Christine Her at ArtForce Iowa. Photo: Duane Tinkey
Writer: Anthony Taylor
Christine Her stands in the flooded offices of ArtForce Iowa. It’s July 1, 2018, and Her, then 27, has been in her position as ArtForce’s executive director for less than a year. She’s surveying the damage from the day before, when a flash flood sent 2 feet of brackish water swirling through the nonprofit’s workspace, carrying away or destroying $100,000 worth of supplies along the way.
It was time to get to work.
Born in Des Moines, the second daughter of Hmong refugees watched her older sister live out the life that Her calls “every immigrant parent’s dream”: class valedictorian at East High School, medical degree, a prestigious job after college. Meanwhile, Her’s passions were always more artistic than her sister’s, a fact her parents did their level best to redirect. “For them, success is money,” she said. “It’s an important degree. Doctor. Lawyer. They never wanted me to sing or play music.”
But where family encouragement and support fell short, Her filled the gaps with a dogged self determination. Talk to anyone who works with her or knows her well, and you’ll come to the same understanding, again and again: Do not ever bet against this woman.
Her graduated from East in 2008, received a scholarship to attend Drake University, made the president’s and dean’s lists and graduated with her B.A. in 2012. After working in human services for a couple of years, Her was approached by ArtForce’s program director about possibly coming on board. Founded in 2013, ArtForce offers arts and self-advocacy programs for disadvantaged and immigrant communities, and Her seemed like a natural fit.
They said, “You’re not white, and you sing and write and play your own music,” Her recalled. “We’re frankly struggling to find artists who look like you to mentor young kids who also look like you.”
John Mark Feilmeyer, the executive director at the time, was determined to recruit classically trained artists, but the feedback was insistent: Just meet her.
Her’s rise through the organization was movie-montage fast. In 2015, she became an artist mentor. Less than a year later, she was managing the DSM Heroes program for young refugees, immigrants and first-generation Americans. Then in 2017, just a month after her 27th birthday, Her was tapped to be the executive director.
The promotion could not have come at a more precarious time. She was ArtForce’s third executive director in eight months. The board hadn’t seen a coherent financial statement in nearly that long, and the organization was adrift from a lack of leadership and vision. It was running on fumes. “The day I took over, we had $2,500 in the bank,” Her said. “Our rent was $2,600 a month.”
She immediately set out to right the ship and focused on raising funds and writing grants. Then, 10 months into her tenure, floodwaters rushed in and washed away nearly everything the organization had. “We had no money, and people aren’t taking me seriously because I’m young,” she recalled.
The next 18 months were a difficult, daily slog of cost-cutting, fundraising and pressure. Slowly but surely, Her started to see light at the end of the tunnel, but there was never a time that didn’t feel like survival mode.
Then came the global pandemic. It might sound counterintuitive, but this is where ArtForce’s story takes a turn for the better. ArtForce applied for and received COVID relief funding, which gave ArtForce its first breathing room in two years. Additionally, while businesses and organizations of all sizes were struggling with reductions in revenue and business, ArtForce already knew how to run lean. The team pivoted to remote programs and never dropped services.
“We just kept programming,” Her said. “And people started to notice: ‘Hey, these guys are scrappy, and they’re committed.’”
Turning that increased visibility into financial support has been a difficult kind of alchemy. Straddling the worlds of arts and social services, ArtForce fosters creativity in impoverished, immigrant and underserved communities while teaching young people to advocate for themselves. The dilemma: Arts donors often see the organization as too focused on social services, while humanities funders find its mission too arts-centered.
But Her, ever the educator, persisted in having conversations to clarify the mission.
“Explaining that, ‘Hey, part of helping these kids make art is giving them food, because how can they do anything else if they’re hungry?’” she said. “Or talking to people on the other side and explaining that a lot of the kids in these communities are surviving significant trauma, and we know art is a way to heal from that trauma.
“It was really about reminding people that we’re going to continue to do the work, and when you’re ready to be a part of this, we’re going to be here.”
For Her, a big part of doing the work is continually finding new ways to connect ArtForce youth with the greater community around them. One example is set to be unveiled at Mainframe Studios’ First Friday open house in September. The project is designed to engage young people in their own healthcare education and advocacy through the creation of pamphlets, posters and even podcasts that share information with other young people in their neighborhoods, schools and communities. It’s touched nearly every single one of the 1,200 youth in ArtForce’s orbit.
“Christine is one of those people whose authenticity and care for the community comes through from the moment you meet her,” said Tiffany Conroy, senior integrated health consultant with Iowa Primary Care Association, which collaborated with ArtForce on the project. “It can be hard as an adult to build genuine connections with young people if you’re not willing to see them as experts in their own stories and treat them as equals. I know personally and professionally the healing that can happen through art, and that’s why I’m so grateful she wanted to partner on the youth health campaign.”
Finding collaborations at the intersection of arts and social services is where ArtForce’s heart lies. It’s the combination that drives Her to keep working, keep advocating and keep finding the next grant, the next donation, the next project.
In the short term, Her hopes to establish an ArtForce endowment. It’s a heady goal that feels a world away from the listless organization with a flooded studio and $2,500 in the bank account.
She also sees an opportunity to help other organizations operating at similar crossroads connect with donors and supporters. In the meantime, she plans to keep advocating for marginalized communities and sharing their stories with people who can help.
“We don’t want people to be ‘Iowa nice.’ We want them to be ‘Iowa kind,’” she said. “Being nice is ‘I’m going to open the door for you,’ but being kind is ‘I’m going to help you find a seat once you’re in.’”
Contributing writer Anthony Taylor has covered life in Des Moines for more than 15 years and recently won a national award from the City & Regional Magazine Association. If you’d like to suggest someone he should profile, please email editors@bpcdm.com.
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