Aileen Norris

Aileen Norris (they/she) is an interdisciplinary artist, organizer, and community member. Hailing from Iowa City, IA, they earned a BFA in modern dance and BA in English from the University of Utah. Aileen co-founded Queer Spectra Arts Festival in 2019 and served as a co-organizer through 2023. She’s also choreographed, produced, and performed in freelance dance works, and ghostwritten several novels and nonfiction works. Aileen believes in accessible art, the importance of play, and liberation-based practice. They currently live in the Twin Cities with their fiancée and enjoy exploring nature, spending quality time with friends, and moving and grooving in their free time.

Amanda Madden

Amanda Madden is a queer filmmaker, artist, educator and community organizer whose work explores evolutions of intimacy, identity, body, and connection. They utilize performance, embodiment, experimentation, and collaboration to explore these concepts and their fluidity. Their work is about what they discover as they travel through and document inner and outer landscapes. Everything they create seeks to queer both the process and the content and to initiate spells, space, and connection for community. They have worked as an editor, director, and creator of documentary, narrative, and experimental projects for the past 15 years and their work has been exhibited internationally and won multiple awards and nominations. They facilitate the independent educational project, Reflection Collective, a series of virtual workshops and gatherings focused on creative practice as a tool for introspection and connection. They are also the Manager of the Artist Foundry at Utah Film Center which provides artist support to local filmmakers and creators.

Bea Colon

Bea Colon is a digital artist based in Utah county. Their work consists of character illustration and design with an emphasis on the reimagining of classic art and queer experiences.

Cyan Larson

Cyan is an interdisciplinary artist from Salt Lake City now based in New York. They use their emotional, (meta)physical experiences in life as medium and driver for their art practice. Through their queer and mentally ill lenses, they manifest representations of how they experience the world in their art.

Eager Zhang

Eager Zhang is a visual artist and graphic designer. They explore among subjects of reading behavior, language issues and the notion of “non-binary” in the realm of design, and translate researches into medium-agnostic practice. Their recent works were featured by Tokyo TDC, Communication Arts, Society of Typographic Art (STA 100), It's Nice That, etc. They graduated from School of the Art Institute of Chicago as an MFA, and received a BE from Tongji University, Shanghai. Zhang currently lives in Los Angeles, United States, and also works as a faculty of Graphic Design BFA/MFA, Otis College of Art and Design.

Emma Sargent

Emma Sargent (she/her) is a dance artist, amateur fiber artist, and professional goofball based in Salt Lake City, Utah. Emma completed her B.F.A. in Modern Dance and a B.A. in Gender Studies at the University of Utah (grad. 2019). In 2019, she had the honor of co-founding Queer Spectra Arts Festival, where she worked for four years as an administrator, grant writer, and queer art fangirl. Emma has performed with several project-based companies in SLC, including Cat + Fish Dances, Deseret Experimental Opera Company, and SONDERimmersive. Emma enjoys collaborative processes drawing from diverse artistic disciplines and values art as a community-building practice. Emma’s next adventure is pursuing an M.Ed. in Clinical Mental Health Counseling at the University of Utah, starting in August 2024.

Russell Roots

Russell Roots, the Director of Film Exhibition with Utah Film Center, is responsible for delivering dynamic, inclusive, innovative and professional film programming to Utah audiences. Additionally, they are the program manager of UFC’s Black culture program, Black, Bold & Brilliant. In previous incarnations, they also managed the Film Center’s two annual film festivals and summer drive-in film series. Russell has a background in journalism, radio, media literacy, and has led administrative efforts on the boards of other arts organizations. They focus their studies on the intersections of marginalized groups in cinema and the rise of white nationalism and other intolerance in the United States.