Downtown’s Hidden Gems

Percy Brown

Known as the self-proclaimed “The Most Charismatic Man” I am an American Actor, Podcast Host and Entertainer whose roots can be traced back to the vibrant and fast-paced city of New York City. Growing up in Foster Care at the age of six and being adopted at age 11, I struggled to fit in with my peers, but I quickly learned that I enjoyed Dancing, Writing and Performing. I honed my skills in chess for six years, beginning to compete at the local and national level at the age of seven. My creative passion eventually led to me pursuing acting at age 14 as a student at the Urban Assembly School for the Performing Arts, I was nurtured and mentored by the award-winning Epic Theatre Ensemble, whose exceptional work earned them recognition from none other than former First Lady Michelle Obama. Read more>>

Clarisse Abelarde

I never thought I would be an artist, although I always drew as a kid. As an immigrant from the Philippines, moving to LA as a teenager, I was discouraged from pursuing a creative endeavor. I went to UC Riverside, majoring in Sociology, dropped out, and worked in accounting for a few years. Something within me knew this was not my path, so I took some art classes at LACC. Seeing this as a career possibility pushed me to get four art-related associate’s Transfer degrees and my bachelor’s in fine arts in Drawing and painting at Cal State Long Beach. Read more>>

Jackie Jiang

I’m a UX designer and multi-media artist. My art and design career began in traditional Japanese papermaking, which is a rare discipline that requires tremendous dedication and attention to detail. I used to harvest mulberry trees and cook the raw skin of bark into fine hair of fiber which can be used to pull sheets of translucent washi paper. The meditative process of papermaking in combination of my background in traditional Chinese calligraphy, together shaped my art and design work of today, which features a unique blend of typography and various art mediums. Read more>>

Susie Salazar

I’m a proud East LA girl. This place has left a mark on my identity, shaping me into the person I am today. Growing up around diverse cultures, music, and captivating personalities, I found myself constantly inspired by the uniqueness around me. From an early age, I discovered a deep passion for the visual arts. Fond memories flood my mind of the countless hours spent drawing, painting and experimenting different art forms and mediums all which ultimately led me to the art of makeup. Read more>>

Ashley Ighorewo

I was born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and grew up in Montreal. I moved back to Ottawa in 2015 for school, and this is where I’ve been based since then. My story honestly started when I was a little girl, maybe around the age of six. I used to pretend I was one of those red carpet correspondents and interview my little sister for fun, and I would perform for my family all the time. Read more>>

Grecia Parra

I’m originally from Southern California, where I spent much of my youth. As a child, I was awestruck by PBS television programming, specifically Julia Childs. I would constantly beg my mother for specific ingredients in order to try my hand at recreating her French dishes. Let’s just say they never turned out as they did on television. As I got older and graduated high school, my love for food never ceased and I ultimately enrolled in Pasadenas Le Cordon Bleu; which ultimately fell through due to financial circumstances. Read more>>

“Mama Jan” Smith

I never really thought much about the fact that I was “first starting out” … music was just something I did naturally from before I could talk until now. While things were certainly different then and not every 15-year-old kid was a singer-songwriter, it had always been my “normal,” so recording was just the next natural thing to do in that progression of being an artist. I will say this, being musically gifted as a kid presented its own challenges, especially during adolescence when teenagers are trying to belong.  Read more>>

Jessie Fox

I was born and raised in the San Francisco / Bay Area and moved to Portland for college at age 18. In college, I studied psychology and minored in art. I have made art for as long as I can remember, but I never thought about doing it professionally. My first career out of college was in the field of social work. I worked with high-risk teenagers at a residential facility here in Oregon. As a counselor, I loved to draw pictures for my caseload and engage them in creative activities. One of our favorite exercises was creating hybrid animals by mixing two animals together and giving them a funny name. The kids would suggest, “What If you mixed a _____ with a _____!!” Read more>>

Fangyu Ma

I come from a small city in Shandong Province, China. Growing up, my parents were busy with work, so I spent much of my childhood with my grandparents in the countryside. My grandfather was skilled in pen and ink, and my grandmother enjoyed drawing simple floral and avian patterns that she would then stitch onto insoles. It’s likely due to their influence that I began drawing at a young age. I took the art exam during college entrance exams and was accepted into the architecture department of the Academy of Fine Arts. However, during my junior year, I realized my true passion lay in illustration and decided to pursue further studies abroad. Read more>>

Cherelle Lenise Ward

I am born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland and I grew up in the urban communities of Baltimore. I was raised in a single-parent home with my mother and little sister, and my story started when journals became my refuge to safety. I would write short stories every day in my journals, subconsciously of my own internal and external struggles. I would fictionalize characters had the same struggles as me, with different upbringings and putting milestones in their midst to see how the story panned out. Read more>>

Sima Haddad

I’ve always loved baking. In January 2021, I decided to take my love of baking one step further after lots of persuasion from family and close friends. I then opened a small home business where I offer my pastries- Sima’s Challas. If you scroll through my Instagram page, you will see and understand the changes I have gone through in the first five months I started baking. I’ve made cakes, cookies, desserts, challahs and loved every moment of it. I was busy all of the time and I had a lot of fun. My birthday came, and I turned 45 (I also can not believe it !!!).  Read more>>

Ibrahim Zemheri

I am Ibrahim Zemheri, US-based multidisciplinary artist who creates 2D/3D design, motion, and digital experiments. With a background in cinematic arts and animation, I have been collaborating with amazing artists and brands in the world of advertising, media, technology, film and gaming. Read more>>

Runzhe (Ian) Chen

I grew up in a small county in Fujian, China and moved to Xiamen when I was five years old. I was interested in collecting some movie posters since I was a kid. Then I came to Maine for the high school. I met some good art teachers there and had some fine art classes, like painting and metal designs, which made me have more interest in art and design. I used to want to choose architecture as my major in college but after some research, I found graphic design is a good combination of making creative works and finding a job earlier in the future, that was how I ended up choosing graphic design as a major and decided to apply art colleges instead of universities, but I still very jealous about university life. Read more>>

Shyam Sivaramakrishnan

I started off as a research scientist at GE’s research headquarters close to Schenectady, NY originally after getting a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. While in grad school and later in corporate roles, I had the opportunity to build a lot of software, typically meant for monitoring and controlling machinery. Today, we use the term IoT to describe this line of work. Read more>>

Arianna Jones

I performed in my first play when I was in middle school and I instantly fell in love with acting. The production was a play about three cheerleaders called So You Wanna Be a Cheerleader. At the time, I was a cheerleader on a competition travel team as well as the team at my middle school so of course, it caught my eye. I auditioned and got the lead role and that’s where it all started. In high school, I began branching out and looking for more opportunities. I booked my first feature film at age 16. Read more>>