Stewardship & Governance
Forge Project is a Native-led non-profit organization whose mandate is to cultivate and advance Indigenous self-determination in relation to all facets of lived and cultural practice.
Forge Project is a model for Native cultural leadership, mobilizing tangible support for long-practiced, experiential and emergent knowledge to build community, public education, and collective action.
We practice self-determination by imagining, articulating, and enacting life in alignment with Indigenous worldviews. This Indigenous worldbuilding is multi-sited, cross disciplinary, reparative, and committed to futurity.
Stewardship & Self-Determination
Forge Project is a collectively held and collectively stewarded organization, enacting Indigenous self-determination through knowledge sharing, education, language regeneration, wealth redistribution, and Indigenous governance as the core of our framework.
We understand self-determination as “the practice of imagining, articulating, and asserting life in alignment with Indigenous worldviews, inclusive of ethical, embodied, relational, material, intellectual, philosophical, political, and cultural frameworks.”
Indigenous Leadership & Governance
Forge Project centers continuous and collective Indigenous governance as the foundation of our organizational framework.
We are governed by three interconnected bodies: the Indigenous Steering Council, the Board of Directors, and Organizational Co-Leadership.
Forge Project’s Indigenous Steering Council (ISC) — a regionally diverse, intergenerational group of Indigenous leaders — sets high-level priorities and guides the long-term direction of the organization.
Sky Hopinka (Ho-Chunk Nation/Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians), Chair
Jolene Rickard (Tuscarora Nation, Turtle Clan), Vice-Chair
Jeffrey Gibson ((Mississippi Band of Choctaw and Cherokee)
Jasmine Neosh (Menominee)G. Peter Jemison (Seneca Nation, Heron Clan), Emeritus
Kerry Swanson (Michipicoten First Nation), Chair Emeritus
Monique Tyndall (Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohicans), Emeritus
The Indigenous Steering Council holds an anchoring role within Forge’s governance model, working in close relation with and advising the Board of Directors and organizational co-leadership.
Mimi Joh-Carnella, President
John Haworth (Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma), Treasurer
Sky Hopinka (Ho-Chunk/Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians), Secretary and ISC Liaison
Jolene Rickard (Tuscarora Nation, Turtle Clan), ISC Liaison
Scott Allocco
Bidtah Becker (Citizen of Navajo Nation)
Kent Monkman (Cree, Fisher River Band)
Kerry Swanson (Michipicoten First Nation)Forge's day-to-day operations are co-led by Executive Director & Chief Curator Candice Hopkins (Carcross/Tagish First Nation) and Director of Relational EducationIndigenous Programs & Relationality Sarah Biscarra Dilley (yaktitʸutitʸu yaktiłhini [Northern Chumash]).
Forge Project is recognized as a 501(c)3 non-profit entity with the US Internal Revenue Service. Our IRS Form 990 financial reports are posted by year:
2024
Our Story
In 2024, Forge Project incorporated as a nonprofit, enacting Indigenous-led governance structures and ensuring the organization’s sustainability and long-term impact.
Forge Project was initially established as a private organization in 2021 by co-founders Becky Gochman and Zach Feuer with the aim of facilitating an immediate, direct impact within the arts and cultural landscape.
The transition to non-profit affirmed Indigenous self-determination by providing complete agency to Forge’s Native leadership to collectively shape the future of the organization. It has also allowed us to expand our ecosystem as an organization, offering new ways for the public and individual donors to join in efforts to invest in Indigenous futures and counter historical and ongoing inequities through the redistribution of resources and wealth.
Under the co-leadership of Executive Director & Chief Curator Candice Hopkins (Carcross/Tagish First Nation) and Director of Relational Education Sarah Biscarra Dilley (yaktityutityu yaktiłhini [Northern Chumash]), Forge has directly supported over 300 Indigenous artists, cultural practitioners, and knowledge keepers, and built new audiences and platforms for their work.
Diplomatic Relations
Forge’s work is grounded in our ongoing relationship with the Stockbridge-Munsee Community, centering our responsibility to homelands peoples.
As a Native-led organization in Stockbridge-Munsee homelands, we are working to enact responsibility to and ground core facets of our work in ongoing relationship with the relational landscape we work within.
In 2023, we worked with the Stockbridge-Munsee Community Cultural Affairs Department to outline shared priorities and activities in a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), which was reviewed by the SMC Legal Department and approved by Tribal Council in March 2024. The MOU outlines key points of working together, including the SMC Fellowship, a cultural easement, and support for community programming led by SMC.
This MOU was set for 2024 to 2026, allowing for priorities and activities to shift as our relationship evolves. As the current iteration of this agreement comes to a close, we are drafting revisions to the MOU with thoughtful consideration and outreach to understand shared capacity, collective vision, and opportunities to directly support self-determined work led by SMC in years to come.