Wisdom Weavers Session 12 - Healing-Centered Conflict Resolution

Giovianna Burrell (she/her) is committed to the work of education and healing with their ability to create authentic change. She has a Bachelor of Science in Family/Child Studies with a Minor in Dance. In 2019, she received her Masters of Art in Educational Leadership, Policy & Administration where she wrote her thesis on the mental health impacts of the education system on Black women and girls and it’s false promises of “liberation”. Both degrees are from the University of New Mexico.

Giovianna has worked in the field of education for over 10 years in various settings from public/community schools to non-profit. Giovianna’s work in education includes developing and managing educational programming for youth, teens, young adults, and in her previous role with adults as she was appointed to the City of Albuquerque Office of Equity & Inclusion as the first Culture Change Leader. She has recently transitioned to the Public Health Institute (based in Oakland, CA) as a Program Manager (Co-Lead) developing & implementing racial equity, anti-racism, and social justice curriculum for the Capitol Collaborative for Race & Equity (CCORE) that is a learning and capacity building program for California state employees. In August 2023, she visioned & launched a healing learning cohort for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color state employees and community members in California called the CCORE Transformative Leadership Cohort. Although, her work is based in California now, she is still lives and works in Albuquerque, New Mexico which she has been for the past 15 years. She also created and facilitated many meaningful workshop spaces to critically dialogue about race, gender, intersectionality, and other social justice topics. Supporting Black, Indigenous folx and communities of color to reach their greatest potential through education, embodiment, and healing is where her passion lies in this work. Through her consulting business Saff’s Sanctuary LLC she is actualizing this passion.

Savage recently retired from Tougaloo College where she was an Associate Professor of Art and has relocated to Santa Fe, where she operates a small but highly successful grants management service for nonprofits.  In addition to maintaining a studio practice as a sculptor, Savage directs the Santa Fe Community Yoga Center’s Yoga inPrison Project, now in its second year.

Savage received a Master of Fine Arts in Sculpture from Georgia State University and holds two additional graduate-level degrees: Medical Anthropology from theUniversity of Mississippi, and Art History from Northwestern State University.  Savage received her undergraduate degree inPhotography from Mississippi Valley State University, as well as having a degree in Advertising Design from the Art Institute of Philadelphia.

Phoenix is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships. She has received the Scholar-in-Residence award from New York University on three separate occasions for her research on Euphemia Toussaint, a Haitian American who left behind the only child’s perspective of 19th-century New YorkCity. 

Savage received the 2019 Humanities Council of Mississippi Teacher of theYear Award. In 2012 Savage was awarded the Being Humans Fellowship from theInstitute of Arts and Humanities at Penn State University where she inaugurated the Human Touch Project. The United States’ State Department awarded Savage aFulbright Fellowship in 2011 where she spent a year in Nigeria conducting research on the Yoruba concept of Ori, (human head) while also investigating metal casting in the ancient city of Ile-Ife. Savage also taught at ObafemiA wolowo University during her time in Nigeria. Savage maintains her relationship with Africa as Chief Yeye Olomo Osara of Ile-Ife, Nigeria where she is a contributing member of the Osara community. Here in the United States,Savage maintains her devotion to Osara, serving as psychic medium channeling Osara, the maternal essence of water.  

Savage is widely known for her cultural writings:  Peju’s Indigo appearing in the art catalog for the exhibition Peju Layiwola, IndigoReimagined; University of Lagos, Lagos, Nigeria, 2019 and I Declare for the works of Tina M. Dunkley, Sanctuary for the Internal Enemy: AnAncestral Odyssey published by Wilmer Jennings Gallery of Kenkeleba House, NewYork, NY.  Other works by Savage have appeared in the Encyclopedia ofSlavery and Resistance, the Encyclopedia of the Blues, and the Encyclopedia ofMississippi. Savage has published two books: African Americans of Jackson, 2009and African Americans of New Orleans, 2010, featuring community histories of two iconic cities in America.

In addition to her scholarship Savage maintains a strong record of national exhibits and art residencies. In 2022 Savage was the recipient of theREVOLUTION Artist in Residency with the Santa Fe Art Institute.