Seeding Justice is pleased to recognize the most recent winners of the Lilla Jewel Awards, Erica Alexia Ledesma and Dharma Mirza. The awards—named for the artist, feminist, and suffragist—support Oregon-based artists of marginalized genders advancing social change.
In recognizing the power of art and the work of awardees, Executive Director Se-ah-dom Edmo says, “Art has always been central to social change. Think of the songs that carried the Civil Rights Movement. The murals that reclaim public space. The poetry that refuses to forget. Art doesn’t just reflect the world—it shapes it. Erica and Dharma shape it.”
The awards were announced on October 2 at the Portland Art Museum during Seeding Justice’s Within Reach gala, which marked the organization’s 50th anniversary.
Erica Alexia Ledesma (she/they) is a first-generation Xicana visual artist, cultural worker, and organizer born and raised in Southern Oregon, with deep roots in Nayarit and Zacatecas, México. Her multidisciplinary practice brings together screen printing, mixed media, digital illustration, and oral storytelling to explore identity, culture, and the political.
Through projects like Noche de Cuentos and De La Raíz, Erica creates spaces that uplift Latine stories, honor lived experiences, and carry knowledge and culture through oral tradition. Her art is deeply rooted in community organizing and activism, with artwork and public art installations supporting movements and community efforts locally and nationally.
At the heart of Erica’s practice is a commitment to reclaiming narratives, making culture visible, and creating space for communities to see themselves reflected in the stories being told. She hopes to continue growing a creative practice that weaves together visual art, storytelling, and community; expands opportunities for Latine artists and storytellers; and helps cultivate a future where our stories and cultural ways are celebrated.
What gives her strength are her grandparents, who spent the final 15 years of their lives in the Rogue Valley. They brought with them stories, and sacred maíz seeds that her family continues to grow each year, reminding Erica that culture is something we inherit, nurture, and carry forward.
Dharmakrishna Mirza (she/they) is an artist, scholar, researcher, and cultural health community educator based in Corvallis, Oregon, where she currently attends Oregon State University. Dharma is pursuing a PhD in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and Public Health.
Dharma is part of the Khwaja Sira/Hijra community, an Indigenous gender and ethnic community in South Asia. As a mixed-race trans femme of color and a queer, intersex, first generation Pakistani Muslim immigrant, Dharma finds solace in art as a means of making sense of a world that often assumes women like her simply could not exist. As a public official, Dharma serves on numerous boards and commissions and in appointed council positions.
In the community, Dharma uses performance art, spectacle, and resistance punk drag to embody the theory and resistance she teaches about in her classrooms. Dharma is the mother of a local drag family, the Haus of Dharma, where she blends American ballroom culture with the surviving Hijra gender performance traditions of her Pakistani heritage. Through a variety of subversive characters, Dharma challenges gender normativity, critiques white supremacist cultural expectations of purity and professionalism, and carves a gender fucked pathway of liberation for the next generation of trans femme leaders and visionaries.
Dharma hosts a variety of drag performances, gallery installations, and talks across the Willamette Valley. When she is not performing, Dharma serves as the Director of Development and Research for the Rural Rainbow Coalition, where she works to establish Corvallis’ first permanent, community based LGBTQI+ community center and cultural kitchen while revitalizing the Corvallis Pride Festival.
