User:KATapley/sandbox

Kristina Applegate is an American portrait artist who founded and is the senior program director of Kids Share Workshops, established in 2008.

Kristina has twenty-five years of business development and management experience, including sixteen years of art therapy curriculum development. She focuses on cross-cultural youth projects that increase underserved populations’ access to information and civic dialogue via cultural gatherings, community events, art therapy, and storytelling workshops.

Through her organization Kids Share Workshops, Kristina has implemented initiatives such as cross-cultural awareness at the Tibetan Children’s Villages in Bylukupe, India, rural Central America coffee farming communities, Oregan, USA migrant communities, rural sub-Saharan African Communities, rural Central Vermont, USA Communities, and New England, USA communities.

In 2010, Kids Share Workshops was awarded by The United States Board on Books for cross-cultural awareness for Young Readers (USBBY) (https://www.usbby.org/news/2010-bridge-to-understanding-award-winner) in Washington DC, where the Kids Share Tibetan and Vermont Children’s Narratives resides in the Library of Congress. Kristina also worked with the Newtown/Sandy Hook community after the 2012 school shooting, using the art of expression to better support children, their parents, and teachers in healing from the traumatic events.

In 2017, Kristina co-directed a short and long-featured documentary film with USAID and World Vision in Zambia. She also aided in the production of GLOW, a music video with filmmaker Wari Om (https://www.wari.cat/video). Sophie Beem was a guest star on the trip to Zambia, where she performed for the Bimbe School community. In 2018, her films were recognized in two film festivals: InShort Films out of Nigeria and Universal Film Festival in the USA.

Kristina has two children and three stepchildren. She is married to British actor William Tapley William Tapley and divides her time between the United States and the United Kingdom.