Artist-in-Residence Archive:
Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI)

Spring 2007-Fall 2008 - Judith Williams Sandoval

Judith Williams Sandoval is Celtic, has a J.D. and has been a community organizer since the 1950s. Presently, Judith is a community photographer who received the gift of magic from her mother and the gift of war from her father. Armed with the gifts, Judith seeks untold stories, stories in the shadows, stories hidden by the walls of urban penumbras and portrays them through photography. Ultimately, she gives back the gift-of-stories as an offering to the storytellers.

Judith created the PhotoStory Project at St. Anthony Foundation, one of OLLI's partners, to gather stories from and shoot photographs of people walking the diverse paths to the crossroads at St. Anthony in the Tenderloin. These stories come from the heart and ultimately create a community that the storytellers will share in an exhibit at St. Anthony in June.

Past Artists in Residence have included: Judith Ehrlich (media artist), Cyra McFadden (writing), Marcia Lieberman (photography), Ed Kashi (photography), Joan Holden (playwriting) and Dan Chumley (directing). OLLI’s residencies have inspired the formation of ongoing creative projects, like Geezer Theater.

OLLI Artist-in-Residence, 2007-2008

Judith Ehrlich
Wartime, Our Times

Judith Ehrlich is an award-winning media artist who works in film, video, and radio.

Her recent film, “The Good War and Those Who Refused to Fight It” tells the story of conscientious objectors to WWII and was funded by ITVS and aired on PBS.

Judith’s residency will explore the themes of war, conflict, memory, conscience and civil liberties. At OLLI and with community partners, she will teach courses on how our culture through media communicates the narrative of current and past wars. These educational courses will plumb questions of ethics, values and the social responsibility of understanding the cost of war, economically, socially, and individually.

The residency also includes a series of courses to evoke personal stories of war and wartime, linking generations of people as well as other experiences as veterans and non-veterans, anti-war activists, and conscientious objectors, or immigrants who have sought sanctuary in the US from countries torn by war. In this part of the residency, Judith and OLLI members will work with community partners such as St. Anthony Foundation and Gateway High School.

Working with KALW 91.7FM, the culmination of the residency will be a radio documentary.

To become involved in Wartime, Our Times, please contact us at 415.817.4270.

“Whether you are a veteran of World War II or Korea or you resisted or fought in the Vietnam War, you have stories to tell about your time in wartime. A generation is coming of age once again during a controversial war, how does their experience compare to yours? What can elders share with those new to the reality of war? How does war impact our society at its core? What can we learn about war from films and radio programs that explore the subject? What can those with decades of perspective teach the newcomers to a world at war?”
-Judith Ehrlich

Dan Chumley and Joan Holden
OLLI Artist-in-Residence
2005-2006

For 2005-2006, our artists-in-residence are Joan Holden and Dan Chumley, longtime members of the Tony Award-winning San Francisco Mime Troupe (SFMT), the nation's finest political comedy company which offers an annual summer season in Bay Area parks. Using the creative method they developed at SFMT, Holden and Chumley will collaborate with OLLI members to create social comedies that reflect the lives and concerns of older adults. Aging will be a subplot as critical issues of the day get satiric treatment.

Joan Holden was the principal playwright for the SFMT from 1967-2000, creating, as author or head writer, a satire a year. Since the 1980's she has enjoyed a parallel career as a translator and adaptor of comedies for ACT, Berkeley Rep, and the Intiman theater (Seattle). Her recent adaptation of Barbara Ehrenreich's best seller, Nickel and Dimed, has run at eight repertory theaters in the US and Europe since 2002. She has received many awards—Bay Area Critic's Circle, Dramalogue, LA Critic's Circle, and Media Alliance's Golden Gadfly.

Dan Chumley was a junior at Harvard when he joined the SFMT in 1967, then on tour with an anti-Vietnam war satire. For 33 years he was an actor, principal director and company manager for SFMT. With a long history of teaching and collaborating, Chumley now spends three months a year in Asia, creating dramatic work in Hong Kong, Taiwan, the Philippines and parts of China.

Geezer Theater

Holden and Chumley's work has resulted in the founding of Geezer Theater, an ongoingensemble of OLLI actors. This year Geezer Theater premiered its first original play, "Subversion at Sunset Acres", an hour-long farce on the current administration's foibles.

For more information on this play and other Geezer Theater activities and opportunities, please contact Juanita Rusev. Also a video documentary called, "The Making of Geezer Theater" is available by contacting Martin Marshall.

Past Artists-in-Residence have included writer Cyra McFadden (2003-2004), photographers Marcia Lieberman (2003) and Ed Kashi (2004). McFadden wrote ten episodes from Phoebe’s life and musing as a 60+ year old in the Bay Area for the OLLI newsletter. The images of photographers Marcia Lieberman (2003) and Ed Kashi (2004) were displayed in OLLI programs. Each artist meets with OLLI members to talk about their work.

Ed Kashi
OLLI Artist-in-Residence
2004-2005

This year's OLLI artist-in-residence is San Francisco photographer, Ed Kashi. His photographs are featured in the book, film, and MSNBC online series Aging in America: The Years Ahead. He is a regular contributor to National Geographic, The New York Times Magazine, Time, Newsweek, Vanity Fair, Fortune, Geo, LIFE, Smithsonian, and U.S. News & World Report, among others. Kashi's work has won awards from the National Press Club, Pictures of the Year, Sunday Magazine Awards, World Press Foundation, and the World Affairs Council.

As artist-in-residence, Kashi's photography is featured in our promotional and educational materials.

Cyra McFadden
OLLI Artist-in-Residence
Spring 2004

Cyra McFadden is a journalist and writer who lives in the Bay Area. Her books include, The Serial:  A Year in the Life of Marin County and Rain or Shine. OLLI commissioned McFadden to take a look at what it’s like growing older in the post-millennium bay area. She has created a fictional character named Phoebe Zeller, a 60 year old Bay Area woman coping sometimes well and sometimes badly with getting older.

Marcia Lieberman
OLLI Artist-in-Residence
Spring 2004

Marcia Lieberman is a freelance photographer whose most recent publication, When Divas Confess: Master Opera Singers in Their Leading Roles was recently published by Rizzoli. Besides being OLLI Artist-in-Residence, she is on the faculty at UC Berkeley and CCA, Oakland.