Program Details

Fredericka Foster

Artist, curator, and water activist

Fredericka Foster is an artist, curator, and activist, known for her oil paintings that focus on water-related themes. She has been recognized as a River Warrior by the Lewis Pugh Foundation for her efforts in raising “awareness about water’s profound impact on our socio-economic, environmental, and subconscious realm.”

Fredericka founded Think About Water, an artist collective of activists who work to interpret, celebrate, and defend water. Think About Water has hosted events with nonprofit organizations to highlight both the challenges facing water systems and the way water heals and replenishes the environment, providing the public with opportunities to engage with art that not only inspires but also educates and raises awareness about the critical importance of accessible water in our communities. Fredericka has exhibited her work in numerous solo and group shows in the United States and Europe.

Susan Weltman

Lifelong activist, weaver, and community builder

Susan Weltman is a passionate activist, artist, and supporter of Food & Water Watch community. Raised to believe in the power and importance of community, she joined her first picket line at Woolworths as a high schooler in the early 1960s. She later participated in Vietnam War protests and attended the first Earth Day at Washington Square Park in New York City. Professionally, Susan worked as a family therapist in the adolescent psychiatric unit of a community mental health center. During this time, her love of textiles and color drew her to weaving.  Her extensive travels inspire her artistic endeavors, whether by visiting fiber artists or being influenced by the sights she’s seen. She is an active member of Weave a Real Peace, an organization that promotes textile artists around the world. Susan is a powerful force for Food & Water Watch, serving on the benefit host committee, donating her handcrafted textiles for benefit auctions, and, true to her upbringing, inviting her community of activists and artists to Food & Water Watch’s mission. 

Matt Wechsler

Emmy-nominated environmental filmmaker

Matt Wechsler is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker whose work focuses on social and environmental issues surrounding how we grow and produce our food. His feature documentaries have screened at film festivals across the world and have been distributed by Netflix, PBS, YouTube, Peacock, and DirecTV. His 2016 film Sustainable explored the dichotomy between small-scale farming and the food industry at large. His 2019 film Right to Harm exposed the environmental injustice in rural communities caused by factory farming. Matt also executive-produced the 2020 film Last Man Fishing, which examined the corporate takeover of America’s fisheries and its devastating effects on ocean ecosystems. His latest film, The Jungle, unravels centuries of greed and exploitation in America’s meat industry.

Wenonah Hauter

Founder & Executive Director, Food & Water Watch

Wenonah Hauter is Founder and Executive Director of Food & Water Watch and Food & Water Action. She has three decades of experience campaigning on food, water, energy, and environmental issuesand is the author of the books Frackopoly and Foodopoly. She has trained and mentored hundreds of organizers and activists across the country and worked at the national, state, and local levels to develop policy positions and legislative and field strategies to secure impactful wins for communities and the environment.

Wenonah holds a master’s degree in applied anthropology from the University of Maryland and a bachelor’s degree in sociology from James Madison University.

Read Wenonah’s interview about 20years of Food & Water Watch here: Against All Odds: An Interview With Wenonah Hauter

Thomas Meyer

Strategic Organizing Projects Director, Food & Water Watch

Thomas Meyer is the Strategic Organizing Projects Director at Food & Water Watch. Based in Seattle, Washington, he works with organizers, volunteers, and coalition partners across the country to develop campaign strategies and build grassroots power. He has played a major role in multiple successful Food & Water Watch campaigns including stopping dirty energy legislation in Congress and organizing the March to End Fossil Fuels. Thomas was previously the Senior Maryland Organizer, where he led Food & Water Watch to a landmark victory with the successful campaign to ban fracking statewide. Prior to joining Food & Water Watch in 2015, Thomas attended American University where he organized a fossil fuel divestment campaign and earned a bachelor’s degree in international studies.

Ada Limón

24th U.S. Poet Laureate

Ada Limón is the author of seven books of poetry, including Startlement: New & Selected Poems; The Hurting Kind, which was a finalist for the Griffin Prize; The Carrying, which won the National Books Critics Circle Award and was a finalist for the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award; and Bright Dead Things, which was named a finalist for the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Kingsley Tufts Award. Limón is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and was named a 2024 Time Magazine Woman of the Year. She is the author of two picture books, In Praise of Mystery as well as And, Too, The Fox, and was the editor of the anthology You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World. She served as the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States.

Summit Olson

Emerging Environmental Filmmaker

Summit Olson is a nature photographer and environmental filmmaker based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is in love with the creatures that roam the Earth, going on adventures, and all things wild. Summit is dedicated to telling stories about the Earth to show how truly beautiful it is and why we need to protect it. Summit’s documentary film, Is It Worth It?, received Honorable Mention in the 2025 One Earth Young Filmmakers Contest.

Michaelyn Mankel

Senior Organizer, Food & Water Watch

Michaelyn Mankel (she/her) is a Senior Organizer with Food & Water Watch in central Iowa. Michaelyn got her start in organizing in 2018, supporting Abdul El-Sayed’s grassroots campaign for governor of Michigan. Soon after, she joined Sunrise Movement and became a leader of the local hub in Grand Rapids, MI. Her work with Sunrise brought her to Iowa in 2019, where she completed an electoral fellowship organizing students on college campuses across the state to participate in the 2020 Iowa Caucus.

Michaelyn then spent several years teaching preschool on the South Side of Des Moines and continued her political work as a volunteer with Iowa CCI (Citizens for Community Improvement), Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, and served on the steering committee for the Buffalo Rebellion Coalition before joining Food & Water Watch.

In addition to community organizing, Michaelyn is a writer, storyteller, and performing artist who uses poetry as a tool of political empowerment.

Angie Chay-Arana

Emerging Environmental Filmmaker

Angie Chay-Arana is a senior at the University of Connecticut studying Digital Media and Design. She is an emerging filmmaker with a passion for animation and storytelling. Her work is inspired by her faith and a deep appreciation for the beauty of nature, often exploring themes of hope, care, and responsibility. Her short film, If I Could Hear the Whales Sing, received Honorable Mention in the 2025 One Earth Young Filmmakers Contest and reflects her desire to use art to inspire others to protect the environment and cherish the world around them.

Maude Barlow

Board Chair, Food & Water Watch

Environmental activist and author

Maude Barlow is a Canadian activist, author, and chair of the Food & Water Watch board. Maude founded the Blue Planet Project, co-founded and chaired the Council of Canadians, serves on the Board of Advisors of the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature, and is a former Councillor with the Hamburg-based World Future Council. Until 2024, Maude served as the Chancellor of Brescia University College in London, Ontario, the last all-women’s university in Canada.

Maude is the recipient of seventeen honorary doctorates as well as many awards, including the 2005 Right Livelihood Award (known as the “Alternative Nobel”), the 2005 Lannan Foundation Cultural Freedom Fellowship Award, the Citation of Lifetime Achievement at the 2008 Canadian Environment Awards, the 2009 Earth Day Canada Outstanding Environmental Achievement Award, the 2009 Planet in Focus Eco Hero Award, and the 2011 EarthCare Award, the highest international honour of the Sierra Club (US).

In 2008-9, she served as Senior Advisor on Water to the 63rd President of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly and was a leader in the campaign to have water recognized as a human right by the UN. She is the creator of the Blue Communities project, in which municipalities pledge to protect water as a human right and a public trust and ban plastic bottled water. There are now more than 25 million people living in official Blue Community towns and cities, including Paris, Berlin, Brussels, Thessaloniki, Los Angeles, Vancouver, and Montreal.
Maude is also the author of dozens of reports, as well as 21 books, including Whose Water is it Anyway? Taking Water Protection Into Public Hands; Still Hopeful, Lessons From a Lifetime of Activism; and her upcoming book on the financialization of nature, called Earth For Sale, The Fight to Stop the Last Plunder of the Planet.

Britton Smith

Musical artist and water activist

Using art to reawaken our connection to the spirit of water

Britton Smith is the frontman of Britton & The Sting, an alternative soul band energizing the New York City music scene. The band has performed for sold-out audiences at The Apollo, Williamsburg Music Hall, Nublu, and other venues, and has been featured in publications including Vanity Fair, Vogue, Fault Magazine, and the New Yorker. Britton & The Sting created MAMA, a concept album that “reawakens our connection to the spirit of water. This essential element is alive — holding wisdom, agency, and a voice of its own, if only we listen.” Britton & The Sting will perform live at our in-person benefit on April 29 in New York City, and sit for an interview, which will be shown at our May 14 virtual program.