WiVLA 2025 Board Members
BROOKE SUMMERS-PERRY | Visual artist, writer
President
Brooke Summers-Perry creates for the purpose of self-reflection and emotional expression. She earned a B.S. in Psychology with a minor in Sociology, a Master’s in Architecture, and certification as a Spiritual Director. After working in architecture for 17 years, she began facilitating art, creative writing, and authentic and meaningful life skills. Continuously discovering new modalities, she integrates compassionate communication and social-emotional competencies with a variety of creative practices. During the pandemic, she and her son established their partnership, We Practice Life, to introduce these practices to younger folks. To support her own growth and well-being, she likes to paint and write poetry with a focus on nature, gratitude, and simplicity.
View my art at https://summers-perry.com/art
Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/instagram.com/brookesp_studio/
SUSAN SALTER | Encaustic Artist
Vice President
Susan is a versatile artist focusing on visual, literary, and theatre arts. She is an accomplished playwright, staging many of her own productions. Her artistic journey includes studying art and design at Glassell School of Art and earning an MFA in directing from the University of Houston. Susan specializes in encaustic painting, incorporating collage, sculpture, and assemblage. She continues to refine her techniques through ongoing study, including membership in Painting with Fire, an online encaustic class platform. Her work has been exhibited in numerous galleries, earning several awards. Influenced by natural and metaphysical sciences, her art reflects inner exploration and contemplation, often imbued with hidden messages and symbolism. Susan resides in the Houston area with her husband, where she creates in her spacious home studio.
View my art https://summers-perry.com/art
My IG https://www.instagram.com/instagram.com/brookesp_studio/
MELISSA CHAMBERS| Writer and Artist
Membership Chair
For 30+ years, Melissa focused her creativity in the world of marketing and communications as a graphic designer, art director, writer/editor, and communications strategist. Throughout that time, she practiced self-expression through writing poetry, short stories, and art journaling. Melissa also enjoys creating mixed-media abstract art and often incorporates it into her handmade books and journals.
Kathi Crawford | Writer
Secretary
With a career spanning decades in organizational development, Kathi Crawford founded People Possibilities, LLC (www.peoplepossibilities.com) in 2008. She is a certified coach who has worked with hundreds of clients one-on-one through leadership, career, and life transitions. Alongside her business career, she actively writes poetry and flash creative nonfiction. Her work has been featured online and in print in various literary journals. Her chapbook, consider the light, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press.
Find her on Instagram or LinkedIn @kathicrawford.
Subscribe to her blog at https://adventureinbeingcom.wordpress.com/.
MELODY LOCKE | Traditional and Alternative Photographer
Treasurer
Melody Locke uses traditional and alternative photographic processes to create fine art prints. Using B&W and infrared film, she develops black and white prints in a traditional wet darkroom. She also specializes in lumen printing, a non-camera photographic process, to create colorful and ethereal images from botanical material and negatives. Her love of nature inspires her landscape photography and her ethereal lumen images of plants and flowers. Melody has a studio in Silver Street Studios at Sawyer Yards.
View samples of her work at https://melodylocke.com/
Follow her on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/melodylockeart
Elissa Davis| Artist and Writer
Programs Chair
My mother taught me to sew, which kicked off a love of making and creating. I have a degree in Hotel and Restaurant Management from the University of Houston, but I landed in the bookstore of The Jung Center over twenty years ago and found a home, where I am currently a book-slinger and gallerist. I am married to a writer, have two cats, and smile very easily.
SHIRLEY BEYER| Artist
Visual Co-Chair
At the end of 2022, Shirley Beyer retired as a psychotherapist to devote her attention to her art practice. She had been seeing clients for over 26 years and began taking art classes part-time at the Art League of Houston, the Glassell School of Art, and numerous workshops nationwide! She loves to paint with acrylic and use mixed media. In addition to spending time with her husband and her family (including five grandchildren), she loves to travel and play golf. Since she began devoting more time to art, Shirley has excelled in her art, and she also loves the fact that she has met so many wonderful artists and has gotten involved in some amazing Houston art groups! “I believe artists are the nicest people on the planet,” is what she says to those who ask questions about her work and life.
Deborah Ellington | Visual Artist
Visual Co-Chair
Deborah graduated from Albion College with a degree in art education, later obtaining an M.A. in Painting from the University of Michigan and an MFA in Ceramics from Sam Houston State University. After college, she taught K -12 in Michigan and ended her career as an instructional dean at Lone Star College in Texas. In between, she was an art professor and department chair at Lone Star College. Deborah has never stopped teaching. Even after retirement, she teaches fused glass workshops in design, color, painting, and kiln casting. Deborah has a studio at Silver Street Studios in Houston, Texas.
Follow her on Instagram at @dellingtonartstudio.
REBECCA CHIRAK| Writer
Literary Co-Chair
Rebecca Chirak has been chronicling ‘interesting things I have seen and heard’ since age 5, writing almost daily since she was in fourth grade, and finally sharing her voice with readers. Her debut novel will be published in 2024 under the pen name Joy Beguine.
She has been Muslim since 2005 and has a lot to say to, for and about Muslim women, especially converts and Muslim women living in the West. She has lived in Houston since 2010 after growing up in western New York and living in Russia, Turkmenistan, Brooklyn, and northern Virginia. She is an active member of Writespace and the Women’s Fiction Writers Association (WFWA) and is thrilled to serve as a literary co-chair for WiVLA in 2025.
Her day job is in education. She attended Bryn Mawr College for her bachelor's degree (in Russian language and linguistics) and Sam Houston State for her master’s (in Comparative and global education). After writing, she is also passionate about travel and kayaking.
Contact info: mrschirak@gmail.com
Gwendolyn Womack| Novelist
Literary Co-Chair
Gwendolyn Womack is the bestselling author of The Fortune Teller, The Memory Painter, and The Time Collector. Next up is her YA debut, The Premonitions Club. Gwen has an MFA in Directing Theatre and Film from the California Institute of the Arts, and she was a screenwriter for many years before embarking on novels. When she is not writing, she enjoys photographing kaleidoscope.
Visit her at www.gwendolynwomack.com.
Jamie Frontiera| Wood Carver
Publicity
Jamie Frontiera is a wood carver and photographer. She has been wood carving since 2017, working on chip carving, relief carving, pyrography, and carving in the round. Several of her carvings have placed in wood carving competitions with both Houston Area Wood Carvers and the Texas Wood Carving Guild. Her style (in both photography and wood carving) reflects a mix of materials, movement, nature, and geometries. She was raised in Texas and has a bachelor’s degree from Pratt Institute.
Jamie’s work can be found on Etsy and Instagram @jmfcarvings.
Denise Bossarte | Writer
Newsletter Editor
Denise Bossarte is an award-winning author, poet, photographer, and artist whose passion is inspiring others. Her short stories and poems have been published in several anthologies and literary magazines, and her photography has been featured in several solo and group juried exhibitions. Her daytime job in IT helps to keep the household running. She enjoys writing and exploring new art forms. She lives in Texas with her husband and literary cat, Za'Ji.
MILDRED J MILLS | Memoirist, Poet
Website Administrator
Aside from writing and reading, Mildred’s passions are traveling with her husband, playing tennis, and helping others— especially older people. She is a retired IT professional who recently published her first memoir, “Daddy’s House: A Daughter’s Memoir of Setbacks, Triumphs & Rising Above Her Roots.” Mildred holds a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts in creative writing/nonfiction. She is the solo host of a podcast, “My Cotton Patch Moment, streaming on major platforms.”
https://mildredjmills.com/; https://www.facebook.com/mildred.j.mills; https://www.instagram.com/mildredjmills/; https://www.linkedin.com/in/mildredjmills/; https://twitter.com/milmill4; https://sites.libsyn.com/455796.
MJ Figard| Visual Artist
Historian
MJ Figard started as an English major in college and ended her work career as a medical librarian and archivist at the Texas Medical Center Library. She did boring and challenging jobs during her work and volunteer life. She was a stay-at-home mom for about ten years, which were also boring and challenging - sometimes in the same minute. Being creative is an aspiration she’s had her whole life. She started sewing clothes using patterns and entered the quilt world using patterns. Having learned the techniques, she has become creative by just doing. Color is her favorite art element.
MARIE CASAMAYOR-HARVEY | Visual Artist
At Large
Marie Casamayor-Harvey is an artist based in Houston, Texas, with roots in Cuba and Colombia. She earned a B.A. from the University of Houston with a major in Art History, minoring in Studio Arts and Architecture, and a Master's in Education and Supervision from the University of St. Thomas, Houston.
Marie is an abstract artist who creates paintings, sculptures, drawings, collages, and mixed media works. Her work reflects intense curiosity, wild imagination, and enchantment with symbolism, expressionism, and metaphysical and surreal imagery.
Liz Plaster | Visual Artist
At Large
Liz Plaster, M.Ed., brings her curiosity, skills, and playfulness to exploring mixed media art, photography, writing (award-winning author), drumming, professional activities, and daily living. She lives each day with spirit and intention. She is committed to supporting the growth of more empathy, wisdom, and clarity in her own personal and professional life and in the world (Ikigai). As an artist, she has exhibited in multiple private, non-profit, and corporate galleries.
Visit her in her studio #106, in The Silos of Sawyer Yard on Sawyer Road.
Board private page click HERE.