Board of Directors

Sam Sills has been on HAM’s Board since 1996 through today, currently serving as President. He’s produced several documentaries on history and other topics for national public television. Currently, Sills is the resident video producer with New York City’s Administration for Children’s Services where he also plays a leading role in racial equity initiatives.

Audrey Frank Anastasi is a prolific feminist artist, working in painting, drawing, collage, mixed media, & printmaking. She is also curator, gallerist, educator and arts advocate. In 2005, Ms. Anastasi and her husband Joseph established Tabla Rasa, the first full-time art gallery in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. She has served on the board of the Brooklyn Arts Council since 2001, and on the board of Hook Arts Media since 2002.

Elise M. Bernhardt has run cultural non-profits for over 30 years, including founding Dancing in the Streets, being Executive Director of The Kitchen and CEO of the Foundation for Jewish Culture. A lifelong dance lover, she attended Sarah Lawrence College, studied under Bessie Schonberg and was the first Artistic Director of Fall for Dance at NY City Center. She continues to work on the JERUSALEM INTERNATIONAL FELLOWS: A Cultural Residency Program, slated to begin in 2020. She has been on Hook Arts Media’s Board from 2017 to present as well as being on numerous artists’ advisory boards.

Corinthia A. Carter is currently the President of Legal Services Staff Association 2320. Prior to that she was a Senior Staff Attorney at Brooklyn Legal Services (“BLS”) where she has worked in the Housing Unit, Workers’ Rights and Benefits Unit, Immigration Unit and as Pro Bono Scholar working on Elder Law cases. She currently represents tenants in affirmative litigation cases. She is a member of the LSNYC citywide DEIB committee. Since 2014, she has been an active member of the NYC Bar Association’s Diversity Pipelines Initiative. In 2019, she was appointed to the NYC Mayor’s Commission on City Marshals and I was recently elected to be a board member on the NYC National Lawyers Guild Foundation. She joined the HAM board in 2021.

Kamau Ware is a multidimensional creative blending complementary yet disparate disciplines as an artist/historian. As the Founder & Lead Creative of Black Gotham Experience, Ware has established an expansive public experience that includes interactive walking tours through Manhattan’s Financial District and a developing series of photography-based graphic novels that weave art and history together. Ware’s Black Gotham Experience has been featured in the New York Observer, The Atlantic, The New York Times, and Time Out New York. BGX has won awards and grants from Columbia University’s History in Action Project and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. He has also made appearances on NBC New York, ABC New York, and The Huffington Post to share this unique understanding of the Black Diaspora’s presence in New York City. Kamau joined the Hook Arts Media Board in 2021.

Martha Bowers is the Founder and Executive Director of Hook Arts Media, formerly Dance Theatre Etcetera. She is an award-winning arts educator (Brooklyn Arts Exchange BAXten Award 2002, NYC Education Chancellor Rudolph Crew’s Community Caring Award 1999) and the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships for her choreographic work (NEA (`84, `88, `96), the New Jersey State Council for the Arts (`84), a 2010 Certificate of Merit from the New York City Municipal Society for her site- specific work Angels and Accordions, among others). She is noted for her 27 years of work as an artist and educator in Red Hook, Brooklyn. In addition to her work at Hook Arts Media, Martha teaches courses on site-specific performance, art and activism for NYU. She has been a Board member since 1994.