News

OKLAHOMA CITY (April 4, 2022)

Internationally acclaimed artist, culinary visionary and business transformation leader will be
among six outstanding Oklahoma natives honored at the 2022 Creativity Ambassadors Awards
at a gala on Wednesday, April 20, at the Oklahoma City Golf and Country Club by Creative
Oklahoma.

The Creativity Ambassador award is presented to outstanding Oklahomans who demonstrate
groundbreaking innovation and creativity in their field of business. The awards will be
conferred by Oklahoma Secretary of Science & Innovation Elizabeth Hutt Pollard.

This year’s honorees include Elizabeth Frame Ellison, Founder of Tulsa’s Mother Road Market
and Kitchen 66; Kurt Fleischfresser, Executive Chef, VAST and Western Concepts Restaurant
Group; Phil Gilbert, General Manager of Design at IBM; Ann Lacy, entrepreneur and
philanthropist; and, Margaret Roach Wheeler, award-winning Chickasaw textile artist. Chip
Oppenheim, Managing Partner of the Oppenheim Group, is being honored with the Susan
McCalmont Creativity Award for his 30 years of service to the arts and education. (See
biographical information below).

The Creativity Ambassadors Gala will feature live entertainment and a gourmet meal designed
with honoree Chef Kurt Fleischfresser. The emcee will be celebrity author Cyndi Kane, author of
Save it Forward, and who is also widely known as “Hyacinth,” Ree Drummond’s best friend.
Presenters will include Governor Bill Anoatubby of the Chickasaw Nation, Lee Allen Smith, Rick
Bayless, former Tulsa Mayor Kathy Taylor, Jonna Kirschner, Edie Roodman, and State
Representative Meloyde Blancett, who serves as Executive Director of Creative Oklahoma.
Sponsors of the event include The Chickasaw Nation, Ann Lacy Foundation, Lobeck Taylor
Family Foundation, with in-kind donors The Oklahoma Beef Council, Sothern Glazer’s Wine and
Spirits of Oklahoma, the Oklahoma Wheat Council and the Heritage Hall Show Choir under the
direction of Jay Ferguson and David Hillis.

Creativity Ambassadors serve as exemplars of creativity and innovation representing the State
of Oklahoma. Current Ambassadors include Olympian Bart Connor, astronaut John Herrington,
singer Wanda Jackson, architect Rand Elliott, BMX legend Mat Hoffman, casting director Junie
Lowry-Johnson, entertainer Blake Shelton, medical researcher Dr. Jordan Tang, opera singer
Leona Mitchell, and Reservation Dogs creator Sterlin Harjo. 

Creative Oklahoma is a statewide nonprofit founded in 2006 whose mission is to foster the
development of a vibrant, creative and innovation-based economy in Oklahoma. In addition to
the Oklahoma Creativity Ambassadors Gala, Creative Oklahoma offers an Innovation Series with
events across the state, and OKEMP, the Oklahoma Entrepreneurship Mentoring Program that
is a locally-operated program licensed from Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Venture
Mentoring Service.

The 2022 Creative Oklahoma Board of Directors is led by President Lance McDaniel , CEO of
McDaniel Entertainment, and includes Past President Robyn Elliott, Cabinet Secretary for the
Department of Communications and Community Development at The Chickasaw Nation; Vice
Chair Douglas Sorocco, Director of Dunlap Codding Law; Treasurer Jane Jenkins, CEO of
Downtown OKC Partnership; Secretary Chip Oppenheim; Gala Chair Jonna Kirschner, Sr. VP
Economic Development, Chickasaw Nation Industries; Judy Allen, Historic Projects Officer,
Choctaw Nation; Ken Busby, Executive Director, Route 66 Alliance; Bart Conner, Chief Executive
Officer, Perfect 10 Productions; Cindy Friedman, Executive Officer, District Strategy &
Development, MetroTechnology Centers; Justin Hazzard, Director, Center for Business
Development, Meridian Technology Center; Mike Knopp, Executive Director, Oklahoma City
Boathouse Foundation; Mark Parker, Dean, Wanda Bass School of Music, Oklahoma City
University; Cynthia Reid, VP, Marketing and Communications, Greater Oklahoma City Chamber
of Commerce; Jay Shanker, Attorney, Crowe & Dunlevy; Tommy Yi, Co-Founder, Projekt202 &
StarSpace 46.

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2022 Oklahoma Creativity Ambassador Inductees

Phil Gilbert, Sr., GM Design, IBM
In 2012, Phil was asked to rejuvenate the legendary IBM design program, spearheading a broad transformation of how the company’s teams understand and solve complex problems, flipping the traditional tech product development on its head with an unprecedented culture change that has spanned 387,000 employees across 170 countries.
The program has established a modern standard for the role of the arts in business — adding formally-trained designers into IBM at an unprecedented scale and reskilling its global workforce in design thinking and agile practices. This transformation has been documented in The New York Times, Fortune and in the documentary film “The Loop,” as part of its Design Disruptors series. Phil is an Oklahoma native now living in Austin, TX.

Margaret Roach Wheeler, Internationally renowned textile artist
Margaret is an award-winning weaver, fiber expert and textile artist who has received a research fellowship to study at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in New York and exhibited works at prestigious institutions, including the Museum of Art and Design and the Museum of Contemporary Native Art (MoCNA). She was most recently inducted into the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s prestigious Costume Institute. She has earned numerous awards including Best of Class-Heard Museum Indian Market, First place in SWAIA (Santa Fe Indian Market), and Purchase Award at Eitel Jorg. She is the owner of Mahota Handwovens, a weaver mentoring studio, and was inducted into the Chickasaw Hall of Fame in 2010. Mahota Textiles is the ultimate passion project for Margaret, for which she honors the legacy and heritage of her family. The Mahota name can be traced back to five generations of lineage within her family and it is her dream to honor the spirit and legacy of creative Chickasaw women.

Ann Lacy, Philanthropist
Ann Lacy has been described as a renaissance woman having had successful careers as a business owner, investor, writer, stand up comedian, and fashion designer, but she is most noted for devoting her life to promoting arts and education in Oklahoma. Her work has benefited thousands of students and young artists, particularly at the Ann Lacy School of American Dance and Entertainment at Oklahoma City University, recognized as one of the best dance programs in the country. Her creative energy has also been spent helping young Oklahoma Opry artists succeed in Nashville, promoting authors at the Centennial Book Festival, and she’s recently written a new musical, “7th Avenue.”

Elizabeth Frame Ellison, CEO, Lobeck Taylor Family Foundation & Founder, Kitchen 66 and Mother Road Market
As CEO of LTFF, Elizabeth Ellison seeks to build equity in the community by reducing barriers for small business entrepreneurs. In 2016, Ellison created the first program in Tulsa to teach food entrepreneurs the business side of food with a sincere belief that business and testing opportunities would decrease the incredibly high failure rate of food businesses. The program, called Kitchen 66, is Tulsa’s kick-start kitchen and a food incubator that has helped more than 200 culinary entrepreneurs go from idea to market in the city’s growing food industry. It offers a 3,000 sq ft, state-of-the-art commercial kitchen and provides food entrepreneurs the resources to establish culinary production plus, open test restaurants. Kitchen 66 members also benefit from the Launch Program where they receive restaurant advice and business wisdom offered by seasoned mentors. In 2021, Kitchen 66 expanded its reach and curriculum to assist Spanish-speaking food entrepreneurs with the Cocina 66 program. In addition, Kitchen 66 runs a retail General Store allowing entrepreneurs the ability to pilot test their latest concepts within the innovative Mother Road Market, Oklahoma’s only nonprofit food hall, also founded by Ellison. Within a year following its grand opening in November 2018, Mother Road Market surpassed $7.5 million in
overall sales and created 250+ new jobs. Entrepreneurs in MRM are offered short-term lease opportunities for Kitchen 66 grads, plus pop up spaces with low risk. There is no other concept in the country that combines training and retail scaling opportunities for culinary entrepreneurs like Kitchen 66 and Mother Road Market. To learn more about Kitchen 66 and Mother Road Market founder, Elizabeth Frame Ellison, visit www.elizabethframeellison.com.

Chef Kurt Fleischfresser, Executive Chef, VAST, and partner Western Concepts Restaurant Group
At age 20, Chef Kurt Fleischfresser began his career at Le Vichyssoise in Chicago under Chef Bernard Cretier. He went on to perfect his culinary skills at some of the finest restaurants in the nation. Chef Kurt has twice been invited to the world-renown James Beard House in New York City as part of the Great Regional Chefs Program and is a two-time finalist in the prestigious American Culinary Gold Cup Competition which is the first portion of the Bocuse d’Or. He was also awarded the Medaille de Merite by L’Academie de Gastronomie Brillat-Savarin for his contributions in education in the culinary arts. In Oklahoma, he has operated over 30 different restaurants over the last 30 years and travels around the world representing the Food of the Southern United States.

COK Susan McCalmont Creativity Award Honoree

Chip Oppenheim, Managing Partner, The Oppenheim Group; Honoree, Creative Oklahoma
Chip Oppenheim is managing partner of The Oppenheim Group, a retail commercial real estate
management and investments company. Chip lived for 12 years in Washington D.C. before returning in
1994 to manage his family business in Oklahoma City.
Since moving back, Chip has been actively involved in the community, including currently serving
as President of the Weitzenhoffer College of Fine Arts Board of Visitors at OU and as President
Elect of Mental Health Association of Oklahoma. He also has served as president of SW 29th
Street Business Improvement District Association; board member/trustee at Creative Oklahoma; past president of Ballet Oklahoma City; past president of Oklahoma Arts Institute at Quartz
Mountain, past president of David Boren’s Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence; graduate of
Leadership Oklahoma Class XV; graduate of Leadership Oklahoma City Class XVII; member / Paul
Harris Fellow, Rotary Club 29 Oklahoma City. Most recently, he was named as a 2018
Distinguished Graduate of Casady School and is currently among an elite group of community
visionaries who are re-energizing OKC Repertory Theater, an award-winning, nationally recognized
professional regional theater, with new, prestigious leadership.

2021 Honoree Prairie Surf Media
Prairie Surf Media is an Oklahoma City-based global production company focused on multi-platform content creation. Through its innovative and transformative leadership team, the company kick-started the growth of streaming, television and motion picture production in Oklahoma City. With decades of combined experience in the entertainment industry, PSM is the state’s undisputed category leader. PSM is co-founded by Oklahoma natives, Rachel Cannon and Matt Payne. PSM was honored with a Creative Oklahoma Susan McCalmont Creativity Award in November 2021 and will be recognized at the April 20th event.

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