Jakub Jerzy Kucharczyk

Jakub's light arc marks a westward trajectory: A star over the city Katowice, Poland, connects to an arc and arrow pointing to Chicago, where his family immigrated. In the Windy City Jakub was helpless to the gravity of artistic creation, so he studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and achieved his BFA. He began integrating community building with arts education through work with Chicago Public Schools, Gallery 37, and inner city after school programs. Jakub saw firsthand the need for alternative forms of education in the arts and thus became the E.D. at the Forum for Creative Study, an arts-based free school outside of Chicago. Concurrently, he honed his own artistic disciplines through apprenticeships with Morava Studios in Chicago and at Jim Anderson Stained Glass Studio in Boston. He voyaged to Portland to deepen his skill and expertise in the art glass field, a boost for his own arts “utility belt”, as an in-house stained glass artist with Savoy Studios. His dedication to open access arts education put him on a mission to manifest these potentials with community alliances, and he became a founder of SpaceCraft.

Laura Lazorski

Laura, who also answers to “The Bridge” and “Lazer Skillz,” brings keen organizational skills, sharpened in her work for two of Portland’s local nonprofits, JOIN and the Benefit Advocacy Coalition. She links experience, travels, and education into an innovative program designed to keep up with contemporary collaboration models and address challenges with team problem solving. Inspired by her time working with glass at Portland’s own Savoy Studios, she awaited the opportunity to bring communities who have never accessed the tools and instruction to create in glass together to learn from local artists. She is, in fact dedicated to building relationships between arts employment educators and people who struggle with standard employment trades. Outside of work she trains in aerial silks (a circus art) and kung fu, has a big ‘ole dog, and is hunting morels this weekend. She has a BA in English Literature from Kenyon College (’03.)

Matthew Allen Wooldridge

‘Neath a smoking aurora borealis o’er the Alaskan tundra during the fateful year 1984, Matthew Allen began. As he grew, he sought applied philosophies of inclusion and collaboration in all his studies, taking him abroad to West Africa and the Azores Islands, where his space flight literally crash-landed. He brought these cultural experiences and perspectives to his work at the Pacific Northwest College of Art, earning a B.F.A. While working with several local galleries, his Art and business savvy sparked a creative project firm in Portland, with collaboration philosophies as foundation. Matthew Allen Productions operates a project space called BOHEMIA where a multitude of artists, organizations, and businesses collaborate and put on community murals, metal pours, video productions, art installations, and performances. In 2010, he partnered with likeminded people working in local nonprofits, and together they formed and launched SpaceCraft.