Music & Art Creator // Community Arts Leader
BIo
Katie Elevitch (she/they) is a Rockland County, NY based multi-arts storytelling artist and director, an award-nominated arts educator, and the Founder and Executive Director of StorySpace Arts, a mission driven inter-generational volunteer Artist Collaborative based in Nyack, NY.
A performing artist since the age of 11, taking part in public and private school and summer theater and music programs and productions in Rockland County and NYC, Elevitch is one of the youngest theater artists to be accepted into and attend Circle in the Square’s Summer Theater Intensive at Skidmore College (1988).
As a singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and recording artist Elevitch has shared stages and written, recorded and performed with Grammy- and Emmy-Nominated jazz and rock musicians and producers, receiving critical acclaim for her live performances and her recorded projects (Village Voice, The Big Takeover, Lucid Culture).
Elevitch graduated Cum Laude from Barnard College, Columbia University (Women’s Studies/Music/Performance, B.A. 1996), studied music at Mannes College of Music/New School and was mentored by Performance Artist/Educator Holly Hughes, Dance/Theater Artist Sara Pearson, Hip Hop Artist/Activist Rha Goddess, and Jazz Artist Peter Apfelbaum.
After taking part in multiple NYC and Brooklyn, NY showcases produced by the Women’s Feminist Hip Hop/Spoken Word/Performance Artist Collectives “W.E.R.I.S.E” (led by Imani Uzuri & Rozz Nash) and “DAWTAHZ” (1998-2001), Elevitch went on to curate and produce a series of New Artist Music & Performance Showcases throughout Brooklyn, NY, including “Strange Brew” (2000-2002) and “M’Sonic Sessions” (Brooklyn Masonic Temple, 2006-2009).
Elevitch is known for her riveting, fearless live performances. She has toured Europe as a singer-songwriter and has supported her various music releases and band projects at such NYC venues as Joe’s Pub, The Blue Note, Mercury Lounge and more. As a poet and performance artist she has performed at NYC’s WOW Café, Barnard College, the Bowery Poetry Club and was a 2017 Rockland Poet’s Women’s Slam Finalist.
In 2007 Katie moved back to Rockland County to care for her aging mother and to reconnect more deeply with nature and to the healing arts. While studying for her 200 hour Yoga Teacher Training, Katie immersed herself in the lower Hudson Valley arts scene, creating strong relationships with local area musicians, theater, visual and literary artists, and arts and social justice organizers. Her focus shifted from performing to serving the community.
Since 2015 she has donated her talents to Community Benefits as a performer in support of the Rockland County Pride Center (2016), Love Yourself Organization (Union Arts Center, 2016, Invited by artist Charlotte Mouquin), Bel-Ans Art Center Women & Art Celebration (2016), Center for Safety and Change “She Is”, April 2023 and 2024/The X House, and the Arts Council of Rockland, June 2023.
In June of 2016, she instigated, organized and produced a community wide fundraiser and visibility campaign with the Nyack Art Collective for the Rockland County Pride Center in partnership with the Rockland County Pride Center, Nyack Art Collective and Casa Del Sol in Nyack, NY. The event, hosted by Drag Performer/Singer Alex Francisco featured live music including Jennifer O’Connor, as well as a live art auction and art show. The Mayor of Nyack, Jen White, wrote a letter of support and celebration for Elevitch and NAC, with Deputy Mayor Don Hammond in attendance to read it.
In January 2018, Elevitch was a recipient of a ArtsWestchester/NYSCA Community Arts Grant Award for her 2018-2019 multi-media Women’s Storytelling Project, a series of workshops, events & exhibits featuring the oral storytelling of local area women which culminated in a weekend long multi-media exhibit at Garner Art Center.
The techniques and healing justice work of the WSP originated in early 2017 when Elevitch organized, hosted & curated several Women's Storytelling Events called “Nevertheless, She...” in response to the election of President Trump and his misogynist, homophobic and racist commentary, and policies, and the #MeToo movement.
This work was directly a result of the community members who met with Elevitch in low cost or free circles, workshops, and open mics, to learn how to more deeply connect to their stories, share their stories, and help build and impact community in the process.
More questions than answers were unearthed: How can we be heard? How can we be believed? How can we support one another in real physical spaces beyond the internet? How can we make art more accessible? How can art directly impact our community? How can the community – and its stories – lead us to authentic arts programming that genuinely reflects the needs of the community? How can we inspire one another and restore a sense of personal and collective healing, empowerment, and agency despite the difficult political climate?
In response to this process, Elevitch founded StorySpace Arts, a volunteer run multi-generational artist collaborative that prioritizes, amplifies, supports and celebrates the stories and creative works/processes of Black people, LGBTQ+ people, women and allies in and around Rockland County.
She also launched, funded and directed the Downtown Nyack, NY Storefront Creative Art Spaces 95 ½ MAIN Gallery (2017-2019) and Studio 101 (2023-Present) with the intention that each space become the physical manifestation of the community who needs it - an immersive, interactive creative project unto itself - the physical homes of community storytelling for creatives, women, youth, and members of the LGBTQ+ communities.
StorySpace Arts and its incubator spaces bring people together to explore, develop and share their authentic voices and stories in safer spaces created by their own community. The ongoing monthly Open Mic Program for All (2018-present) is an example of one of the long running programs of StorySpace Arts that is heralded by supporters and participants as truly accessible to all.
At the end of Elevitch’s March 2020 TedX talk at Bergen Community College: “Community Story Space as Revolution” - unknowingly prepared and performed on the eve of a worldwide Pandemic - Elevitch asks a pointed question: “What would happen if every Main Street in America had a Community Story Space?”
Elevitch’s community focused projects and programs over the last 10+ years, and her on-going resilience during and after the Pandemic, has shown that Rockland County, Nyack and the surrounding area has immensely benefited from her artistry, vision and leadership.