Vision
Phantasma Arts envisions a creative future where the boundaries between disciplines, experience levels, and the leadership source of artistic inspiration can become more fluid, allowing artists to create more freely and collaboratively than traditional structures often allow.
We aim to cultivate a sustainable artistic ecosystem where emerging artists can develop alongside experienced professionals, where interdisciplinary collaboration becomes the norm rather than the exception, and where access to meaningful creative experiences is not limited by background or resources.
Our long-term vision is to help build a culture of artists who see collaboration an appreciation as a lifelong practice—artists who carry those values into their communities, their classrooms, and their future creative work and into society itself.
Because we believe the future of the arts will not only be built by individuals working alone, but by communities of artists who know how to build something together.
Our People
Maya Kallay
Founding Executive Director
Maya Kallay is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of Phantasma Arts and has been immersed in the arts since childhood. With over a decade of experience in theatre around Los Angeles, she brings a steady, process-driven approach to creative work, grounded in clarity, structure, and collaboration. Alongside her career in nursing—where she has led and created hospital response programs—she has developed a leadership style rooted in care, adaptability, and guiding people through complex, high-pressure environments.
As both a mother and a leader, Maya is committed to creating inclusive, intergenerational spaces where artists of all backgrounds and experience levels can come together to work, learn, and grow. At Phantasma Arts, she helps shape an environment that prioritizes process, support, and cross-disciplinary exploration, facilitating work that allows artists to fully engage without barriers.
Her approach centers on the belief that strong, thoughtful process is what makes meaningful creative work possible.
Jacob Nye
Founding Artistic Director
Jacob Nye is the Co-Founder and Artistic Director of Phantasma Arts and a Southern California–based director and performer with over a decade of experience in theatre and helping build communities. His work focuses now on bringing together performing and visual artists to work side by side across disciplines and experience levels, creating work that values process, trust, and shared creative ownership and appreciation.
He helped found Phantasma Arts to build the kind of artistic home where artists support each other’s growth and create work that reflects collective imagination and individual freedom. His guiding belief is simple: focused collaboration is the art form, and through that process we not only create stronger work, but stronger human connections.
Board of Directors
Mara Wolfsen - President
Maureen Brock - Treasurer
Hilary Zachry - Secretary
Karin Baker - Board Member
Andrew Defty - Board Member