Working on something meaningful is a common desire – but how? We started asking folks to share the story of how they ended up working on a project they felt was meaningful because we wanted inspiration but also because we wondered if hearing from people from across a range of industries would help us identify patterns making it more likely for anyone to be able to find and work on projects that they would find meaningful.

Tonia Yiu

One of the most meaningful projects I worked on was a collaborative design challenge I joined earlier this year. In this challenge, I teamed up with two of my peers to create an online platform within one week. We created a prototype website called Oracle, and its goal is to promote sexual heath and wellness towards all genders. It was the first time I had worked on a group project with a topic that I was truly passionate about. Read more>>

DeMario Easley

My most meaningful project is the one I am currently working on right now. It’s called, “The Middle of Nowhere”. It’s a subtle elaboration of the idea that while everything that matters to you is validated, at the end of the day this is all pointless! I have evolved in my craft in ways I couldn’t imagine. I have been able to simultaneously say things that are meaningful to me while also having fun. As I continue to grow and develop as a human being, Read more>>

Derrick Johnson

One of the most meaningful project i’ve worked on was a project entitled The Mundane of Vincennes which I released last year and was a collection of 82 film photos I captured during my time in Vincennes, Indiana. I was a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed kid excited and nervous to be at college and be away from my family, though I wasn’t too far. My first experience with film photography was my first year there; I had no idea how this medium and class would impact my life. Read more>>

Pooja Shah

One of my most meaningful projects to date has been my editorial photo and video project, “STAINED, The Indian Art of Bandhani: A Love Letter to Women.” You can find it here: https://tembotones.com/blog/stained It is a celebration of the history and heritage of Bandhani, a centuries-old tie-and-dye method practiced in India, that also challenges our perceptions of tradition and bounding women to certain standards and molds. Read more>>

Izreal

The most meaningful project I’ve worked on so far has to probably be the Album I’m working on now due for release next year in 23. Musically, it’s probably the most personal I’ve been in some of my songs, discussing my upbringing and really embracing who I am as a person. As a rapper, I feel like it’s not really “cool” to be from a small city, and I’d been running away from that for a long time. On this album, I’ve accepted that I’m from Las Cruces, NM as well as deep personal trauma from my past. Read more>>

Kay Jay Olson

Recently, I completed the full score and demo album for my first full length musical titled “Inner Demons: The Musical.” The work has mean so much to me, because it is a culmination of things that I hold near and dear – Queer issues, horror movies, and community driven narratives. When I started working on Inner Demons, I wanted to focus in on creating work for queer people that would also be created by queer people. Read more>>

Jessica Godsey

So many of my furniture refinishing projects that I look back on feel meaningful, but when I get to work on family heirlooms is when I feel the most purpose in my work. Not only do I get to turn something old and worn into something beautiful, I’m preserving memories and extending the life of the furniture so even more family memories can be created. Read more>>

Emma Supica

I have worked on a lot of meaningful projects in my life, but the one that comes to the top is the one woman show I wrote this summer called “Scar Tissue.” I had been dreaming about the concept of this show for a long time, but wasn’t until I met Daniel Jones of the Kindling Arts Festival that I considered actually writing and performing it. I had always considered myself a real “ensemble” player on a stage (in bands, choirs) or as a director. For this project, I wrote and directed the whole thing on my own – mostly on an airplane and in my basement recovering from/isolating with COVID. Read more>>

Ann Brennan

I founded Burgers and Bands for Suicide Prevention in 2017 as a way to show people that there is hope and that their lives don’t have to end in suicide. The event started with one stage and ten kid bands provided by the Priddy Music Academy. We now have 3 stages and 27 bands at our main event and have held other events in Annapolis at Charm City Run/Annapolis Town Center and in New Zealand. The very first event proved to touch our community so deeply that I knew we would have to host it every year. It’s become a staple of our community and something that people of all ages latch on to for that sign of hope. Read more>>

Meaghan Kent

It is meaningful to me to be able to work with artists. I love helping artists realize new work and to be able to provide a platform to share their ideas. I learn so much in the process and get to share that information to our visitors. When I curate a group exhibition, it can be very personal. For example, I was dealing with loss at one point in my life and I curated an exhibition entitled “Tactile Hallucinations” which dealt with memories and the loss of loved ones. Read more>>

Sean Mawhirter

For myself, the usual answer is that the next project is the most meaningful…but this time it’s true! I lead 2 groups that play Latin dance music: Mundo Nouvo (salsa) & Cucharada (tango). While these are ordinarily separate and discrete traditions with divergent audiences, I can finally see the horizon of merging these acts. Starting next spring, at the new, bigger space at The Ship in The Westbottoms Neighborhood, I will be hosting an “Ultimate Latin Social Dance Music Night” wherein tango will be featured from 6pm-9 with salsa to be followed until 1am. DJing will be included so that the music never stops. Read more>>

Yurie Ono

There is a piece called “Shogeki” I made with Umami Playground Dance Company. I was planning to do this piece as a solo dance video. But the company director decided to do it as a company group piece on stage. The theme is about human-being which has both ugly side and beautiful side. I started the piece with small notes in Japanese on my phone. I talked with 4 choreographers and they gave me a lot of ideas. Five of us were talking more than moving because the topic was very deep. Read more>>

Capt Dab

I have been putting a mixtape together called “Capt. Dab Presents: The Purple Strain” It’s a tribute mixtape to my favorite artist of all time: Prince. Prince was a huge part of my childhood and was one of my mother’s favorite artists.
She passed due to Stage 4 Cancer in 3 major organs literally within 48 hrs of my daughter being born.
This mixtape is to pay homage to her as well. And the mixtape is to also pay honor to my son, whom I named Prince. Read more>>

Troy Castellano

I would say that is my non-profit Instruments For Education. IFE, for short, was started in 2018 after I saw a video of a teacher in Nashville teaching with music. I could see how the kids were engaged. They wrote the lyrics, learned the science, and sang songs about what they were learning. It made it so fun for the kids. As a songwriter here in music city, I see a lot of dusty instruments sitting around. I thought if I asked if they would donate the instrument to me and I could get into a classroom or a student’s hands I could be a liaison to facilitate that. Read more>>

McKenna Bailey

The most meaningful project I’ve worked on has to be my latest EP, “Home”. This EP became everything to me from moments of love, heartbreak, family and more but the song I’m most proud of from this is called, “My Last Name”. I recently just got married this October and it’s about eventually changing my last name, the relationship I have with my dad, and basically how my day will be with out him. My parents got divorced when I was around the age of five, and I finally was able to write a song about how my dad wouldn’t be walking me down the aisle at the end of the day. Read more>>

Rajkumar Ramalingam

The vision emerged in the form of Master Degree Thesis, Beautiful Chaos: Art of being slow, less and small. Imagine an architectural space that tells a story about food that is made locally, is affordable and provides healthier choices. Fast food chains provide easy accessibility to food, but they rarely offer healthy options. This system converts chefs into laborers, and transforms the kitchen into a factory, sacrificing the artistry of making. This has produced a monotonous culinary culture, corrupting distinction with bland, uniform tastes and experiences of food. Beautiful Chaos proposes a methodology by creating a small themed experience. In a key urban environment (a Savannah public square), the design proposal transforms an underutilized area into a cultural hub, where making slow food draws people together. Slow food requires a nurturing community, sensitivity to seasons, and connectedness to the environment. Read more>>

Darianne Tolbert

Unlike many creatives, I stumbled into a passion byway of curiosity. Two weeks before college, I was asked “what do you want to pursue in a career?” I replied, “I want to tell people’s stories”. At the time that answer seemed so simple and vague, but I did not know it would take me on a wild ride that started with a degree in Political Communications, and has led to the establishing of a content studio and hub for collaborative, creative storytelling in the deep south. Yeah, ‘wow’ is the word that comes to my mind as well! Read more>>

Maddie Shutes

Out of the work I’ve done, the most meaningful project to me has to be photographing one of my best friends & models, Ella. A couple years ago, she was diagnosed with stage 4 Fibrolamellar carcinoma; a horrible, aggressive & rare liver cancer that has affected every aspect of her life, including her image of herself. She lives in Colorado, but I am lucky enough to be able to visit her multiple times a year. On one of my recent trips out, we had the opportunity for an impromptu photoshoot in a creek in the mountains. Read more>>

Daniel Bass

I believe that my most meaningful project was my first album “Urban Missionary”. I have been doing music since I was about 9 years old. I have done songs with multiple people on their projects and never really had the means or the time to create .y own album. In the last 9 years I have had some very powerful life changing experiences and I was motivated to share my life through my music. So my first album is a statement of who I am, where I am from, and where I am going. I named it Urban Missionary because I believe that God allowed me to go through everything I did in the streets to send me back into the streets to help others. Read more>>

Lenji Jacob

It is amazing when you discover a new journey through your journey. At a very young age I was introduced to theater by my father and as a stage artist the emphasis prevailed towards expressions and emotions. He used to always say that “you become a successful artist when the audience sitting in the last row of the theater can see and get involved with the emotions you are attempting to display.” Read more>>

Will Bradford

Right now I’m finishing up a documentary about gentrification in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. It’s a coveted neighborhood that used to be known as the Black Bohemia of New York, because of all the artists, writers, and musicians of color that were living there. But in less than twenty years the whole identity of the neighborhood was pulled apart. I wanted to understand how that happened, and then share the story, because the same thing is happening to historically Black and Latino neighborhoods across the city and the country. Read more>>

Nolli Brothers

Nolli Brothers is a peculiar country, folk Brazilian Band, acting in this segment since 1997. With a successful history in spreading country music throughout. Brazilian grounds, Nolli Brothers gathers the influence of modern American country music with Brazilian sounds and instruments. Writing it’s own songs in Portuguese and in English and investing in country-pop/rock sounds, with a hint of country-flavored versions, mixing the “Brazilianesses” influences to their country influences, the band is proud of it’s originality. Read more>>

Karen Waldrup

The most meaningful project I have ever been a part of is working with Mission of Hope: Haiti. I got involved with Mission of Hope in 2018 and was very surprised by the request to partner with the charity. I felt like it was a huge compliment but I had no idea how God was calling me to help. I agreed to travel to Haiti and let God figure out the rest. We travelled to Haiti and went village to village playing country music with my saxophone player, Chris Schaffner, and my co-writer, Mel King. Read more>>

Uri Gurvich

One of the most meaningful projects I have worked on is an album I did in 2013, called BabEl, which was released on John Zorn’s label, Tzadik Records. BabEl happened at an important point in my life of exploration and growth, both musically and personally. This project brought together my multi-national Quartet with Leo Genovese on piano from Argentina, Peter Slavov on bass from Bulgaria and Francisco Mela on drums from Cuba and a special guest, the Moroccan multi-instrumentalist, Brahim Fribgane, who played oud and percussion on the album. Read more>>

Angelica Leontyne

Currently I am working on a project entitled “In Her Feelings” Dance Project. I was born in Los Angeles, California & before moving to Atlanta, GA, I lived in Downtown Los Angeles in a one room apartment with a mother battling drug addiction & paranoid schizophrenia. I’ve been dealing with anxiety all of my life and later realized in my adult life, that my childhood truly had an affect on me. The anxiety comes through my skin, to where I break out in hives, I’ve always thought it was eczema. Read more>>

Cole Mitchek

One really meaningful project that comes to mind with smallsongs is a recent video I did of Thee Sacred Souls at The Telluride Blues & Brews Fest last month. My older brother Justin was there to help film a few songs from their set as we followed the lead singer through the crowd singing a couple tunes. There was a special energy in the air. The moments weren’t planned. We were just there to capture the aforementioned energy. Read more>>

Jeni Reynolds

I am currently working on an exhibit that covers depression, anxiety, ptsd, and recovery. It began in the midst of my own bout. I started this body of work on a challenge to paint a painting per week, to help me have something to focus on. It became my story of survival. I painted what I was feeling in my lowest lows in an attempt to describe my feelings. I started painting very emotional stuff, and then decided to scatter in more positive ones to help ease the spiral that I was in. Read more>>

Rahlou and Que Sera

The most meaningful project we have worked on is our latest EP titled ‘A Trip Through Brooklyn’. We started writing this project right after we returned from a three month trip to Europe and Africa, in which we promoted our first project and added onto our resume as international DJs and performing artists. After being gone for a while, we came back to Brooklyn and marveled at the energy and pace of the city! We met in Atlanta, but for many years Brooklyn has been our home. Read more>>

ricky lee gordon

From very early on i was a doer and constantly have been building projects since i was 18. I have founded and successfully run a clothing company, gallery, artist residency, conceptual advertising agency and a school rejuvenation program all by the age of 27, I then decided to focus only on my own art and painting realizing I was a on a crusade to change the world and needed to start working inwards, That set me on the path for immense and beautiful shifts in my life, constant travel , adventure ,inspiring connections and friendships. Read more>>

Tommy Capps

As a musician, I had been in bands or collaborated with other artists most of my life, usually as the drummer. In 2015, I realized I wanted more control of the artistic direction of the music I worked on and began composing myself. The foundation of work was with the piano and started branching out from there. I started playing as a jazz pianist in town at restaurants and bars, but my passion was recording piano-based, atmospheric, soundtrack-esque compositions . Read more>>

Dawn Mayes

The most meaningful project I’ve done to date is a community project called “The Urban Quilt” It was a homage to Black Panther with a series of community art classes that I facilitated in which each month I would teach about a real African tribe, their way of life, culture, traditions and attire. Then I would challenge the participants to paint something that they learned about the tribe or what inspired them about the tribe. The classes took place from May-August 2018. We discussed the Wakanda tribes while comparing them to the Massai, Dahomey Amazons, the Himba, and Surma tribes. Read more>>

Jared Mcphoy

The most meaningful project I have ever worked on would be my debut memoir, “By Grace Through Faith: A Journey of Self Discovery.” My reason for this is because if you would have asked me this question three years ago, I would have said, “no” it did not feel like something that was possible for me since I was very insecure about my writing abilities. I remembered going to the University of Guyana where I pursued a bachelor’s degree in Education English (Secondary), I was expected to write a lot of essays for the English courses I was pursuing. Read more>>

Jeff Beck

My wife Adrienne Lortie and I started a project in our Hometown of Thomasville, NC called Tville Mural Project. We came up with the project to help beautify our Downtown as well as help bring foot traffic and visitors to our local businesses. We reached out to local businesses to see if anyone had walls they were willing to donate for us to paint the murals on. We initially had three different businesses reach out to us and express interest in being a part of our project. Read more>>

Nicole Malcolm

Nicole Malcolm Places You Pass 8’x10’x11’ Installation/Mixed Media: Screen print on handmade abaca paper, screen print on Tyvek, original lyrics and songwriting, bookbinding, handmade cotton rag paper, found objects (desk, chair, lamp, string lights, wall paint, rug, radio, headphones, etc) This installation piece was my senior thesis project, culminating my time at Ohio University in Athens, OH. Read more>>

Jonivan Jones

My latest finalized full length album of songs (due to be released in December) has been the most meaningful or the heaviest, it’s the peak of the last few years in regards to writing & recording music and also it’s the sum of the experiences during those years as well. I guess the backstory is that the road map I took to get here was just archaic and wild and I spent a lot of years experimenting with music and content that I created. I spent many of those years crawling around in the dark and fighting my own battles with depression and my identity.. Read more>>

Laura Colomb

Most of my creative projects have been impacted by the locations where I live, so when I first moved to Florida, I found myself needing to reinvent my practice. I came to Florida from upstate New York, where I grew up, and while I found the adjustment to this new place fun and hilarious in many ways, I did really struggle in other ways. While trying to figure out how I could fit in here, I took to the natural areas, hiking and swimming. Read more>>

Jane Skoch

It’s really challenging to select the most meaningful project I’ve worked on because the nature of my creations means that everything I work on has meaning to my clients. And knowing this give me great joy. One of the most meaningful projects was a personal one. My son is a jazz pianists. In college, he studied piano under Mark Flugge, a gifted musician and kind soul. Throughout those college years, my son grew close to his teacher and we had many opportunities to hear him play. Read more>>

Harley and Kaiti Wallen

We’ve been making films a while now with 11 Feature Films, a full season of a TV Series and 5 short films leading up to it. Something really special happened when we took on the True Story of Nicole Beverly “Finding Nicole”! Our lawyer Bill Dobreff dropped the story off in our lap after having the conversation with Nicole about making a film of her story and brought it to us. Bill had no idea how close to home this was for me (Harley) as I grew up in a Domestic Violence home and have never been very comfortable sharing much of this with others but it gave me a sense that I could tell this story and essentially be a small voice of Nicole’s two sons. Read more>>

Pamela Maynard

My memorial pieces are all meaningful projects to me. I preserve everything from funeral flowers to cremains in resin, and each project brings me a sense of accomplishment and joy. My most meaningful, though, was a resin cross preserving funeral flowers for a 3 year old boy who died. His family is local and the story was in the news, so it’s a high-profile case. Being able to bring that family a little bit of comfort during their loss is so rewarding. Read more>>

Jai’koa Parham

One of my favorite projects I’ve done would have to be when I partnered with Reebok and Champs. They reached out to me to do a social media collaboration in which they sent me over 20 pairs of the latest basketball legend Allen Iverson’s inspired shoe. I contacted a good friend of mine at a local high school where we gave all the shoes to the boys and girls basketball team. Being able to give back to the community always makes me happy! Read more>>