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Jessica Laskey

Journalist

About This Author

Jessica Laskey is a freelance writer and professional actress who has lived and worked in Sacramento, San Francisco, Dallas, New York City and Paris. She is also the co-founder of Theater Galatea and Indomita Press.

Articles by this author

Out & About March 2023

Find out what is going on in Sacramento during the month of March!

Sky’s The Limit

A woman dangles from the ceiling, her skirt a giant parachute. Waves of fabric undulate through the room.
Two figures in snorkeling masks dance in tandem, suspended as though swimming in mid-air.

This is not an oceanic fever dream. It’s the work of Tony Nguyen and his company TwoPoint4 Dance Theater. The company is an innovative arts group that specializes in “vertical dance,” a medium that combines modern dance with rock climbing gear to create a unique experience.

The visuals described here are from “Fragmented Memories,” an immersive performance piece Nguyen and his company members created and performed in November 2019. They updated the work and performed it again in May 2022.

100 Years of Solicitude

It might seem hard to imagine working until you’re age 87, but when you meet Mary Ellen Fort, who celebrated her 100th birthday in December, it’s easier to picture.

Though Fort loved her job at American River College, what she enjoyed most was that the work allowed her to help people. After earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees in psychology and counseling at Sacramento State, Fort taught psychology at ARC.

Then she went into counseling and eventually helped develop the Mathematics, Engineering and Science Achievement and Minority Engineering Program, which became a national standard for helping minority students get into science, math and tech studies.

Media Mixologist

When you visit mixed media artist Linda Paris’ website or East Sacramento home studio, you’ll find a treasure trove of work, from collages and paintings to dioramas of found objects. What you won’t find is the artist’s biography.

“My philosophy is I like people to interact with the work. I don’t want a provenance or bio to interfere with that,” Paris says. “It’s the piece that we’re selling, not me.”

Interacting with Paris’ work is like jumping down the rabbit hole into another world.

There’s Always A Way

One lesson Christie Martinez’s mom instilled at an early age was “there’s always a way.”

That idea stuck with Martinez as she embarked on a new career path as a digital artist who specializes in pet portraits to raise money for animal rescue organizations.

“It all starts with the thought process of giving,” says Martinez, a Sacramento native who lives in Fair Oaks with her husband and 12-year-old son. “You see all these animals in the shelters. I feel so bad for them, I wish I could take them all home. I thought, if I’m doing pet portraits, how cool would it be to partner with these organizations and donate? It’s a win-win everywhere.”