SICA-USA Board

Chair/Secretary – (Elected November 20, 2020) Paul E Nelson is a poet & interviewer. He founded SPLAB (Seattle Poetics LAB) & the Cascadia Poetry Festival. Since 1993, SPLAB has produced hundreds of poetry events & 600 hours of interview programming with legendary poets & whole systems activists including Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Joanne Kyger, Robin Blaser, Diane di Prima, Brenda Hillman & many others. Books include American Prophets (interviews 1994-2012) American Sentences (2015) A Time Before Slaughter (2009) and Organic in Cascadia: A Sequence of Energies (2013). Co-Editor of Make It True: Poetry From Cascadia, Samthology: A Tribute to Sam Hamill, Make it True meets Medusario and 56 Days of August: Poetry Postcards. Winner of the 2014 Robin Blaser Award from The Capilano Review, he is engaged in a 20 year bioregional cultural investigation of Cascadia, lives in Seattle’s Rainier Beach neighborhood, in the Cascadia bioregion’s Cedar River watershed and serves as literary executor for the late poet Sam Hamill.

Past Chair – Hamilton Cheifetz has been described in Fanfare Magazine as “unquestionably a magnificent player” for his solo recordings, and he has performed throughout the U.S. and Canada as well as in Europe, Australia and Asia. Recent concerts include an appearance as guest artist with the Takacs Quartet, and he is professor of cello at Portland State University and a founding member of the Florestan Trio with Carol Sindell and Janet Guggenheim. Videos online at hamiltoncheifetz.com, and downloads and CDs available on iTunes, Spotify and Amazon.

Ralph Davila (Acting Treasurer) belongs to the Subud 50-year club. He’s held a variety of administrative positions for Subud: both locally & regionally, served as a local & regional helper & has been both a participant & developer of several Subud enterprises. Currently the Rental Coordinator for Subud Santa Cruz “Centerprise” Ralph’s media career began as the Business Manger for a Country/Rock band. He later built his own marketing/sales/magazine distribution business, partnering with major retailers in the U.S. During that same time, Ralph acquired a bookstore/newsstand. After selling his businesses, Ralph went to work for a non-profit media reform organization whose purpose was to expand the power and influence of independent magazines to an “underserved community” i.e. all of us. For fun and peace of mind, Ralph listens to music, builds projects at Burning Man, enjoys camping, river rafting, cooking and travel to faraway places. Ralph is happily married (49 years) with 4 amazing adult children 2 fantastically fabulous grand children.

Lawrence Pevec

I was born in North Eastern Ohio, on a small farm where I enjoyed a rural, natural childhood that involved playing hard in nature; camping, hunting, swimming in the creeks, and working on local farms in the summer. After high school I attended The Columbus College of Art and Design in Columbus, Ohio and spent four years there. I developed a lifelong appreciation for all aspects of art, design and culture that became my career and spanned several design disciplines including graphic design, interpretive and commercial exhibit design, interior design, architecture, and, finally, motion picture production design. I designed sets and props for TV series, movies of the week, and feature films. My fine arts activities included creation of a body of work while living in Portugal and later in Portland. I went back to school in 2003 to acquire a MA in Leadership and Training at Royal Rhodes University in Victoria, BC. I currently live in Boulder, Colorado, have a small business and enjoy working with World Subud Association Archives editing video contributions to the archives collection.

Sanderson Morgan lives in Eureka, California and is a member of the Subud California at Arcata Center. At Arcata he is currently the Center Chair, House Co-ordinator and a Men’s Helper.  He served as a California Regional Helper 2010 to 2014. Sanderson taught Art at Humboldt State University from 1980 to 2010 with a specialization in Museum Studies and a secondary teaching area of drawing.

From 1980 to 2005 he was the Director of the Reese Bullen Gallery and produced and curated 6 to 7 exhibitions a year. Prior to this he worked at the University Art Museum at the University of California (now the Berkeley Art Museum). With a BFA and MFA in Painting (Lone Mountain College and Art Academy College, now University) San Francisco, he maintains a studio practice and exhibition activity as both an artist and as a curator. He joined the SICA-USA Board on January 17, 2021.

Lauren Woodward Stanley is a practicing architect, advocate of nature in cities, outdoor enthusiast, and dabbling artist.  She lives with her husband Lars, another architect and blacksmith, and two sons in Austin, Texas.  A native east coaster, she found herself in Texas for grad school, the Pacific Northwest for 9 years, and bouncing back to central Texas in 2005, where she continues to create the home base she shares with her family, a two-acre compound that includes their residence, studio, metal shop, and permaculture-based gardens.  While making buildings and spaces remains her career focus, she allows herself much divergence, following other pursuits like writing, playing music, yoga and long walks, and lots of civic engagement.  She is a proponent of sustainable living, thinking across disciplines, deep ecology, idea brainstorms, art that breathes, and planting trees.

Susannah Rosenthal came to Subud when her cousin met a man who thought he was Lewis Carroll reincarnated.  Opened in 1967 at Miriam Ralph’s farm in New Hope Pennsylvania, she attended latihans in NYC and Brooklyn while she worked as a designer of exhibitions and products at Hallmark Gallery on 5th Avenue. After a psychic told her she would have a new job, she was hired by Mattel and moved to Manhattan Beach,

Michal Brownell is a National Helper liaison to SICA. She was opened in 1972 in Bangkok and has been a Regional Helper on the East Coast of the U.S. and in London, UK. Married with 4 kids (2 in Subud) she has lived in Europe and Asia. She’s worked as teacher, waitress, reporter, copy editor, editorial assistant, is retired and living in coastal Rhode Island.