Erik Takeshita

Erik Takeshita was a Senior Fellow to ArtPlace America, supported by the Bush Foundation, from 2019-2020. His thought partnership came from more than twenty years of culturally rooted community development experience. Erik joined the Bush Foundation as Community Creativity Portfolio Director in August of 2015. From 2008 to 2015 he led a breadth of work at the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), including launching a nationwide Creative Placemaking initiative. He was previously a senior policy aide to the mayor of Minneapolis, where he advised the framework for a 10-year Plan for Arts and Culture, and led an art center in Honolulu, Hawai’i, helping to revitalize the city’s downtown. He serves on numerous boards and commissions, and is nationally recognized for managing high-impact initiatives that express a community’s unique culture through the arts. Erik holds a master’s degree from the Harvard Kennedy School—an opportunity he pursued through a 2005 Bush Leadership Fellowship.