Felia Salim
Felia Salim has 30 years of experience in the private and state owned companies. She is also a financial advisor in the banking and government sectors, and currently on the board of directors for EXIM Bank and senior advisor for Oliver Wyman Consultancy.
She is a passionate arts enthusiast, actively involved in the non-profit sector and is known both for her work as a supporter of the civil society movement in Indonesia, and as an activist in the promotion of societal arts as a means of balancing all aspects of society.
She is one of the founders of the Tifa Foundation, an organization that fights for an open society in Indonesia. She is also a member of the Partnership for Governance Reform; the Management Board of Transparency International Indonesia; the Forum for Corporate Governance in Indonesia; and sits in the initiative board for CLUA, &Green, and member of the Board of GAIN engaging in environmental sustainable development and health care.
As the co-founder of [ESAS], she is intimately involved in the promotion and production of all aspects of the organization programs, involving in community based projects promoting the value of art and creativity, as a means of identifying and alleviating problems in the lives of the people.
-2%20(1).jpg)
Inés Somellera
Born in Jalisco, Mexico, Inés Somellera is a theater maker; actress, director, producer, dramaturg, who has lived and worked outside of her country of origin for the past 20 years. From her earliest days, her life has always been linked to the fine arts and the performing arts.
From 1997 to 2003 she lived in New York, co-founding The South Wing Theater Company (TSW) with Kameron Steele and Ivana Catanese. She has collaborated with prominent artists and organizations, such as W a x F a c t o r y and Merce Cunningham Dance Company. She worked with director Robert Wilson as an actress, touring the world in his works; and, as part of Wilson's creative team at the Watermill Art Center, Robert Wilson's 21st-Century Academy.
In 2003, Ms. Somellera moved to Indonesia where she found a spirit similar to that of her native Mexico, and a life rich in the arts. Ms. Somellera has collaborated with various artists and projects in Indonesia, Singapore and Southeast Asia Region. Although a current focus of her work, however, is on [ESAS] Empu Sendok Arts Station, which provides an environment to nurture the new ideas/seeds of new projects in the arts and sciences; a space to develop works in process; and, a platform for the exchange of ideas between local and international artists. She believes in balance in life, expressed through her yoga practices. She currently teaches yoga in Jakarta.
Ines is the co-founder of [ESAS], bringing the art and well-being flare into the equation.
Rhoda Grauer
Rhoda Grauer is a producer, director and writer for theatre, television and radio. She developed programs of her own creation and produced works of international artists including: Mikhail Baryshnikov, Savion Glover, Gregory Hines, Jerome Robbins, Malavika Sarukkai, Twyla Tharp and Bando Tomasburo.
Her television programs including DANCING, an eight hour series on world dance; Baryshnikov by Tharp, Choreography by Jerome Robbins, Gregory Hines: Tap Dance in America, and more have been broadcast internationally. DANCING, and its companion book, have become the basis of university courses on world culture.
Her work has won support from the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities, Readers Digest Fund, the Ford, Rockefeller, Freeman, Japan and Hoso Bunka Foundations, the Corporation for the Public Broadcasting, Public Radio International, Asian Cultural Council and others. They have garnered awards including the Emmy and the Golden Globe of Montreux.
Ms. Grauer was Dean of the School of Visual and Performing Art at Long Island University, and has held executive positions with the Asia Society, WNET/Thirteen, American Ballet Theatre, National Endowment for the Arts, Twyla Tharp Dance and the Spoleto Festival, Italy.
In Indonesia she was dramaturg for the Robert Wilson production of I La Galigo, co-founded Yayasan Kelola, a service organization for the arts, directed documentary films, and conducted research for Ford Foundation, Jakarta. A New Yorker, she now lives permanently in Bali.
Mini Caire Obregón
Mini Caire Obregón is an Art Historian with a Masters Degree in Cultural Management and Promotion. Her involvement in the cultural scene began in 1984 when she became part of the team at Mexico City´s Festival del Centro Histórico.
In 1991 she became Director of International Programming at the Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico´s main opera house; in 1995 Programming Director at the National Center for the Arts; in 1996 she was asked to direct SIVAM, a private foundation dedicated to discovering, guiding, supporting and promoting Mexican artistic talent. This was achieved by organizing fundraising galas, with world renowned artists like Renata Scotto, Plácido Domingo and Rolando Villazón.
As of 2006 she became General Director of the Festival Internacional Cervantino, which is considered the most important festival in Latin America.In 2008 Mini was in charge of Artistic Programming for the festivities that celebrated Mexico´s Independence Bicentennial and Revolution Centennial which took place in 2010. From 2008 until 2012 she was also counsel to the Minister of Culture of the State of Campeche and to the Culture Director of the University of Veracruz.
Her activities in Mexico´s Culture Ministry, from 2012 until February 2017 included: Director of Fondo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes, General Coordinator of the National Cultural Plan and Director General of the Centro Cultural Helénico.With her own firm, Fabrica 56, S.A. de C.V. she works as an independent in different cultural projects, such as the organization of the artistic happening commemorating the beginning of the new Mexican government on December 1st 2018; as the representative of the Mexican Ministry of Culture for the organization of Mexico’s participation in “Lille3000”, among other interesting projects.
Helly Minarti
Helly works as an independent dance curator and scholar. A native Jakartan, she just relocated to Yogyakarta in November 2018, planning to set out her venture, LINGKARAN | koreografi, designed to be a collaborative choreographic research platform. She trained in journalism (BA from University of Indonesia and MA in International Journalism from City University) and dance studies (Ph.D from University of Roehampton) - the last two in London, UK.
She contributed writings on arts and culture to various publications from 1997-2008 (among them The Jakarta Post, the then Singapore-based Art Magazine, the London-based International Art Magazine, and Dewi magazine). She shortly edited for djakarta! magazine before taking up the post Head of Arts of the British Council Indonesia (2001- 2003). This marked the advent of her curatorial journey even before she understood what it actually entails. In between, she reported on dance events and was trusted to do some dance projects, mainly commissioned by Goethe-Institut Indonesia, including to be the project manager of the first performance of Sasha Waltz & Guests in Jakarta.
In 2004, she co-curated her first international curatorial programme, the 2nd Asia Europe Dance Forum titled Eurasia: Mis/Understanding, with Bettina Masuch of then Hebbel am Ufer Theater in Berlin, a project commissioned by the Asia Europe Foundation. She also co-curated the first Asia Windows Series of the Asia Cultural Center in Gwangju in 2015. She co-curated three editions of Indonesian Dance Festival (IDF) in 2014, 2016 and 2018; and co-initiated a platform in forms of traveling festival, Jejak Tabi 旅 Exchange: Wandering Asian Performances in 2018. Helly is a recipient of several international research awards that took her to live in Beijing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong (in total for a year) and New York (in total for 10 months).
As a scholar, she co-convened an international conference in 2008 and presented papers in several international conferences since 2005. She intends to combine her curatorial and scholarly practices by experimenting with groundbreaking projects that instill critical thinking in producing shared knowledge. Whilst delving into a deepened practice of yoga and trying to understand herself through the lens of syurveda, she also develops new passion on gardening, is a budding Lao Tzuian taoist and very much intrigued with the idea of forest bathing.
