Creative People, Creative Places - Creative Technologies on the Mother Road
About this Event
UNM Rainforest Innovations is hosting a Creativity and Technology on the Mother Road Seminar Series in honor of the Route 66 Centennial. This seminar series brings together panels of creative people in science, technology, and the arts, highlighting STEAM and showcasing areas where technology and creativity meet.
New Mexico is full of Creative People and Creative Places at the University of New Mexico and beyond. This series serves to build connections and bridges amongst players in the Albuquerque and New Mexico creative ecosystem and engage communities of technologists and creatives whose work and mission build towards entrepreneurial economic development for the state of New Mexico.
This panel focuses on creative people and creative places at the University of New Mexico and in the community. The September event will feature museums in Albuquerque on and around NM Route 66. Panelists include:
- Leba Freed, President, WHEELS Museum, Inc.
- Alicia Romero, Head Curator, Albuquerque Museum
- Sheldon Hamilton, Director X Studio, Explora Science Center and Children’s Museum
Lunch will be provided.
Free, no cite parking available for this event.
About the Panelists:
Leba Freed, President, WHEELS Museum, Inc.
Leba Freed was born in Albuquerque and is a graduate of the University of New Mexico. She is a member of many boards, including the legislative railyards advisory board. She ran her family business for decades and began the effort to save the Rail Yards in 1994. She has worked full-time as a volunteer for 31 years with elected officials, volunteers, corporations, schools, film and many others to create the WHEELS Museum and other projects on the iconic Rail Yards. The WHEELS Museum has now served over 300,000 people from around the world, won 30 awards and has more than 10,000 rare exhibit items of historical importance.
Alicia Romero, Head Curator, Albuquerque Museum
Alicia Romero was born and raise in Albuquerque. She graduated with a BA in History and Art History and an MA in History from UNM. Romero graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz with a PhD in History following the completion of her dissertation on Albuquerque’s Barelas community. She returned to UNM in 2015 and served as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Equity and Inclusion. From 2018-2023, Romero was Curator and later Head Curator at the New Mexico History Museum and Palace of the Governors in Santa Fe. In 2023, she became Curator of History at the Albuquerque Museum and was recently promoted to Head Curator and Curator of History there in 2025. She has curated over eighteen exhibitions on Albuquerque and New Mexico history and is currently celebrating the opening of The Other Route 66: 100 Years of People, Identity, and Place in Albuquerque.
Sheldon Hamilton, Director X Studio, Explora Science Center and Children’s Museum
Sheldon Hamilton is the Director of X Studio, Explora's teen workforce development center, where he has worked in the informal education and museum fields for seven years. He believes that when young people are given space to explore both creative and technical skills, they develop a fuller picture of what a future in STEAM can look like for them, and has built programs that reflect that belief, centering access and equity for underrepresented teens in Albuquerque. Sheldon is a two-time recipient of the Association of Children's Museums Diversity in Action Fellowship and has also participated in the NMOST Out-of-School Time Leadership Institute and the Association of Science and Technology Centers New Leaders Fellowship.
Where is it happening?
Event Location & Nearby Stays:
USD 0.00
