Healing Lives Through the Arts and Music

There is power in the arts and music—power to inspire, to connect, to restore. Individuals and communities affected by trauma and abuse can experience this truth. Our mission is to bring it to them.

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We're On A Mission

Premier Arts Collective is an experiential nonprofit organization that uses the arts as a vehicle of healing and hope.

When people experience trauma in their lives, the process of healing and recovery can be complicated. Often, the pain from the memories and scars is too difficult to be spoken or even written. Self-expression through the arts and music helps to heal wounds and pave paths for recovery unlike anything else. It allows children and adults to be themselves, free of judgment and fear.
Our Mission

Our Programs

Travel with us around the globe as we seek to offer healing and hope through the arts to serve the underprivileged and those affected by trauma and abuse.
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How We Do It

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Identify

Through our partners, donors, and research, we identify communities that are in great need of healing. We thoroughly vet each community and partner to ensure that the arts will be the right path for healing.
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Partner

Once a community or organization is identified, we then look for stable partners in that area to come alongside us as we work to develop a specific arts- and/or music-based curriculum for those they serve.
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Impact

Once established, the impact of the arts and music brings life to individuals and communities at large. Cycles are broken, souls begin healing, and communities are empowered to live new and changed lives.

Stories of Transformation

Our Partners and Sponsors
Premier Productions
KLove
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Greenville Journal
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Become a Curator of Change

Join the collection of those looking to make a sustainable change around the world through the arts and music. Your donation can go even further by committing to give monthly.
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Get Involved with Premier Arts Collective

Interested in being a part of the work we are doing? Learn about upcoming events, volunteer opportunities, and other ways you can become involved in the PAC mission.
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DAVID (Nu-Day Academy)

David has been blind since the age of two, but that has not stopped him from pursuing his passion for music. Nu-Day Academy awakened his musical interests, challenged him as a pianist, and propelled him forward in his journey as a musician. However, Nu-Day Academy of the Arts means much more to David than simply a place to hone his skills.

Take a look at how Nu-Day Academy has shaped David and how he is giving back to those around him.

Marielos

Marielos (Nu-Day Academy)

Marielos’ life is completely transformed because of music. Growing up in El Salvador surrounded by violence and enduring immense trauma, music created a release and allowed her to take back her life. Take a look at how Nu-Day Academy saved Marielos.

Troy Murray (A.K.A TYP)

Troy Murray was introduced to Premier in 2016. As a young aspiring artist, he found a deep connection with the organization, as well as with PAC artist Jared Emerson. As the relationship grew, Troy was open and honest about his prior struggles with alcohol and drug addiction.

He started drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana in the summer of his 8th grade year. He soon made the transition to harder drugs, and by the beginning of his sophomore year of high school, Troy had tried almost every drug available to him; always seeking to feed his daily addiction.

In 2012, at 21 years of age, Troy had been in and out of various rehabilitation centers, struggling to stay sober and falling back into addiction each time. After hitting a life-altering low point, he checked into one last facility. There he was reminded of his love of drawing and began sketching portraits of the people around him. He started immersing himself in art and daily prayer as a means to overcome his abusive urges. Art helped Troy turn his brain off and escape from past temptations. The desire to get high to survive was miraculously gone within two weeks. With every struggle and obstacle during his painful journey of staying sober, he learned a lot about the real Troy Murray. His new relationship with God revealed his true capabilities and strengths. Troy rediscovered himself with confidence; growing into the person God created him to be.

Troy has played an instrumental role in the development of Premier Arts Collective. His story of redemption and recovery is the embodiment of how art can be used as therapy to heal from life’s traumas. To give back and help others, he has taught art classes to girls in Cambodia who were victims of sex trafficking, led sessions in Cuba, performed in Jordan for Iraqi and Syrian refugees and was involved with the K-LOVE Hope Center, an inner-city, faith-based organization in Detroit. Together with Premier Arts Collective, Troy continues to share his challenges with addiction and the redeeming path to recovery, encouraging others to find healing and hope through art.

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Samuel Monterrosa

Samuel Monterrosa is the Director of Nu-Day Academy in San Salvador, El Salvador. He has been mentoring, coaching and advising students in music education for over 15 years. He is often asked how music helps. Samuel believes that for many children, music is opportunity. Music is the way out of a life of poverty and brokenness. Nu-Day Academy provides opportunities for youth to build their self-esteem through music.

Born and raised in San Salvador, Samuel believes all lasting achievement is rooted in developing good character and maturity through the daily exercise of personal responsibility. Samuel’s guidance at Nu-Day Academy has built an environment focusing on character skills.

Under Samuel’s leadership, Nu-Day Community Choir was formed. The choir has become a favorite to the entire country, performing on every national television station, at concerts and for the Salvadorian government. Samuel is also the baritone pillar in the youth band known throughout Latin America as One Love El Salvador.

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Keisha Oliver

Keisha Oliver is a social artist, community facilitator, and academic whose cross-disciplinary practice explores themes of identity, social equity and cultural heritage within the African diaspora.

She joined the University of The Bahamas in 2013 where she now works as an Assistant Professor and Head of the Visual Arts and Design Department. She is the principal of KOliver Design, a design and branding studio, and co-founder of Summer Arts Immersion, an intensive creative program for high school students. Keisha holds degrees in Graphic Design from the University for the Creative Arts and the University of The Arts London. She also contributes as an arts writer, photographer, and independent curator with creative and non-profit organizations invested in advancing Caribbean visual culture.

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Alison Hughey

Alison Hughey’s greatest passion is guiding clients in connection, comfort and communication through music. Since studying music therapy at Converse University and earning her board certification in 2010, she has served clients from 18 months of age up to 103 years old and contributed to research in community mental health and dementia care. Alison wears multiple “music hats” as a worship leader, band member, and music & wellness workshop facilitator.

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Courtney Chandler

Courtney Chandler is a board-certified art therapist, licensed professional counselor, trauma-conscious yoga teacher, and founder of HeARTS for Hope Therapy in Greenville, SC. She has a decade of experience offering expressive art therapy groups in mental health facilities, schools, detention facilities, and substance use treatment centers across the country. She loves supporting adults and teens as they navigate challenges of trauma and grief, using an integrative combination of art therapy, somatic psychotherapy, and EMDR. Motivated by the belief that everyone is innately creative and art is an expression of self-love and divine connection, she uses a holistic mind-body approach in her therapeutic practice, and feels honored to hold space for hope and healing.

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Anita Yeh Norrie

Anita Yeh Norrie (MA-Art Therapy) is passionate about creating change and improving lives through the transformative power of creating art. A life-long believer in the therapeutic and cathartic power of art, she built her career around developing programs and relationships that encourage expression, and self-realization through creativity.

While an art and design business owner, she was the vehicle of expression for her client’s vision. As an art therapist, she has created therapeutic art programs for kids, mental health programs and nonprofits; launched and operated an open art studio for a community arts center; and led hundreds of people to live a better life through their own discovery of creativity and artistic self-expression.

Anita’s current work of art is Art Power!, the nonprofit she founded in 2017 where she and her team are working to change the lives of underserved kids in Cozumel, Mexico, through their therapeutic choice-based art studio.

When not in the art studio, you can usually find Anita contemplating her next project while exploring tasty food stands and out-of-the-way eateries, wherever she may be.

Troy Murray

Troy Murray

Troy Murray, a.k.a. TYP, is a multidisciplinary artist, originally from Detroit and now based in Los Angeles. He works in a variety of mediums, typically blending painting with fabrication and 3-dimensional elements. He specializes in what he calls “alternative canvas,” where he uses 3-dimensional objects to create his substrate and paints subjects that correlate with them in order to bring a story to life in a unique way. His creativity and artwork has earned him significant acclaim and attention from art buyers around the world.

Troy is always expanding his talents by hosting compelling art shows and engaging in cutting-edge collaborations. His iconic work is featured by clients such as Little Caesars Arena in Detroit, The House of Athlete, Cincinnati Bengals and Cincinnati Reds.

Beyond expressing his creativity, Troy uses art as a charitable platform and a way to make an impact in the world, whether it’s through teaching art to children in countries across the globe, or inspiring others with his personal testimony of how art aided in his recovery from drug addiction.

Troy continues to be instrumental with inspiring the direction of Premier Arts Collective from art-related mission trips to Cambodia, Jordan and Cuba.