Board of Trustees
Elizabeth Boyd
President
Wiley Designs, LLC, Founder and Principal Designer
Brian Bryzinski
Member-At-Large
Ian McCutcheon
Vice President/Treasurer
Heather Sannes
Secretary
Ignatius Valentine Aloysius
Writer, Poet, Literary Citizen
Lan Samantha Chang
Author, Director of Iowa Writers’ Workshop
John Cialone
Tom Stringer Design Partners
Dawn Cooke
Jacob (Jake) Goldberg
Goldberg General Contracting, Inc.
Jason Kalajainen
Co-Trustee, Holly Palmer Foundation
Rebecca Makkai
Novelist and Short Story Writer, Artistic Director of StoryStudio Chicago
Margot McMahon
Visual Artist and Sculptor
Victoria Medvec
CEO of Medvec & Associates, Adeline Barry Davee Professor of Management and Organizations at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University
Sue Shattock
Brett Taylor
Vice President, Lake Forest Bank & Trust
Scott (Sandy) Turner
Ann Walters
Book group facilitator at Between the Covers
Cindy Wilson
Clinical Professor of Law, Northwestern Pritzker School of Law
Roland Kulla
Life Trustee
John Merritt
Life Trustee
Carol Newman
Life Trustee
Phoebe Turner
Life Trustee
Penny West
Life Trustee
Ragdale Staff
Our staff can be reached by calling 847.234.1063 and then entering their individual extensions, which are listed below. Many of our staff members can also be reached directly via email below.
Paul Sacaridiz, Executive Director
Paul Sacaridiz has been widely recognized for his work as an artist, educator, administrator, and leader in higher education and the nonprofit sector. Most recently he was the Maxine and Stuart Frankel Director of Cranbrook Academy of Art and previously held the position of Executive Director of the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts. Earlier in his career, he served as Professor and Chair of the Department of Art at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Associate Director of the Wonsook Kim School of Art at Illinois State University. As a speaker, he has lectured nationally on art, education and leadership through the Artists Communities Alliance, American Craft Council, College Art Association, International Academy of Ceramics, and the Smithsonian Institution. In addition to organizational leadership, Sacaridiz is an accomplished sculptor, having shown his work at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Denver Art Museum, and the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, among others. He is also the recipient of numerous artist residencies including the Archie Bray Foundation, the Arts/Industry Program at Kohler Company, the Ragdale Foundation, and the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts.
Hermelindo “Mele” Cruz
Property Associate
Avery Grant
Resident Facilities Coordinator Ext. 23 avery@ragdale.org
Roland Kulla
Special Projects Manager Ext. 28
roland@ragdale.org
Regin Igloria
Artistic Director Ext. 26
regin@ragdale.org
Martha Machuca Development & Communications Associate Ext. 29 martha@ragdale.org
Deanna Miera
Residency Manager
Ext. 23 deanna@ragdale.org
Martha Quintanilla
Housekeeping Associate
Cathy Ramsay
Finance Director
Ext. 27
accountant@ragdale.org
David Rodriguez
Property Associate
Marita Seaberg
Office & Development Manager
Ext. 21
marita@ragdale.org
Mary Beth Sova
Director of Funding Resources Ext. 24
marybeth@ragdale.org
Jess Sladek
Garden and Land Manager
jess@ragdale.org
Linda Williams
Chef linda@ragdale.org
Interns
Xiadani Perez
Cristo Rey St. Martin College Prep
Mariana Vaca
Lake Forest College
Curatorial Board
Photo Credit: Thomas Ryan RedCorn
Curatorial Board Co-Chair
Quraysh Ali Lansana is author of twenty books in poetry, nonfiction, and children’s literature. Currently a Tulsa Artist Fellow and Director of the Center for Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation at Oklahoma State University-Tulsa, Lansana is also Adjunct Professor in Africana Studies and English. Lansana is Executive Producer of KOSU/NPR’s Focus: Black Oklahoma monthly radio program. A former faculty member of both the Writing Program of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Drama Division of The Juilliard School, he served as Director of the Gwendolyn Brooks Center for Black Literature and Creative Writing at Chicago State University from 2002-2012. His work Our Difficult Sunlight: A Guide to Poetry, Literacy & Social Justice in Classroom & Community was a 2012 NAACP Image Award nominee. Most recent books include the skin of dreams: new and collected poems, 1995-2018 and Opal’s Greenwood Oasis. Lansana’s work appears in Best American Poetry 2019. He is a founding member of Tri-City Collective.
Curatorial Board Co-Chair
Ignatius Valentine Aloysius is a naturalized U.S. citizen, born in India and raised in Mumbai by a Tamilian father and Anglo-Indian mother. He earned his MFA in Creative Writing from Northwestern University, where he won the Distinguished Thesis Award for fiction. He is a lecturer in writing at Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and in the Writing Program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Ignatius is the current host and curator of the long-running reading series Sunday Salon Chicago (sundaysalon-chicago.com). A resident of Evanston, he also serves as a mayor-appointed board member of the Evanston Arts Council. Twice Pushcart nominated, Ignatius is the author of the experimental novel Fishhead. Republic of Want, and his prose and poetry appear in several venues, including Cold Mountain Review, Another Chicago Magazine, Porter Gulch Review, Trampset, Olney Magazine, Roi Fainéant Press, and others. He is currently at work on his next book. Visit https://linktr.ee/ignatius.valentine.aloysius
Curatorial Board Co-Chair
Lauren M. Pacheco is a Mexican-American born and raised on Chicago's southwest side. She is a civic practice artist and cultural worker with over fifteen years of arts administration, curation, and project management experience. Her background is grounded in social practice and public engagement with a personal mandate to responsibly and respectfully invest in targeted communities. Many of her projects are interested in space, people, and social impact. Today, Pacheco serves as a resource to policymakers and institutions in the public dialogue about issues that impact artists and creative enterprises. Lauren is an associate faculty lecturer and the director of arts programming and engagement at Indiana University Northwest in the School of the Arts.
Alice’s Board
Named in honor of Ragdale founder Alice Judson Ryerson Hayes, who drew artists and supporters to Ragdale through her friendship and hospitality, Alice’s Board seeks to extend the reach of Ragdale throughout the global arts community, both inviting people in and bringing Ragdale out into the light.
Alice’s Board is an advisory board comprised of individuals with a strong connection to the Ragdale Foundation who are committed to representing Ragdale in the world, supporting the Foundation’s mission and operations, and being a key part of the Ragdale family.
Kaveh Akbar
Andrea Change
Stuart Cohen
Carey Cranston
Molly Cullum
Danielle Evans
Jamie Ford
Alex Kotlowitz
Jeffrey Meeuwsen
Jill Pollack
Roberta Rubin
Craig Snider