Welcome to the ArtStart Board of Directors.
While our careers are diverse, we all share a common bond and that is a passion for the arts.
We joined the ArtStart board because we see evidence of that same passion in the staff and artists of ArtStart.
Anne Sawyer
Executive Director
Anne Sawyer is a puppeteer, author, and arts educator who has worked extensively as a teaching artist with ArtStart for many years, showcasing her strong commitment and connection to ArtStart’s mission. With deep roots in the Twin Cities arts community, she has worked with organizations such as Heart of the Beast and the stilt group Hijinks Stilts (formerly Chicks on Sticks). To date, she has created four picture books: Nalah and the Pink Tiger, Nalah Goes to Mad Mouse City, Mars on Life, and most recently, The Pollinator’s Gift (October 2024). She works in many mediums: felting and painting, embroidery and stilting, fiction and poetry. Anne has created commissioned puppet works for the Minneapolis Institute of Art, MacPhail Center for Music, and Gustavus Adolphus College. She has received support from the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, the Minnesota State Arts Board, Puppeteers of America, and the Jim Henson Award.
Sara Dovre Wudali
President
Sara Dovre Wudali is a writer and editor living in Saint Paul. She is a 2023–2024 Poetry Fellow in the Loft Mentor Series and her work has received support from the Minnesota State Arts Board and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council. Her poems and essays have been published in literary journals and anthologies such as under the gum tree, Barrel House, Blood Tree Literature, and the Saint Paul Almanac. She is the co-editor of the hybrid anthology chapbook, All You Need Is One Avocado. Dovre Wudali grew up on a farm in southwest Minnesota, where wind blows through the cottonwoods and box elder bugs rule. She is owner and director of Buuji, a small content production house.
Phil Gurbada
Treasurer
Phil Gurbada served as Royalton Elementary School principal (Royalton, MN) for 35 years from 1988-2023. He recently retired from his position in the spring of 2023. Prior to that, he was principal at Our Lady of Victory Catholic School in Fergus Falls, MN, and was a public school elementary teacher in Fargo, ND.
In addition, he has taught graduate educational leadership courses as an adjunct professor for St. Thomas, St. Cloud State, and St. Mary’s universities. Also, besides his teaching and administrative degrees from Mayville State and Moorhead State respectively, he earned a doctorate in Educational Leadership from St. Thomas University.
Throughout his career, Phil has been an advocate for innovative curriculum, interactive instruction, and arts integration. He is a past recipient of the Art Educators MN Administrator of the Year and the National Arts Education Association Distinguished Service awards.
Phil and his wife, Shelley, live in Victoria, MN. Together they have two grown children and four grandchildren. He enjoys reading, walking, biking, traveling, and the fine arts.
Lois Eliason
Secretary
Lois (Lola) M. Eliason is an art historian, entrepreneur, and artist who has been leading undergraduate and graduate courses in art history for over 20 years. Lola is also the co-founder/owner of Jack & Lola (Shop JL) which specializes in one-of-a-kind and limited editions of jewelry using repurposed components. As an artist, Lola is currently exploring the medium of collage, and currently has 12 small scale collages on exhibit in the group show titled In Rotation. She received BAs in English and Art History with a minor in Studio Art at University of California, Irvine, and a PhD in Art History (concentration on 15th-century sculpture in Italy) at Rutgers University. Lola has recently discovered the joys and frustrations of gardening and won her first Macalester-Groveland alley garden award in 2022!
Nancy Randall Dana
Board Member
Nancy Randall Dana, a licensed principal and superintendent , is a passionate advocate for providing underserved students the quality education they need to ensure a positive future. She has been a leader in the charter school movement with personal involvement for more than thirty years and has served in the field of education for over fifty years. As Coordinator and Consultant, she has started nine schools, closed four, and directly helped sustain another nineteen, serving a diverse urban population of new arrival immigrants and communities of poverty. Nancy has devoted her professional career to education, and has served as adjunct faculty for Hamline University, Macalester College, and the University of St. Thomas. Most of her adult training classes are supporting adult leadership development. She spends her additional time training school boards on School Board leadership development. Her most exciting moment was to watch her daughter lead her granddaughter into her first class at ArtStart this summer….just as she walked her daughter into class in the early 1990s. It’s a beautiful legacy !
Judy Geck
Board Member
Throughout my work life as a bookseller, Park Ranger, naturalist, and volunteer I have initiated collaborative opportunities for individuals and communities that combine nature and the arts. Bringing people together to utilize their strengths and create something bigger is what I enjoy most. I serve on the ArtStart Board of Directors and have worked in partnership with ArtStart to host EcoArt Fest, teach Art and Nature classes, and support the ArtScraps Reuse Center.
Jodi Gustafson
Board Member
I am a choral musician, guitarist, and songwriter. I was founding Creative Director of InVocation, a semiprofessional chamber choir that concertized to raise funds for various Twin Cities nonprofits. I have a Master’s Degree in Sacred Music from Luther Seminary/St Olaf College, and I’ve been a professional church musician for many years, conducting major works, commissioning new ones, and leading music of all kinds, because I believe in the power of people singing and creating beauty together.
By day, I work for the YourClassical service of Minnesota Public Radio, and I live in St Paul with my wife Rochelle and our two dogs, Sally and Marcie.
Isabela Larsen
Board Member
Isabela Larsen is a recent college graduate from Gustavus Adolphus College, a Liberal Arts school based in the small town of St. Peter, Minnesota. She received her B.A. in English with a minor in Film and Media Studies.
During her time at Gustavus, Isabela dabbled in several different areas within the fine arts realm including photography, handbuilt ceramics, creative writing, and poetry. Isabela has had a photograph and a poetry piece published in her alma mater’s English department literary journal, Firethorne’s 2022 edition. In addition to her publication, Isabela has had two separate artworks exhibited as a part of Gustavus’s fine arts All-Student Juried Exhibition, one back in 2020 and the other during the fall of 2023.
Isabela currently works as a Horticulturist Apprentice at Como Park Zoo & Conservatory where she’s found a passion for all things plants and the outdoors.
Carol Sirrine
Founder, Former Executive Director
Carol Sirrine is a versatile educator, accomplished musician, and dedicated arts advocate with a journey spanning over six decades. Graduating with a BA in music performance and education in 1967, she embarked on a teaching career while also contributing her musical talents to the Saint Paul Civic Symphony for an impressive 52 seasons. In 1976, she received a Fulbright Scholarship to teach in England, composing a musical in honor of Queen Elizabeth’s Silver Jubilee. Serving as the first K-12 Fine Arts Curriculum Coordinator in Hopkins until her 2003 retirement, Carol also founded the nonprofit ArtStart in 1988, promoting interdisciplinary arts and environmental stewardship. After retiring from ArtStart in June 2023, she is pursuing her love of writing through online creative writing classes at Cleveland Lit, aspiring to become a published author.
Tom Lang
Board Chair Emeritus
I served on the ArtStart board from 2020 until 2023, first as board secretary and then as board chair, overseeing the organization’s recent leadership transition. I have nearly 20 years’ experience volunteering and working for mission-based, non-profit organizations, including NeighborWorks Home Partners, Park Nicollet, Mills Music Library, My Very Own Bed, Open Eye Theatre, and Hennepin County Library. My current work is in hospital relations at LifeSource in Minneapolis. My formal education is in teaching and music composition, and I hold a bachelor’s degree in music education from Winona State University and a master’s and doctorate in music composition from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
