ID: A mixed East Asian woman with short, black hair wears a black dress and stands strong among a cluster of green bamboo shoots that stretch overhead. Photographed on film by Eddie Rhea Hemphill.
Michele Kumi (久美) Baer (she/they) is an arts leader devoted to igniting, kindling, and sustaining people’s capacity to practice creativity, equity, and liberation in their lives.
Over the course of her career, Michele has designed and directed initiatives that have seeded new funding and cultural programs; fostered greater authenticity and trust among colleagues and collaborators; and advanced bold agendas to further social justice in the cultural and philanthropic fields. She has contributed to the arts and culture ecosystem as an advocate, executive, programs director, service provider, grantmaker, facilitator, coach, and performer.
Previous posts include work at Urban Bush Women, Race Forward, The New York Community Trust, and the Global Fund for Women. As a consultant, Michele’s client roster has included the Center for Cultural Power, Creatives Rebuild New York, Creative West, Intercultural Leadership Institute, Mellon Foundation, National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures, and the Sundance Institute, among others.
Active in the nonprofit field, Michele regularly contributes to field-wide events, coalitions, and grant and fellowship panels. Past panel service includes the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Dance Project, the California Creative Corps Artist Fellowship, and the Constellations Culture Change Fund.
A lifelong dancer, Michele’s sensibilities as a mover and choreographer shape how she leads, strategizes, and collaborates. She has been committed to deep study of dance traditions from West Africa (Mandé & Malinke), Brazil, and Haiti for over 16 years and has traveled to study with master culture bearers in Brazil and Mali.
Born and raised on the ancestral and unceded lands of the Ohlone people—what people also currently refer to as the San Francisco Bay Area—Michele is a mixed race, East Asian, cisgender, and non-disabled woman. She is a proud Yonsei (fourth generation Japanese American) who has both Japanese and mixed European ancestry. It was learning about her family’s incarceration during World War II that propelled Michele into critical inquiry at a young age.
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