ARTIST AND FOUNDING DIRECTOR

Aida is a Bosnian-American artist based in Sarajevo. She is the recipient of Culture Push and Socrates Sculpture Park Fellowships, and was an artist in residence at the LMCC, Grand Central Art Center, and Santa Fe Art Institute. Recent exhibitions include Ars Aevi Nucleus Kyiv, Canadian Museum of Human Rights, Kunsthaus Dresden, Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, KRAK Center for Contemporary Culture, Laumeier Sculpture Park, and ARTIVISM Pavilion during the 58th Venice Biennale. She earned her BA from the University of Vermont and her MFA from Hunter College.

CHAIR, DEVELOPMENT & STRATEGY

Ana’s approach to research and project development is centered in co-curatorial methodologies. She holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Northwestern University and is a research associate with the Field Museum in Chicago. Ana has been writing and teaching about Bosnian diaspora experiences with forced migration since 2005. This work informs her exploration of subjects such as food cultures, artmaking, racism, monuments removal, and solitary confinement. Ana is passionate about creating space for making connections across differences that help to protect vulnerable ecologies.

CHAIR, PARTNERSHIPS & PROGRAMMING

Dženeta, one of the founding board members, is an academic at the University of Salzburg and freelance consultant. She holds a PhD in Politics and International Studies from the University of Warwick. Her academic interests are in international political sociology with a focus on migration, transnationalism, diaspora, education, remembrance, transitional justice, foreign policy, and the Balkans. Among her publications are the first book on Bosnia and Herzegovina’s foreign policy and Bosnian Studies – Perspectives from an Emerging Field. She was born in Banja Luka, BiH and grew up in Berlin, Germany and Burlington, VT.

CHAIR, RESEARCH & EDUCATION

Jasmina is a Full Professor of Cultural and Gender Studies at the University of Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina. She earned her Ph.D. at Aberystwyth University, UK. Her research interests address the politics of witnessing and trauma, equality and solidarity, critical pedagogies, and the possibilities of emancipatory politics at the intersection of cultural and knowledge production. Jasmina is widely published internationally on these issues, and she is deeply invested in working towards transformative social change through a number of artistic-academic-activist collaborative platforms she has initiated in the last decades.

TREASURER

Lejla is a business professional with extensive experience in the USA and Bosnia and Herzegovina. She holds an MBA from Bled School of Management and is in the process of obtaining her CPA license in the USA. Lejla has worked with small and medium enterprises, leveraging her skills in accounting and private equity to aid turnarounds and start-ups in achieving financial performance and growth. In addition, Lejla has served as a Board Member and Treasurer for several non-profit organizations in BiH, focusing on education, professional development, as well as promotion of tolerance, inclusivity, and empowerment of BiH citizens.

CHAIR, COMMUNICATIONS & OUTREACH

Tom teaches courses in religion, ethics, philosophy, and human rights at Phillips Exeter Academy. He holds a Ph.D. in religious studies from the University of Virginia. Before teaching at Exeter, he was the director of a travel program at Emory University focusing on the global intersections of religion, violence, and peacebuilding. It was that program that brought him to Bosnia and Herzegovina for the first time in 2004. Tom has been teaching and writing about postwar Bosnia and Herzegovina ever since, with special interest in practices of cultural memory, transitional justice, healing from trauma, and genocide prevention.