Hi, I'm Dana. I’m an artist and creativity teacher. For over 25 years, I’ve been devoted to creativity as a transformative healing force in my own life — especially my habit of keeping journals. I’ve shared my artwork, teaching, and writing with small audiences in a variety of contexts in the Northampton & Easthampton area of Western Massachusetts.
Participatory group arts like modern dance, polyphonic shape-note singing, and playing drums in bands have also figured importantly in my ecosystem of outlets.
Inner Studio, as it originally existed, was in Easthampton, MA (2016-2019) on Cottage Street. It was my large, sunny, spacious, personal art refuge and the where I facilitated groups and started building a niche community for adults seeking artistic camaraderie and/or support in their creative recovery. My groups included musicians, songwriters, therapists, and folks with no arts background at all. My signature class was a three-month group to help people make it all the way though The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity course book by Julia Cameron. It takes you through a sequence of weekly themed reflections, activities, and practices to explore or recover your relationship with your own creativity. It is notoriously challenging to finish the course all by yourself, and that’s where the support of a group comes in!
During that era, I also taught a creative journaling class for teenagers at LightHouse Holyoke: Personalized Education for Teens.
In the 2020s: I moved twice, played drums on two EP releases (with Psychic Energy and Ex-Temper), started working on a book idea, and made whole new body of work called DECONTEXTUALIZED.
UPCOMING! October 2-5, 2026: Creativity As Countermeasure, a weekend workshop with Dana Wilde at Rowe Camp & Conference Center.
2026 NEWS: One of my new collage works was published in Contemporary Collage Magazine (UK), print and digital
2025 NEWS: I’m proud to announce that I was awarded the $5,000 Creative Individuals Grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council!
I’m a Virgo. I’ve lived and worked in Western Massachusetts for most of my life. I attended UMass Amherst as an undergrad Sociology major, then returned later through their University Without Walls program. I’ve worked a variety of day jobs while focusing on my self-guided artistic development and health/healing process over many years.
