Artist Detail

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April Edwards

Visual Artist

About the artist:

April Edwards has a 17 year career of producing indoor and outdoor events including concerts, festivals, conferences, residencies, fundraising galas, performances, outreach/education activities, gallery exhibits, graduation ceremonies, and lecture events. She has worked for universities and regional non-profit organizations presenting programs to audiences of up to 15,000 people. This includes managing all aspects of event production such as hiring operations staff, event staff, vendors, artists, consultants, lecturers, and providing leadership for programming committees. For most projects, she has also directed the production of marketing materials, video, web pages, and brochures. Ms. Edwards has served for 12 years as a grant review panelist for local, state and national organizations and has written and received grants and administered budgets ranging up to $500,000. In addition, she is active in sharing best practices and speaks at conferences and events in the areas of audience development, community outreach, event management, fundraising, and grant writing. Through her leadership she has brought groups together to dream and create successful events which fully utilize the talents of all involved. Ms. Edwards’ passion is the arts, implementing audience development projects targeting diverse communities, bridging communities, and building new leadership around her. Throughout her education and career, Ms. Edwards has sought out opportunities to be a part of and support cultural communities. This is due in part to her diverse experience growing up in Lagos, Nigeria; Aberdeen, Scotland; and Larned, Kansas. She uses the term Global Nomad* to express her sense of being a part of everything, yet being a part of nothing. In addition, Ms. Edwards is active as a visual artist. She describes her artwork as being representative of a universal memory and experience that each of us is connected to. She is concerned with depicting truth, lies, perceptions, reality, myths, traditions, and the spoken and unspoken that is propagated by society in the areas of nature, religion, advancement, diversity, and women. * Global Nomad” is a term coined by Norma McCaig. A global nomad is an individual who, spending a significant part of their developmental years in another culture, develops some sense of belonging to both the host culture and the home culture, while not having a sense of total ownership in either. Elements from both (or multiple) cultures are blended, resulting in the third culture.