Who We Are. . .
Ausable Valley Nor-East’r Association of Folk (AVNAF) is a 501c3 non-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of creative and performance arts in northeast Michigan with special emphasis on traditional. We define “Northeast Michigan” as I-75 & M-55 north & east to Lake Huron.
2024 Board of Directors
President: Lisa Jacob (avnafpres@noreastrfest.org
Vice President: Susan Tschiggfrey (avnafvicepres@noreastrfest.org)
Treasurer: Naomi Braun (avnafvendors@noreastrfest.org)
Secretary: Christine Matthews (avnafgrants@noreastrfest.org)
Trustees:
Eric Janetsky: avnafmusic@noreastrfest.org
Russ Barringer: mioruss@yahoo.com
Judy Wyrembelski: nephotoandarts.jw@gmail.com
Bill Cardinal: wmandruby@aol.com
Julie Sherlock: avnafworkshops@noreastrfest.org
Ray Schilling: rayschilling57@gmail.com
Lee Kitzman: lkitzman47@gmail.com
Our Mission
Our mission is to provide opportunities to learn and celebrate the diverse areas of folk culture through music and the arts.
Our Objective
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Encourage, educate, and enrich people.
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Create and provide a cultural event for the community.
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Draw an interest from outside the area to open a new venue for economic development.
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Bring together organizations and individuals.
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Establish a local performing arts stage. (WE DID IT IN 2004!!!)
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Create facilities to support the arts.
Our Purpose
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To expand facilities and educational programming related to the arts in our region.
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To plan and provide a traditional music and folk-art festival to create cultural opportunity for the community, improve potential for economic development, and attempt to define and meet the artistic needs of this community.
Our Vision: AVNAF envisions creating, at least, one quality performance stage (DONE DEAL 2004) and possibly other public facilities on the site it utilizes, with the hope to expand improvements to other artistically related public sites. We strive to provide subsidy to artistic educational programs within our region. We plan to achieve this by hosting a sought-after annual musical and art event requiring a cap on ticket sales, able to support its own office with paid receptionists, expanding to include quality exhibits of the traditional arts from all media and increasing educational sessions. All donations are tax deductible!
