Activist/Artist/Filmmaker Eliaichi Kimaro is director of 9elephants productions, a company that uses art and video to bring stories of struggle, resistance and survival to a broader audience.
9elephants has produced over 80 videos for local and national non-profits working within underserved communities to address social and economic justice issues. Kimaro brings a lifetime of personal and professional experience exploring issues of culture, identity, race, class, and gender to her Award-winning directorial debut, A Lot Like You.
Kimaro has been on the campus/conference lecture circuit for the past 6 years, engaging with communities around the world about the issues raised in her film, including gender-based violence, cultural identity and the power of personal storytelling. These keynotes culminated in her TEDxSeattle talk last year, “Why the World Needs Your Story.”
Complete list of KEYNOTES/LECTURES.
ACTIVISM
From 2006-2011, Kimaro served as President of the Board at the NW Network of Bisexual, Trans, Lesbian and Gay Survivors of Abuse. Prior to joining the Board, she was on staff for 4 years as a crisis counselor and community organizer.
Kimaro also served on the Seattle Globalist Board of Directors, a daily online publication dedicated to elevating diverse voices through media. She is a Mentor with the Globalist Apprenticeship Program.
Kimaro was Vice President of Seattle Documentary Association, where she coordinated the Works-In-Progress program.
In addition, she has served on numerous art grant panels, film festival juries, museum exhibition planning committees, and advisory committees.
ART
Kimaro is a self-taught artist who will learn whatever medium it takes to tell the story that’s emerging.
She loves layered stories that breathe in and out of space and time, stories that span generations and continents. For 40 years, she has been exploring these narratives in her journals, then in her award-winning documentary A Lot Like You, then with her photography and music, and now in her encaustic mixed-media work.
In 2014, painting became her primary focus. Eliaichi was selected for Center on Contemporary Art’s Artist Residency in 2017. The following year, she was the recipient of the Artist Trust Fellowship and a scholarship from the International Encaustic Association. She has received multiple grants from CityArtist, 4Culture and Artist Trust for her work in art and film. In 2020, she was awarded the McMillen Foundation Arts Fellowship. And earlier this year, she was the recipient of the Chateau d’Orqueveaux International Artist in Residence in France.
Eliaichi is currently a member artist, and Vice President of the Executive Committee at Columbia City Gallery, member artist at the Center on Contemporary Art Gallery, and a juried artist of the City of Seattle’s Ethnic Artist Roster and the Art In Shops program.
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