Elana Mann and Las Fotos Project
Elana Mann and Las Fotos will be creating a custom photo booth where audience members can amplify their own thoughts on gender and equality.
Elana Mann (b. 1980, Boston, MA) creates artwork that brings a greater consciousness to the listening and speaking we practice in everyday life with the goal of building equanimity in ourselves and increasing equity in our world.
Recently, Mann has been creating a series of sculptural instruments for protest and performance. She co-edited, with John Burtle, the 2018 performance score anthology "Propositional Attitudes: What do we do now?", published by Golden Spike Press. She was named a 2017-2018 Cultural Trailblazer by the City of Los Angeles and is currently the ceramics artist-in-residence at Pitzer College.
Mann has presented her work in museums, galleries, city parks and buses in the U.S, China, Europe and Brazil. In addition, Mann curates, collaborates, organizes, and writes. She is the co-founder, with artist Robby Herbst, of the curatorial project Chats About Change. Since 2005 she has collaborated with artist Audrey Chan as Chan & Mann. Mann has produced six publications, and her writing has been published in the book In the Canyon, Revise the Canon, as well as periodicals including Afterall Journal, Art21, and The Journal of Aesthetics and Protest.
Mann received her B.F.A. with honors from Washington University in St. Louis, and her M.F.A from California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA. She lives in South Pasadena with her husband, designer Jean-Paul Leonard, and their son.
Las Fotos Project and Elana Mann will be creating a custom photo booth where audience members can amplify their own thoughts on gender and equality.
Las Fotos Project is a community-based nonprofit organization that inspires teenage girls through photography, mentorship, and self-expression. Offering year-round programming, we provide girls with access to professional cameras, quality instruction and workshops that encourage them to explore their identity, learn about new cultures, build leadership and advocacy skills, and strengthen their social and emotional well-being. Every year they mentor hundreds of girls from communities across Los Angeles.
Arts education fosters creativity, communication, critical thinking, and collaboration, skills needed to compete in a twenty-first century workforce. Studies affirm students who participate in the arts “develop the ability to innovate, communicate, and collaborate. Arts education in schools increases test scores across every subject area, lowers dropout rates and helps close the achievement gap regardless of socioeconomic status.” (California Alliance for Arts Education)
STUDENTS: Las Fotos Project students are teenage girls between the ages of 11-18, from low to middle-income households living in communities of color, who do not have access to photography equipment or art-based programs. Students are referred to Las Fotos Project by our partners and are identified by having an interest in photography or likely benefiting from our programs.