The level of care these gardens need to be given is not as much as people think. As long as you have good sun and water them regularly, you’re going to be fine,” Lozano says.

New gardeners take three organic gardening classes throughout the year before finishing the year-long program. Families can also come to monthly classes if they have additional questions and want step-by-step help.

“My garden really helped me to feel better and be less lonely. I see how my plants are growing and changing every day and I feel good about growing my own food,” says Esperanza, a Valley Verde garden grower. “I haven’t bought lettuce or cabbage for the last four months.”

Valley Verde’s team wants to show that gardening is a valuable skill that is useful for the rest of their gardener’s lives. Most families aren’t just cash poor, but “time poor” as Lozano describes. “We’re trying to get as many people knowledgeable,” he says. “If we have these classes, it gives them the support to become self sufficient.”

“If we can not only give them materials but teach them how to garden themselves and feel confident, then they are going to be able to provide it as long as they live,” Lozano says.

But Lozano’s movement has helped more than the pockets of low-income families. It’s creating symmetry between families in any economic class, government officials, city planners, and corporations.

In ten years, Lozano hopes to have planted 20,000 gardens in Santa Clara County as part of Valley Verde’s Plant, Eat, Share campaign. They’ve partnered with city council members, corporations, and nonprofits. “If we’re successful, I’d like to create the same movement in other regions across the US,” Lozano says.

“We are hoping corporations like Google will pick up the idea and collaborate on our Plant, Eat, Share campaigns with employees. They get their employees to eat healthier and we get to add gardens to the campaign. It’s a win-win,” Lozano says.

Three hundred gardens later, Lozano doesn’t rest.

“What’s really got me through the really tough times is that I totally believed in what we were doing,” Lozano says. “I totally believed the community needed it. That’s how I wanted to start my new career. And it’s way more rewarding that I thought it would be.”

valleyverde.org info@valleyverde.org twitter: @valley_verde

“YOU DON’T ALWAYS PUT URBAN PLANNING AND ARTS TOGETHER, BUT THEY’RE BOTH ABOUT PLACEMAKING AND COMMUNITY BUILDING.”

CIVIC entrepreneur CONNIE MARTINEZ Written by FLora moreno de Thompson Photography by Daniel Garcia

a career arts and culture non-profit leader. I came out of business school, did a gig in Mountain View. I’ve always spoken the language of business. It was easy for me to see that as opportunity and leverage it.

Connie Martinez has been in Silicon Valley for 28

years, having worked previously as executive director of the Children’s Discovery Museum and as managing director and CEO of 1stAct Silicon Valley. Martinez is ready to take on her next leadership role as CEO of Silicon Valley Creates, the result of a merger between 1stAct and Arts Council Silicon Valley.

What are the advantages or disadvantages of working for a non-profit?

The non-profit sector has the pressure of a marketplace without the upside. There is the complexity of the public sector without the funding mechanism. In leadership, private sector is always touted for all they do and do well.

The complexity of a non-profit is that you actually have to enroll people in your vision. You have little resource to buy people’s support. You don’t have clear cut bottom line, you have multiple constituencies. That’s the big difference. I would say I’m attracted to non-profit because of the complexity. Simplicity in my life, complexity in my work.

You were the Managing Director and CEO of 1stAct. How did that come about?

I was working at the Children’s Discovery Museum in 2001. I had been an observer of the valley and our culture, and the idea of a creative place that you want to live in. Children’s Discovery Museum was my first foray into the arts and culture world. 1stAct came out of conversations about “Our neighborhood is downtown, what can we do to make it better?” 1stAct was just than just downtown San Jose. We were looking at the cultural ecosystem.

What’s your perspective on arts in Silicon Valley?

How’d you end up in Silicon Valley?

We need not to compare ourselves to anyone else because no one else is Silicon Valley. We share the region with San Francisco and Oakland and as far as I’m concerned, we’re lucky to have those two cities in this region for all the things they bring. But they don’t bring what we bring, and we don’t bring what they bring.

I was in Boulder, CO, and my then spouse and I were in a consulting firm together. He ended up getting second Master’s in regional planning. He got a job here and I ended up working for the city manager in Mountain View.

What are the key elements for San Jose to continue to be the place you personally want it to be?

Where’d you get the bug for arts and placemaking?

I grew up in southern Minnesota…it was like Little House on the Prairie. My dad’s a Lutheran minister. I was a single mom of two babies in diapers. The pragmatist in me, I got an MBA. You don’t always put urban planning and arts together, but they’re both about placemaking and community building. But if you follow my career, you see I use business skills and training to run nonprofits or government. I think part of it was that I wasn’t

It’s not all arts and culture. I see our sectors as one of the contributors. You can’t have vibrancy without people being engaged. There’s a reason why 1stAct chose a music agenda. In this very diverse, male engineer dominated region, music is one of the things that brings us together.

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“WE NEED NOT TO COMPARE OURSELVES TO ANYONE ELSE BECAUSE NO ONE ELSE IS SILICON VALLEY.”

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How do you think we can sustain art and culture?

We actually had a model for what sustainable arts and culture looks like. I think because of who we are, first of all, some people don’t like me saying this, but relevance trumps excellence. Quality is always relevant. Start with the product—this is my MBA talk—if you start with the product you have to ask yourself first of all, is it relevant?

The relevance is to this region. If you fundamentally don’t like this region, you’re probably in the wrong region.

You start with the product. We have all these product qualities that speak to this demographic. It has to do with the multicultural, the left brainers, all of that. That’s the product. Then you have the market. You have to communicate with your product. If you’re on a growth pattern here and you want to grow your market, you can’t ignore the culture, the multicultural. And then the leadership. I think here looks very different and should look very different than New York or San Francisco.

We are civic entrepreneurs. The people that do best are much more entrepreneurial, garage-like. We are not a region that wants our art community to have an incredible amount of overhead. Which leads you to a financial market. Those are the quadrants to look at and navigate.

Those who accept it and don’t fight it are the ones that can do better.

1stAct has now merged with Arts Council Silicon Valley.

What does that mean for Silicon Valley?

It’s called Silicon Valley Creates. It speaks to the issue of creativity, but it’s also a verb. Action.

You’ll see that we’ll take the innovation and action orientation of 1stAct and actualize and steward the initiatives we started, many of which are embedded in Arts Council. We’ll bring forward some of the legacy investments that Arts Council has made. They were ahead of most people in terms of picking participatory arts. We’ll bring initiatives to life. We have about six announcements lined up of new things that are going to be.

What’s the most exciting thing for you?

I wouldn’t say there’s one. First of all, I’ll give you the mission of Silicon Valley Creates: igniting investment and engagement in arts and creativity. We want to raise level of investment in the arts. We live at the intersection of creativity and pragmatism.

svcreates.org

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CREATING A DISTINCT FUTURE

CHRIS BLOCK Written by lynn pethman stock Photography by daniel garcia

SILICON VALLEY’S AMERICAN LEADERSHIP FORUM LOOKS TOWARD THE NEXT 25 YEARS

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days, an ALF class does not necessarily create one large project. Instead, the focus is on large systemic change.

“Can we move large systems in the right direction? We’re taking what we’ve learned and building the next 25 years on top of it.”

ven when Chris Block was a young child, there was something in him that simply made him act… something that drove him to take charge and to lead.

There was the time when he was playing on the beach in Santa Cruz with his sister, and an older woman strolling nearby fell down and could not get up. Even with a beach crowded with sun worshippers, no one came to her aid. So Block rushed to help her husband get her back on her feet, without taking a moment to think why.

It’s more of these synergistic projects they want to incubate. “In a network there’s lots of things because people are connected…Networks are good at going where the energy and passion is.”

This year, for the first time in the Silicon Valley chapter’s history, ALF will have two classes within one year. Class 25, the iconic class, is made up of regional leaders and lasts the traditional ten to eleven months. The other, Class 26, is more focused on education and members meet more often and within six months, then continues to gather for the next two years. “This is a group of people who have been brought together around education,” Block says. The education class still follows the ALF curriculum.

Block has thought about that moment a lot ever since— why he didn’t respond differently that day. “I was someone who could step into it” and be a leader or be in a position to lead, he says.

For the past five years, Block has led the American Leadership Forum of Silicon Valley. This group brings together diverse leaders from our area to bring about positive change. According to its website, ALF is a network of regional leaders committed to serving the common good in Silicon Valley. Through its Fellows program, ALF brings together demonstrated leaders to explore process of collaborative leadership that can strengthen their capacity to address difficult issues.

“It’s interesting having an anniversary of 25 years,” he says. “We could say, ‘We’re really good and everyone likes us’ or you could say, ‘What have we learned in the last 25 years that could point our way the next 25 years?’

ALF has chosen to take the latter position.” Block quotes leadership writer and leader Peter Block (no relation): “We should create a future distinct from our past.”

This year, ALF celebrates its 25th anniversary and Block, its CEO and president, wants to plan for the next 25 years. Block got his start with ALF as a member of its Class XVI and has served on its board.

So, for someone like Block, who considers himself a leader in our community and works to create greater opportunity for other leaders here, what exactly is leadership? Block ponders this question as he places his fingertips together just under his nose and slowly rubs his mustache, eyes closed.

ALF brings together established leaders in the community, but the twist is these folks are diverse: CEOs of tech companies, religious leaders, and activists. The result often is that “they build these very deep relationships,” Block says. For example, Joel Slayton, executive director of Zero1, the art and technology network, and Robert Sapien Jr., battalion chief of San Jose Fire Department and president of San Jose Fire Fighters, IAFF Local 230, have worked together recently. “The fire department is doing community wide meetings…one held at Zero1.

Those relationships are important.”

After a few moments, he responds. “I think that leadership happens when people are in deep relationship with each other and that relationship allows them to take greater risks. People who step in and do leadership work have a sense of personal accountability and a larger sense of accountability.”

Another example from Block’s childhood represents his own sense of accountability. When he was little, he

Once upon a time, each ALF class would create and implement one big project for the community. These

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quickly gained a lot of weight, and by the fifth grade, his parents were so concerned they consulted a doctor. The physician recommended he start to lose weight within two weeks, and if he didn’t, he would be placed in the hospital. To help with the weight loss, the doctor gave him pills. Today, Block wonders if those pills contained speed (it was a much different time) but even then, he thought that would not be the best idea. So Block decided to he wanted to lose the weight himself and he flushed the pills down the toilet. In short, his sense of personal accountability kicked in.

Block’s family has been in the valley for three generations.

His great-grandparents settled in Morgan Hill from Sicily and pruned orchards. They then moved to an area south of First Street, where his grandfather owned a dry cleaner business. Block’s mother was born there and she and his father moved to Los Gatos once they were married; his mother, Marion, still lives there.

For a large part of Block’s career, he worked for Catholic Charities of Santa Clara County, building a reputation of strong leadership in affordable housing. In 2007, the Full Circle Fund honored Block in its showcase of bold models of social change. Full Circle Fund stated, “He has been a great mobilizer in Silicon Valley, continually bringing together private, public and nonprofit stakeholders to address critical social issues.” As Executive Director of Charities Housing, Block partnered with Full Circle Fund to form a high-profile Blue Ribbon Commission, which aims to resolve the issues of homelessness and the lack of affordable housing in Santa Clara County.

“LEADERSHIP HAPPENS WHEN PEOPLE ARE IN DEEP RELATIONSHIP WITH EACH OTHER AND THAT RELATIONSHIP ALLOWS THEM TO TAKE GREATER RISKS.”

Full Circle Fund is an active philanthropic network of members in the San Francisco Bay Area who partner with social entrepreneurs to advance innovative solutions to the world’s most pressing problems.

Today, at ALF, Block helps community leaders learn to work together, noting that leadership now is not topdown leadership like the traditional model.

As ALF celebrates 25 years of networked leadership for the common good, “the intent here is to use everything we’ve learned the past 25 years at ALF,” Block says.

“The most exciting leadership that is happening now is not individual, egocentric leadership,” he says. “The role of the leader is not defined by an individual anymore.”

alfsv.org facebook: alfsiliconvalley twitter: @alfsv

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Professional Do Goodrs:

How GoVoluntr Is Making a Difference

Written by kathryn Hunts Photography by daniel garcia

GoVoluntr is on a mission to change the way you think about volunteering.

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ounders Young Han, MJ Fogelstrom, and Kevin Zittle are full of energy and passion. Their enthusiasm is certainly contagious. The source of their joy is an activity that has become bottlenecked into a an arduous chore. However, GoVoluntr does not buy the idea that volunteering is a drag, only applicable to soup kitchens.

The site is on a mission to prove volunteering can be anything from helping pour wine at events, to live tweeting at a conference for a nonprofit. Whether you are new to the volunteer world or experienced, GoVoluntr wants their users to feel excited, rewarded, and to most importantly, have fun.

never stop volunteering because it’s a part of me now.” After deciding to leave Apple, Han got together with Zittle, an Apple colleague, and Fogelstrom, whom he met while volunteering, to figure out how to volunteer for a living.

Han’s story is a familiar one in Silicon Valley. He sold his first business at 23, had two other ventures, and worked for Starbucks and Apple. Busy figuring out the next business edge, he never volunteered until Starbucks encouraged him. His life changed after visiting Hope Services, a nonprofit that assists people with developmental disabilities.

There is often a great separation between the have and the have-nots in the South Bay. The startup is the marriage of San Jose soul and Silicon Valley technology. GoVoluntr wants to use the successes of Silicon Valley technologies to help the community. The website serves as a platform to match volunteers with opportunities. Schools, governments, and nonprofits can post volunteer prospects on the Opportunities Page and users can sign up for shifts with a mere click of a mouse. The site incorporates social networking and aspects of gamification, such as badges and leveling up, seen in sites like Facebook and Foursquare.

Fogelstrom’s parlay into the volunteer world is the product of Bellarmine College Preparatory and Santa Clara University, where his Jesuit education left a lasting impression on him. He credits his passion for volunteering to the schools’ focus on social action. With a background in city government, Fogelstrom quickly recognized the need to connect people seamlessly with the social sector.

“It was very eye opening to me because I never had any experience with people with developmental disabilities.

Then I started wondering, ‘What else didn’t I know about the world?’ ‘What other communities are out there that I never paid attention to?’”

This is to encourage involvement and to make it fun. As a volunteer accumulates hours, they receive “VPins” which they can turn in for perks, like concert tickets or even as a monetary donation back to a nonprofit. Users also get certificates the next day, thanking them for their service and verifying, for work or school, that they volunteered.

Han started getting involved with everything from senior nonprofits to environmental nonprofits. “It got to the point where I was volunteering more than I was working.

I was actually volunteering 40 hours a week and it was insane. I just loved it…I started sleeping better. I started becoming happier. My life changed immediately. I’ll

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“We can sit here and complain about it all we want, or we can try to do something about it. GoVoluntr is that for us.”

“It got to the point where I was volunteering more than I was working. I was actually volunteering 40 hours a week, and it was insane.”

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“Then I started wondering, ‘What else didn’t I know about the world?’

‘What other communities are out there that I never paid attention to?’”

The incentive aspect of the company receives much attention, but Han and Fogelstrom are quick to point out that there is nothing wrong with applying the same strategies, used by the private sector, to increase productivity and morale for their employees. “We wanted to do incentives to really attract, engage and reward people who do good in the world,” explains Han. “Why not? We should be recognizing these people. They’re going out of their way to help someone else in need. If anybody should be acknowledged, it’s the people that are volunteering in our communities and making our world a better place.”

If you look at the business card of GoVoluntr, you will see “Professional Do Goodr” as the job description. In fact, users of the site can also use this title. Volunteers can be strategic about how they donate their time. Organizations don’t just need people distributing food, they need help behind the scenes, such as HR, sales and social media. It is a chance to work on your professional skillset while making an impact on the way an organization functions.

It can be easy to feel pessimistic about the world these days, but Han counters, “We can sit here and complain about it all we want, or we can try to do something about it. GoVoluntr is that for us. Anything can be done, and nothing is impossible. You just have to want it enough.”

GoVoluntr govoluntr.com twitter: @govoluntr facebook: govoluntr linkedIn: govoluntr

“MANY OF THE ARTISTS WHO ARE IN THE ICA REALLY ARE EMERGING ARTISTS, OR UNDER-RECOGNIZED, MID-CAREER.”

ART DIRECTION AT THE ICA

CATHY KIMBALL IS DEDICATED TO GIVING EMERGING ARTISTS THE RECOGNITION THEY DESERVE.

Written by Jonny Keshishoglou Photography by daniel Garcia

For up-and-coming artists trying to establish themselves, there are few havens quite like the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art. For over 30 years now, the ICA has been searching for new artists waiting to establish themselves, and their most recent successes have been under its current director, Cathy Kimball.

While she’s a part of the San Jose community now, Kimball was originally from the east coast, where she worked at the New York State Museum and the New Jersey Center for the Visual Arts. When her husband got a new job out here, Kimball came upon a stroke of luck shortly after her arrival, where she met an old coworker from the New York State Museum who was now a curator at the San Jose Museum of Art. He informed Kimball that both his assistant curator and education director had resigned a month earlier and asked, “so when can you start?”

While at SJMA, Kimball kept ties to New York by working as a curator for collaborations with the Whitney Museum. It was in 2000 when the ICA, only 20 years old at the time, approached her about being the Institute’s new director. While the ICA had a long history of curatorial highs and financial lows, both were at a low point at the time. But to Kimball, it meant there was no place to go but up.

“The opportunity to come into a space and set a vision and really determine the path, the future path, for that place, was kind of exciting.”

Despite the schedule being an initially blank slate, Kimball set an aesthetic revolving around unrecognized artists who may not be particularly well-established, but who are still unquestionably quality in the eyes of the curatorial staff. The staff collaborates heavily, with different curators proposing ideas and visiting studios of artists who may possibly show up in later exhibitions.

And along with opportunities to exhibit, the ICA provides opportunities for education, for both the art-loving community and for the artists themselves, who can see what other artists are doing local to the Bay Area or further away. For anyone who at-

tends an ICA gallery or one of their panel discussions, there are chances to speak with both art collectors and the artists themselves, who are always around and love to discuss their processes and subject matter.

“Many of the artists who are in the ICA really are emerging artists, or under-recognized, mid-career. And that’s who I am most dedicated to. Especially those midcareer artists who really deserve to be recognized and have their work shown…but they haven’t marketed themselves to get the kind of shows that they deserve.”

In general, Kimball emphasizes the aspect of connecting with the art community. For members, there are various trips and other member perks, and their aforementioned panel discussions can go very in-depth about their art on display, often expanding a two paragraph label into an hour-and-ahalf discussion of the work and its themes.

They also offer an annual art auction, with up to 170 artists and every medium you can think of.

“And whether you’re thinking that you want to start buying art for yourself, to surround yourself with beauty, or you really just want to learn more about art, that’s an excellent opportunity.”

ICA.ORG

twitter: @sanjoseICA facebook: SanJoseICA

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CONNECT +COLLECT If you’re thinking about starting your own permanent collection, here are Cathy’s tips on beginning your own collection:

Collecting tips Love it. You need to absolutely fall in love with a work of

art before you consider writing any checks. And if the price tag works with your budget, that’s great. If it doesn’t, you briefly worship that work of art, and you move on.

Don’t go over budget. A lesser-known artist cannot command the same prices as more well-established artists, but who knows how established that artist will be later on?

Also look at works on paper or photography, which tend to be more affordable that large oil paintings or bronze sculptures.

Look into the local art community. It’s very

important to meet the artist and establish a relationship.

Artists are not mysterious; they’re still people who live in the local communities and graduated from San Jose State University, or Stanford, or other local art programs.

AUCTION EXHIBITION

September 28 - October 26

OPENING RECEPTION FOR THE ARTISTS

Don’t worry about investing. Despite what you

Friday, October 4 6pm - 8pm Free Admission. All welcome.

may hear, investing is not a good strategy, especially if you’re on a limited budget. Dorothy and Herbert Vogel were a working class couple who amassed one of the largest art collections of the 20th century, estimated at over 60 million dollars. They weren’t worried about investing, they simply bought what they found enjoyable until their whole apartment was covered in art.

SILENT AUCTION:

Saturday, October 12 6pm - 10pm Free Admission.

To bid in the auction you must purchase a $50 BIDDER CARD

It’s for everybody. “If I can buy a pair of shoes or a

bag or a dress or an expensive dinner, it’s not that different from art buying.” It’s not for a certain kind of person, it’s for everybody. And whether it’s impulse buying what looks beautiful, or a research project about which pieces you want to learn about first, collecting art is different for everybody.

LIVE AUCTION:

Saturday, October 26

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“COLLECTING ART IS DIFFERENT FOR EVERYBODY.”

M A K I N G

GIVING A N

A R T Written by Gillian Claus Photography by Daniel Garcia

rt is integral to every life. Regardless of socioeconomic background or education, each of us should have access to the arts. Sally Lucas and Charmaine Warmenhoven are committed to bringing the arts into the lives of our children.

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ing Zero1 and Ballet San Jose. Lucas has supported the Children’s Discovery Museum and Arts Council Silicon Valley. Now Montalvo Life Trustees, each of them has served as President of the Board. Lucas puts it very simply: “What I support is creative thinking.”

By launching a $50 million campaign to secure the longterm sustainability of Montalvo Arts Center, the two visionary women are intent on creating a future that will ensure many more generations can encounter the arts on their own terms.

A woman of her word, Lucas and her husband Don have launched the fund with a $10 million gift, the single largest gift ever given to a South Bay arts organization, while Warmenhoven and husband Dan have pledged $5 million. In addition to the $15 million lead gifts, the campaign is supported by a $500,000 grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation to fund operating expenses of the campaign.

Both women have established a strong tradition of giving to the arts in the South Bay. Warmenhoven has supported dozens of nonprofits in Silicon Valley, includ-

CHA RM A I NE WA R M E NH OV E N

S ALLY L UCAS

Educators at Hear t

“IF THE FABRIC OF A COMMUNITY IS TO BE STRONG, THEN WE NEED TO DO A BETTER JOB OF EXPLAINING WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO SUPPORT GROUPS THAT ARE RIGHT HERE.” CHARMAINE WARMENHOVEN

When Sally Lucas first taught school, her classroom was chaos. When she graduated from San Jose State, any child with an IQ of 70 or better was included in mainstream classes. But thanks to an SJSU public school art class, Lucas realized that even in a class of 30, “you can engage the naughtiest, the most disinterested, the most hyperactive, the most unathletic—you can engage them into any subject through a creative process. I used to have people tell me that my classroom should be quieter. It seemed like chaos to the outsider but it worked.”

Charmaine Warmenhoven also spent 30 years as a special education teacher. “Back then, when I first started, they called it the ‘multi-sensory approach,’ which meant that you tried to teach children through different learning modalities, not just reading and writing.” Many of the kids that Warmenhoven worked with lacked reading and fine motor skills. As the daughter of a concert pianist and a childhood performer with the ballet, she drew on her artistic experience to teach children core concepts via music and movement.

Passing the Torch After realizing how instrumental the arts were in their own classrooms, Lucas and Warmenhoven became determined to include teacher training in the programs at Montalvo. When the arts curriculum standards first came out in California, Montalvo collaborated with the County Office of Education to develop annual teacher inservice dedicated to incorporating the arts into the curriculum. Lucas said the program is very well received. “The teachers are really hungry for that kind of in-service.”

Current State of the Ar ts Modern families in Silicon Valley have so many entertainment options available at the touch of a button. Even when attending live performances, patrons can often be found viewing their phone screens rather the looking directly at the performers in front of them. Consequently, arts groups face a distinct challenge in getting their message out to a generation that is more comfortable with their screens than a with stage or symphony hall.

“You have to take art out to the people,” says Lucas. “Its not automatic like when I was growing up. We automatically went to the Pasadena Playhouse, Hollywood Bowl, the symphony...You just didn’t have all these other things going on.”

Warmenhoven is well aware that the arts are just one of many alternatives people have for their entertainment. “But I think for us, it is a much more integral part of human being’s nature and culture—and we want to make sure it’s included in kids upbringing.”

That is why supporting Montalvo’s performing arts series for students is so important to both women. Children’s experiences at Montalvo teach them about drama, dance, and audience etiquette; they also serve as a means to get all members of the family excited about visiting.

“When the kids actually get here, they will be good ambassadors,”says Lucas. “Then they’ll go home and say—there’s this really great place, mom. We should go.”

Where in the World is Villa Montalvo?

A hundred years ago, Senator James Duval Phelan built a grand house in the hills of Saratoga. Since he bequeathed the villa and 175 surrounding acres to the people of California in 1930, Villa Montalvo has operated as an arts center. Somehow the property has managed to weather 82 years of economic downturns, earthquakes, and often neglected grounds. “We’re a little out of the way,” says Lucas. Admitting that the historic villa is not on everyone’s radar, part of the challenge of the campaign is to raise the profile of the center.

She and Warmenhoven are working to do so by emphasizing the range of offerings available at Montalvo every day of the week. Visitors can pack a picnic and come enjoy the grounds—all of the outdoor sculpture, gardens, and public hiking trails are open free of charge, 364 days a year. The upkeep of the house and five surrounding acres is considerable, but the Board of Trustees has always opted to keep access free to all.

“WHAT I SUPPORT IS CREATIVE THINKING.” S ALLY L UCAS

Creative Community Emulated by many, the Sally and Don Lucas Artist Residency Program at Montalvo Arts Center consists of ten studio cottages and a commons building where artists can live and work together. Since becoming the first woman president of the board at Montalvo in 1994, Lucas was instrumental in mounting the effort to build and design the facility. “When people ask me about it I try and explain it and I think about how complicated it is. When we were starting, it just seemed so simple. Invite artists to come and we’ll have them stay.”

The initial price tag for each artist residence was to be $50,000. But, as Warmenhoven explains, that was before the planners realized they were building atop an earthquake fault. “When you look at the cottages they are beautiful, and it was really an inspired idea to match an architect with an artist to design each one. But what you don’t see is all of the stuff under the ground that was required because of the earthquake fault.”

So, with the help of considerably more donors, the ten LEED certified, discipline-specific studios opened in 2004. “When the rest of the city or town falls down, come right up here,” says Lucas. Hosting 60 invited artists each year, the program is also the first of its kind to include a year-long fellowship for a culinary artist. These artists are fully integrated into the artistic community of the Residency program. Says Lucas, “the intellectual experience is a great pleasure for them. They always hate to leave.”

Giving in Silicon Valley When it comes to individual and corporate donations, it is often said that the big money stops at Stanford. It isn’t that Silicon Valley tech companies are not philanthropic, but more people tend to invest in their alma maters or hospitals. When Warmenhoven comes knocking on doors at tech leaders like Apple and Cisco, she finds them less than responsive. “They think of the arts as something else not as an integral part of life. They think of it as pictures on the wall.”

On the East Coast, there is an established tradition of support for the arts. Companies give “because their grandfather and their grandfather before them supported the symphony,” says Warmenhoven. “We don’t have that here.” She feels that more wealth will be invested back into the community after multiple generations have grown up here.

The arts have proved a hard sell for the two fundraisers. “All of us, the arts groups specifically, need to do a better job in articulating what is important to support the local groups,” says Warmenhoven. Where would companies like Apple be without design and creativity? Even Facebook needs a logo.

“The companies that I talk with say ‘I am a global company—so I support all over the world.’ Great, but they are part of a community.

If the fabric of a community is to be strong, then we need to do a better job of explaining why it is important to support groups that are right here.”

Look out Tim Cook and Mark Zuckerberg. Get that checkbook ready, Jerry Yang. Sally Lucas and Charmaine Warmenhoven are coming to convince you to fund the arts right here at home, and it’s difficult to imagine anyone whose mind these two powerful women can’t change.

montalvoarts.org 408.961.5800

twitter: @ montalvoarts facebook: montalvoarts

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Montalvo Arts Center Lucas Artists Residency Program

Written by Jonny Keshishoglou Photography by daniel garcia

The Montalvo Arts Center, besides being a beatuiful local park,

is home to a number of artists from all over the world.

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he Lucas Residency Program is a multidisciplinary artist residency program that continues Montalvo’s 75-year tradition of hosting artists in the heart of Silicon Valley. From local cities like Saratoga and Los Gatos to much farther places like New Zealand and Australia, the program hosts painters, sculptors, dancers, writers, filmmakers, and architects all at emerging phases of their careers.

The residency space, built in 2004, was specially designed for artists with the help of the artists. During the building and planning, architects collaborated with the program residents, resulting in unique live/ work spaces for ten different discipline-specific studios. The end result is a community where the artists can feel free to explore their creative mediums while building relationships with other residents as well as the public.

Since Montalvo is a public park, the artists have opportunities to engage with some of the 200,000 people who pass through the property every year. The artists often display their work to the public, such as the Final Friday program (which is the last Friday of every month), and they frequently partner with local organizations and schools, such as the San Jose Museum of Art, Stanford, or San Jose State.

A current project of the Lucas Residency Program involves providing local public schools with teaching artists. Montalvo had a number of teaching artists in residence from 2007 to 2010, and they’re now offering elementary schools in the Campbell Union School District the opportunity to have artists visit classrooms and teach the students.

One of the many unique feature to the LRP is a culinary fellow which provides the chef not only time to create, but to also bring the artists together several times a week at the dinner table. Around the meal, relationships are forged, collaborations begin, and creativity flourishes.

In the next few pages, you’ll find a cross section of the artists that were a part of the LRP during the Summer of 2013.

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Four of the ten live/work artist studios.

Shelly Silver

Medium: Movie Image, Film, Photography and Video Installations.

Home: New York, New York.

Shelly has been working on a video project to understand why people live here and why they have moved to the Bay Area. Thinking of herself as an “alien” or outside observer, dropped into our community, Silver remarked, “everyone here says they are an entrepreneur.” shellysilver.com 5lessonsmovie.com

Revista Bostezo Medium: Journalism and Education Home: Valencia, Spain (Left to Right)

David Barberá

Associate Editor of Bostezo since 2008 and Assistant Professor at INGENIO (CSIC-UPV, Valencia, Spain). Barberáis interviewing Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and artists as part of his academic research on failure.

Itziar Castelló

Castelló is Associate Editor at Bostezo, Assistant Professor at Carlos III University (Madrid, Spain) and researcher at the Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility at Copenhagen Business School. Castelló and Barberá are also conducting research at SCANCOR at Stadnford during thier stay at Montalvo Arts Center.

Francisco (Paco) Inclán

Inclán is a writer, journalist, activist, and Managing Editor of Bostezo. As part of a coming issue of Bostezo on failure, Inclán is interviewing and doing research in the Bay area to better understand how people learn, handle and overcome failure. revistabostezo.com twitter:@revistabostezo facebook: revistabostezo.com

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Tiffany Singh

Medium: Participator Based Installations Home: Auckland, New Zealand Singh has been working on a project called “Bells of Mindfulness”which focuses on the calming of the mind in our western business culture. Stringing 1,000 bells and colorful hand (?paper instead of hand?) cranes, Singh asks participants to listen to a bell that “speaks to them” and then transplant it to a place they find sacred; then send an audio file to Singh explaining the location and reason for the placement there.

Through this we can all track with Singh and learn what our community finds sacred. tiffanysingh.com Tiffanysinghcurrent.tumblr.com facebook: tiffanysinghsart Follow the Bell’s journey: bit.ly/Bells_Journey

sally AShton

Medium: Writing, Poetry, Education and Editoring Home: San Jose, California Ashton has been diving into a manuscript that had to be put on the back burner while serving as the Poet Laureate of Santa Clara Country. In addition, she is working on a journey project and a few poems. She describes her time at Montalvo after a few days as being “like a hundred years and it feels like three days... the time warp is a strange river of experience.” poetryonastick.blogspot.com dmqreview.com

Enna chaton

Medium: Photography and Education Home: France Chaton’s primary question is about the politics and social aspects of the human body, specifically about nudity. “Without clothes, we are all the same. Maybe not our shape and physicality, but when you are nude there is no idea of rich or poor and other social classes.

We are equal.” Chaton places in her photos different elements and props from sthe urroundings that relate to the subjects and demonstrate a sense of place, but also the contrast of human and non human. ennachaton.canalblog.com

Andrea Blum

Medium: Culinary, Journalism and Photography Home: USA Andrea Blum is not only the person to set the tone and table for the meals and conversations, she is a reporter, journalist, photographer and entrepreneur.

With many interests and talents, Blum has also founded My American Pantry, an Interactive marketplace of American Food and Drink, as well as working on a cook book while cooking for the residents. Blum is working on aerial photographs connecting American food, the artisans, and the land. andrea-blum.com myamericanpantry.com facebook: myamericanpantry

brother grand Story and Photography by

Victoria Felicity

“It is a big family in San Jose, especially in the arts community.”

-Benjamin Henderson

For Benjamin Henderson and Endika Currier, even a hurricane can’t stop them from making music.

The artistic flare of Brother Grand is all around San Jose.

Benjamin Henderson’s unmistakable powerhouse vocals can often be heard in local San Jose music venues, either collaborating with other local artists or performing with The Good Hustle. The slap bass compositions created by Endika Currier are recognized across the Bay Area music community as well, most recently as part of the local band Panthelion. It was while caught in the havoc of Hurricane Sandy, when the experimental musicians were touring on the East Coast, that Brother Grand was born.

How did you two meet?

Benjamin: My first memory of Endika was playing cello for the Mumlers at Streetlight Records here in San Jose in 2006. I remember watching him, thinking “Mumlers picked up a cellist too? They have a small chamber orchestra in their band, they are unstoppable. That is just unfair.” Then I heard about one of his side projects, Panthelion. I saw them play one New Year’s Eve. A mutual friend of ours put together a show at San Pedro Square Market where I opened up for Panthelion...that is when the bond was formed.

Endika: We also did some The Good Hustle lineups and M dot Strange over at the Art Ark doing weird shit. We have basically been doing Weird shit after that.

mentally. Most of my good friends say they will never pull me away from San Jose. I love being here. I love our neighboring cities too, for me it’s very special. I have so many friends that as years go by, they are putting on events and running business and it’s neat. It is a big family in San Jose, especially in the arts community. It’s good for me.

What’s next?

Benjamin: Lots of good things. We are continuing to do shows, make videos...It is fun to be excited about what you are doing.

What made you guys decide to do something together?

Endika: We are at this stage where we are planning on releasing material exclusively at shows. Which is a little retro, but with all the content on the internet it just seems so overwrought with content. It’s noisy; it is almost the same as not having anything at all.

Benjamin: Probably my solo shows. When I would [play] bigger shows, I would often build a band to accompany me at the shows, and I don’t know how Endika was convinced to get on those shows with me...

We wanted to record it live and have us both be playing and not doing anything overdubbed. We recorded at this place called The Burning Room and we basically recorded a live show, choosing not to have an audience.

Endika: I think you paid me...

Benjamin: It would have changed things if we had people there. It would have changed the way we played.

Benjamin: Yeah, then we started playing together and I don’t know, that’s how it happened.

What is your best tour story so far?

Endika: We were opening for a tour on the East Coast during Hurricane Sandy. We were on stage and their power got fucked up. We are on stage at The Bowery Ballroom in New York, and some weird power surge hits the stage. My loop station has a stroke...Ben breaks a string and we are mid song. We just went with it and it was dope. People knew that the shit was hitting the fan...

Benjamin: ...but we saved it.

Endika: We did, and we make a lot of mistakes and we are good at making them sound good.

What took you guys to the East Coast?

Benjamin: Dredg, a rock band out of Los Gatos, originally. They reached out to me and asked if I wanted to open up on these East Coast tours. I was having lunch with Endika and he was down to go. That’s kinda how Brother Grand started...we performed all these shows and songs together as a duo and it just worked, and the audience really vibed on it. So we thought, ‘this is really cool, we can just hop on an airplane.’ Everything that we need can fit in our checked in luggage. it was neat that we can deliver the kind of performance we do and have it be so portable.

Endika: Except for my big bass.

What has been your experience with the San Jose community?

Benjamin: I don’t have to go search for work in San Jose...it’s a struggle trying to juggle art and music. I have gone back and forth on my hometown a lot, mostly

Endika: It is weird, the difference between being in the studio and being on stage. On stage people take away your energy that you put out and they put back into you.

Whereas in the studio, there is this potential energy that exists on the other side of the finished experience which is not being pumped back into you. So, it is almost like if you can feel good about the experience with those microphones it’s like for sure it will translate.

What do you want people to take away when they listen to Brother Grand?

Benjamin: I just hope people think that when I get up there and do my thing, that I come from a genuine and heartfelt place and that I really want to be there. My main goal is just to be energetic and effect people one way or the other during our show, hopefully a lot. I don’t expect them to understand exactly what I went through. I just want it to be a very intense and captivating performance.

Endika: I don’t think there is a lot of control in what we do.

Benjamin: I think its fun, I think we are lucky. I feel like we can get up there on stage and our main goal is to feel it ourselves. If we are not into it, I can’t expect anyone else to be into it. I just want to get up there and have a lot of fun, I want to give an emotive, provocative experience to the listeners so that they feel that it is worth leaving the house, or sharing it with a friend, or hitting repeat on your stereo...all those things that made it special when we were growing up.

What would your Desert Island Disc be?

Benjamin: Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd, or Metallica’s Metallica.

Endika: Bob Marley, Legend. We are on an island right? facebook: BrotherGrand

a little m o r f p l e h our friends

Written by jon Havens Photography by daniel garcia

Jon Havens plays guitar and occasionally sings for Hurricane Roses.

We asked the former Content Magazine contributor to give us a look into the making of their new album.

h

elp. Why is this word so difficult to say? Is it our society that tells us that we must do it alone? Or is there an innate feeling inside each of us that shrugs off this need to seek assistance? Whatever the reason, the word “help” often remains foreign to us.

Perhaps it is a pride in us that wants to tread this path alone. And yet some of the greatest art ever produced has come about because someone decided that it is best to have more than two pairs of hands and eyes to create.

Whether it is a book editor, a film team, or the opening of a new store, like-minded folks can produce great things. In Hurricane Roses, we saw this come to fruition in a tremendous way.

As we sat down to figure out how to record this album, we came to the realization that in order to record an album with no barriers, exactly how we wanted, we would need a lot of money. With families to provide for and immediacy in our minds, we knew that this was not something that we could do on our own.

We decided to see if people would get behind our vision. It was a huge risk. We believe strongly in the artistic community of the Bay Area and wanted our dream to stretch beyond our band. As a result, we partnered with local artists to create some incentives that people would really enjoy. This project was no longer just about making the best record we could: it became about local artists in general. By buying our record, people would be supporting local filmmakers, graphic designers, tattoo artists, and local businesses.

Our band formed out of the dreams and journals of our singer, Angi Lemucchi. For years, she had quietly crafted episodes of her life into songs. These songs were intimate and personal, offering the listener a glimpse into her life.

Taking these songs anywhere else but her own bedroom would be to draw upon courage that she knew was deep inside her. But in order to give them the life that they needed she could not do it alone.

We created an Indiegogo campaign and set a lofty goal of $10,000. This would allow us the freedom to make the best record we could and the chance to have our album mixed in Los Angeles by Brad Wood (who has worked with Pete Yorn, Smashing Pumpkins, and Sunny Day Real Estate). The stage was set and we were ready.

Over the next few months, a group of five dashing gentlemen (yes, dashing) took the songs that Angi had crafted and helped make them into what they are today.

What started out as a demo of a few songs slowly turned into a yearlong recording project that became Hurricane Rose’s first album. Over the course of that year, her story slowly became our story (see our video for “Sophia”). We learned to cooperate, to share ideas, to put aside differences and listen to one another. Slowly, this group of individuals with very different musical backgrounds grew into a group of very close friends that shared a similar idea: to make music that speaks. We released our debut album in the winter of 2011. But we wanted more.

But within a few weeks of our campaign, our dream looked like it was fading. With just a week left we were only about halfway to our goal. Doubt crept in. Did people care about this project? Would we have to make an album that cut corners and wasn’t what we had hoped?

Does the music we are creating matter?

And as often happens, people surprise you in beautiful ways.

At 7:00pm on the final day of our campaign, we reached our goal. And it is because of people who believe in music, who believe in art, who believe in a group of people who have careers, families, and kids of their own reached out to help us. It is because of our supportive community that a dream originally started in a journal has become what it is today. This is the best gift that any community can offer to its people: a chance to think big and explore the possibilities.

After a string of Bay Area shows, we set aside the winter of 2012 to write a new album. This would allow us the time to give these songs the attention that they needed.

Winter became spring. Spring became summer. Summer turned into fall. Week after week, we would travel out to south San Jose to create music together. Angi would arrive by train from San Francisco. The songs were written in collaboration and we helped each other discover new ways to express ourselves through music.

By the start of 2013, we had thirteen new songs that we were more proud of than anything we have ever done before.

hurricaneroses.com

facebook: hurricanerosesband twitter: @hurricaneroset

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blackford hill Sam & Sara’s road to Nashville Interview courtesy of

Chris Jackson, Mix106 DJ Photography by amy froese

A few years ago Sam Talbert and Sara Oromchi began packing the cafeteria during Branham High School’s “Acoustic Night” with attendance surpassing all sporting events. CBS 5 picked up the story as Sara would later go on to join the first season of The Voice. Since that time, Blackford Hill has been playing to packed crowds and clubs and venues around the South Bay and drawing the attention of industry folks in Nashville.

Sara… what was it like being on Blake Shelton’s team on The Voice?

Sara, when you’re writing songs: what are you keeping in mind… personal experiences?

Blackford Hill (Sara): It was really cool. Since it was the first season none of us really knew what to expect. So when we got to sit down and actually meet with Blake and see what everything is about, I felt really comfortable being on his team, and I actually felt very lucky to have been chosen by him.

Sara: Its different every time. But a lot of times its my personal experiences so that anyone who’s listening and has been through the same thing can relate. That what is most rewarding for me in writing songs.

Sam, can you talk about the Blackford Hill songwriting process between you and Sara?

What’s the history of Blackford Hill?

Sam: It’s interesting… sometimes Sara will come to me with an idea for a song, other times we’ll just being playing around musically… I’ll throw down some kind of groovy guitar riff and she’ll just start humming along, the next thing you know we’re finishing up a song.

Sam: We started singing together in musical theater back when we were 13 years old. We were in the production of Annie Get Your Gun, and both had lead roles in Babes in Arms. We’ve been singing together for a long time.

Tell us about Blackford Hill in Nashville.

Sara: Then we started singing together again in acoustic guitar class our senior year at Branham High School. We were paired in Mrs. Wyant’s class accidentally… and the songs we came up with were pretty amazing.

Sam: We spent a weekend in Nashville opening for a band called Something Distant out of Jacksonville FL. It was a good time. We got to play at some historic venues on the famous Nashville strip in downtown. We played shows at Rippys and at Tootsies. We had a fun time.

Sam: We knew we had chemistry back then and we just kept writing songs together and performing them at the schools acoustic nights.

We’re going back to Nashville to record at ZodLounge in the Fall. We are really excited about spending some time there writing and record for a full album to be ready the first part of 2014.

How did you came up with the name?

Sara: There’s a hill in Scotland called Blackford Hill, and we loved the name and have a dream of doing a show there one day.

Sam: Blackford Hill live in concert on Blackford Hill!!

blackfordhillmusic.com

twitter: @lackfordhillmusic facebook: blackfordhill

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Picks by Local Mohammad Gorjestani PicksPicks

by Susannah “The princess”

by LocalGreenwood, Mohammad Gorjestani

local

street cred

Susannah Greenwood

In the third grade, I got 18 kids to give up their recess for a month to be in a play I co-wrote, directed, and starred in. I also convinced the teachers to paint a set for it and allow us to perform it at the school for our parents.

Hometown Born at Stanford, I grew up in Palo Alto until my quick four-year break for college (in Ohio), where I discovered the Bay Area had it all and had it best. I was back directly after graduation and haven’t strayed from the Silicon Valley since.

During the last twelve years I’ve lived in South, East, and (for the last six years) downtown San Jose. I love the energy and potential that San Jose has and I’m particularly excited to see all the growth and change happening right now.

Day Job Online Content Manager and Social Media Princess for Team San Jose for the last two years. I’m in charge of the website, all social media, online tools, microsites and the general viral and online marketing of San Jose.

Night Job I can be seen backstage directing local community theatre, acting on stage occasionally, and a couple of plays have even been produced by me. I’m also an avid audience member and I write reviews for my blog. As the owner of two, threelegged cats, I can occasionally be found volunteering for Maine Coon Adoption Cat Rescue. I make whimsical custom hats and am on the advisory board for Happy Hollow Park and Zoo.

Today, I see approximately 150 live performances a year in the South Bay and the Peninsula simply because I can. I’ve done just about every job in the theatre including directing, writing, sound lighting/set/props design, producing, stage managing, reviewing, and acting, so I clearly have a passion and addiction for the performing arts and a background to appreciate some of the more invisible aspects of them. I was a Drama and English major at Kenyon College, if street cred includes paper creds in Latin. I spent eight years as the Princess of Artsopolis, getting paid to help market the local arts scene. Princess is still on my business card.

Contact: Arts Reviews: artsalot.wordpress.com twitter: @Artsalot facebook: Artsalot Custom Hats: Etsy.com/shop/ChimericMillinery twitter: @CMNogginToppers facebook: ChimericMillinery

Team San Jose: sanjose.org

twitter: @TeamSanJose facebook: TeamSanJose

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With a city as big as San Jose, even the most savvy insiders need a local’s advice every now and then.

With a city as big as San Jose, even the most savvy insiders need a local’s advice every now and then.

A. The Class Act

D. The Whole Enchilada

H. The Natural

The California Theatre 345 S. 1st St. San Jose, CA 95113

Mexican Heritage Theatre 1700 Alum Rock Plaza San Jose, CA 95116

Sanborn County Park 16055 Sanborn Rd. Saratoga, CA 95070

With 500 seats and not a single one of them bad, The Mexican Heritage Theatre really is one of the best designed, gorgeous, state-of-the-art facilities around and the groups that use it know how to capitalize on its awesomeness.

The fresh air, the babbling brook, the billions of visible stars and no cell reception make the winding drive and small hike to this venue well worth it.

Shady Shakespeare builds an intimate stage each year amongst the towering trees and once you experience it, you’ll be hooked on the au naturale experience.

Tip: Throw down the extra bucks for the Royal Seating; this venue does VIP wicked good.

sanjosetheaters.org/theaters/californiatheatre

Do you believe that your arts experience starts from the moment you arrive at the venue? The California Theatre certainly does. From the time you reach the marquee, you’re already transported back in time. Romance and nostalgia radiate from every inch of the Art Deco structure and the surprisingly top-notch acoustics make it even more majestic. Get the good dress and tie out for this venue; it makes any time you attend a special occasion.

mhcviva.org

E. The Transformer Olinder Theatre 848 E. William St. San Jose, CA 95116

northsidetheatre.com

B. The Hidden Gem Le Petit Trianon 72 N. 5th St. San Jose, CA 95112 trianontheatre.com

A slice of Versailles in San Jose! It’s a quaint 348-seat concert hall across from City Hall, but the acoustics are so well suited to classical music, you can feel each note resonate.

c. The Quintessential San Jose Repertory Theatre 101 Paseo de San Antonio San Jose, CA 95113 sjrep.com

It might be an obvious choice, but not as obvious is the fact that the front row of the balcony is fantastic. I sit there every chance I get. This venue is also my favorite when it comes to technical geekery. Their technical crew and design teams are uber creative and I always find something techie to drool over here.

You don’t expect much rocking up to this theatre on the campus of an elementary school /community center, but once inside the 80 seat black box, the expert sets transform the interior and set you up for some great live performances. For 34 years, Northside Theatre Company has called this venue home, proving you can’t judge a theater by its exterior.

F. The Swankiest The Theatre On San Pedro Square 29 N. San Pedro Square San Jose, CA 95110 tabardtheatre.org

Hands down (or butts down?) the most comfortable seats in San Jose. Add in a full bar in the back at your disposal, and you’re ready to relax and enjoy everything from theatre to jazz to stand-up comedy.

g. The Happy Ending Hicklebee’s 1378 Lincoln Ave. San Jose, CA 95125 hicklebees.com

One of the best combatants against the effects of digital overdose and age is attending a story time, author visit, or other literary event at this sweet and colorful book hub. The benefits of watching children get excited about books is almost as therapeutic as the stories themselves. Your inner child will thank you for making some time to visit this Willow Glen staple.

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shadyshakes.org

I. The Exotic Morocco’s Restaurant 973 Castro St. Mountain View, CA 94041 moroccosrestaurant.com

I was devastated when Morocco’s left San Jose, but the Mountain View restaurant is holding up the tradition of promoting every type of performing art possible while serving up brilliant food. Belly dance, Flamenco, jazz, magic, even dinner theater fill the warm glowing space almost nightly. The exotic ambiance takes you across the globe and the entertainment and food are only matched by the impeccable hospitality.

J. The Bigger Picture Everywhere San Jose, CA Life IS Art and the creative community is performing everywhere 24/7. Pick a corner, café, plaza, hotel lobby, or park and watch the drama and the comedy unfold. Sometimes my favorite venue for experiencing is the one that isn’t intentional. The one not advertised, ticketed or planned. Each of us has the best seat in the house for what’s happening in our city.

Contributors The production of Content Magazine would not be possible without the talented writers, editors, graphic artists, and photographers who contribute to each issue. We thank you and are proud to provide a publication to display your work. We are also thankful for the sponsors and readers who have supported this magazine through advertisements and subscriptions.

SHANE HAGERTY Shane is a graphic designer and film photographer living in San Jose. His passion for design and photography developed as a kid along side his love of skateboarding and snowboarding. He later earned his BA in Design Studies from San José State University. Shane also enjoys vinyl records and living in California, a place that inspires him everyday. shanehagerty.com

DIANE SOLOMON Diane produces and hosts a weekly public affairs program on Radio KKUP, 91.5 fm, and writes freelance for Content, Atom Magazine, De-Bug and Metro, Silicon Valley’s Weekly Newspaper. She’s also a big time San Jose BikePartier, Willow Glen neighborhoodie and Silicon Valley wage slave.

LESLIE GRIFFY Leslie Griffy is an award-winning journalist who has written about Northern California and the Central Coast for more than a decade. She loves good stories, data and hockey. She’s most often out and about San Jose collecting sound, public documents and stories as an independent journalist.

AMY FROESE Amy, born and raised in San Jose, California is a wife and a mother of two beautiful girls and a soon-to-be-little boy. She is the owner of Two:Ten Photography. Her photography is all inspired by family, love, and even music.

TwoTenPhotography.com

MARK HANEY Mark was born and raised in neighboring Santa Clara. During his time at SJSU, he became enamored with San Jose and its urban potential. He moved into the downtown area with his wife and blogs focusing on improving architecture, supporting local business and art. He is convinced that downtown is changing for the better and is intent on changing people’s perspectives of the area. thinkbiggersanjose.blog.com

JONNY KESHISHOGLOU Jonny is a writer and undergraduate student at New York University, although he grew up in the general Campbell/Los Gatos area. Back in New York, he’s on the editorial staff of his school’s student-run newspaper. He is also an avid trumpet player and has taught himself some basic piano. nyunews.com/author/jonathan-keshishoglou

EVALYN DICKERSON Evalyn grew up in San Jose and went to Branham high school. She is entering her senior at Biola University majoring in Art with a focus in Graphic Design. She has always been inspired and drawn to magazines and their layouts. She loves fashion, traveling and Instagram.

KATHRYN HUNT Kate is a freelance writer based in the Bay Area. She has a passion for sharing people’s stories and eating pie. When she isn’t writing, she’s yelling at the TV during Giants games, spending time with her beautiful wife, and cuddling with her dog until it’s awkward. @kathrynhunts kathrynhunts.pressfolios.com

Want to be a part of the Content magazne community?

Contact us at: editor@content-magazine.com

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