fpo-wa-about-hero.jpg
 

About

We envision a future where society values care. To get there, society has to see care. 

At Working Assumptions, we think in pictures. We remember in pictures. We make jokes in pictures. We talk in pictures. 

Strong pictures and good art feed us with energy and propel us. We love making things. We experiment. We let ideas emerge from photographs, and we don’t rush good ideas. 

We make art happen about work and family.

 
 

Teaching Artists

 

Alice Proujansky
Portfolio

Christine Hochkeppel
Portfolio

Dawn LeBeau
Portfolio

George P. Perez
Portfolio

Joanne Miller
Portfolio

 

Joshua David Watson
Portfolio

Mark Leong
Portfolio

Rick Ney
Portfolio

Shannon Oden
Portfolio

 
 
 

Our Team

 

Alice Proujansky
Art Education and Art Experience Advisor

Alice is a documentary photographer and writer covering women and labor: birth, work, motherhood and identity. She is currently working on Hard Times are Fighting Times, a project about the legacy of radical activism in her family; photo essays about culturally-responsive maternal healthcare; and photography workshops. Alice has taught photography since 2002. Her first book, Go Photo! An Activity Book for Kids was published by Aperture.

 

Chad Coerver
President

Chad believes deeply in art’s capacity to transform our perceptions of the world and inspire new ways of thinking, and he has dedicated his career as an arts leader to exploring creative approaches to public programming, digital outreach, and community building. He has served as Executive Director of The Contemporary Jewish Museum (2021-2023) and led content strategy, education, and community engagement in multiple roles at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (1999-2021).

 
 

Eve Biddle
Creative Advisor

Eve is an artist, culture maker, and collaborator. Her work lies at the intersection of making objects, making connections between people, curating, building projects and institutions, helping to bring other artists’ art into the world, and making and facilitating public art. She’s a founding co-director of the Wassaic Project, home to a year-round artist residency program, art exhibitions, music festivals, and art education programs for kids, teens, and adults.

 

Geoffrey Biddle
Curator and Photographer

Geoffrey co-curated Game Face and Showing (work x family). He was a location photographer for 20 years and taught at Parsons where he was also assistant chair of the Photography Department for six years. His books include Alphabet City, Sydney and Flora, and God Bless America. His Alphabet City photographs and papers were acquired by The New York Public Library in 2017. His recently released companion memoirs are Rock in a Landslide and Eve and Me.

 
 

Jane Gottesman
Founding Director

Jane was one of the few journalists in the ‘90s covering the systemic implications of girls and women having fair access to school-based athletics. She created the exhibition, book, and education project, Game Face: What Does a Female Athlete Look Like? Building on sports-informed insights about the interplay between women’s bodies and women’s public authority, Jane developed Showing: Pregnancy in the Workplace, Showing (work x family), and wrkxfmly.

 

Jennifer Edwards
Director of Content Strategy

Jennifer is a multifaceted creative guided by a deep love of listening and learning paired with an innate ability to hold space for complexity. She is passionate about projects that center equity and make the intangible, visible. An alumna of New York University (Tisch), The New School (Milano), the OpEd Project, she toured North America, Europe, and China as a spoken word artist, performer, teacher, and choreographer. Jennifer has built story-telling programs with communities across the country and for Georgia Tech, Jacob's Pillow, NCCAkron, and The New Museum / NEW INC.

 
 

Maritza Tapia
wrkxfmly Program Coordinator

Maritza was born and raised in the Central Valley of California. Her family is native to the southern state of Michoacan. Being passionate about live music, photography, and agriculture, Maritza has dedicated her time and career to focus on uplifting the community through education. Through educational programs and opportunities like wrkxfmly, Maritza hopes to help equip youth with the necessary tools for a sustainable future in the modern world. In her spare time, Maritza makes her own photographs and attends local live music events.

 

Rubi Alcazar
Administrative Manager

A Bay Area native, Rubi studied economics and sociology at Santa Clara University. Passionate about education, cultural/social structural systems and community, her career began with working with marginalized students in both public schools and private institutions. After several years of operational and administrative support at an investment bank focused on sustainable technology and infrastructure, Rubi is happy to turn back to more community-oriented work.

 
 

Trudy Wilner Stack
Curator and Project Consultant

A writer and independent curator, Trudy has originated, organized, and consulted on photography, contemporary art, and cultural projects for more than 30 years. Formerly in curatorial posts at numerous museums, today she works with artists, estates, and organizations with a focus on post-1945 American photography, unconventional and popular contexts for art and vernacular photography, and current social and economic issues mediated through imagery.