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Lecturers & Performers
Performers and Lecturers Bio's :
Abram Sterne is a clinical psychologist with experience in working with children and families as well as research projects on the genetics of mental illness. He has a Ph.D. in language development in deaf children, as well as a clinical doctorate examining shame in teenagers. He is currently working in New York for a large not-for-profit mental health agency.
Akiva The Believer (Collaborating Artist) Akiva The Believer is a passionate percussionist, writer of prayers and songs and teacher of spiritual drumming. Akiva has played with Rav Shlomo Carlebach, zt"l, Paul of Peter, Paul & Mary, Shefa Gold and others and lives on a beach with his family.
Amichai Lau-Lavie (Founder, Artistic and Executive Director), an Israeli-born mythologist, storyteller and teacher of Judaic literature, has been hailed as ‘Super Star of David’ by Time Out NY and as ‘one of the most interesting thinkers in the Jewish world’ by the NY Jewish Week. Amichai is a Synagogue 3000 fellow, the recipient of a Joshua Venture Fellowship award, and serves on the advisory board of Bikkurim. He studied at the Shalom Hartman Institute and the Elul Center in Jerusalem, and the 2005 Lamama Intl. Directors Symposium in Italy. Amichai has worked with Theatre Company Jerusalem, Avodah Dance Ensemble, and served as an Artist-in-Residence at Congregation B'nai Jeshurun in NYC from 1997-2000. Amichai is the theatrical representative for Rebbetzin Hadassah Gross. www.hadassahgross.com.
Anat Litwin is a NY based artist and curator. She is the Director of the Makor Artists-in-Residence program and the Makor Gallery. She received her MFA from Hunter College’s Department of Combined Media, and her BFA at the Bezalel Academy of Art in Jerusalem. Anat has been focusing her curatorial and artistic efforts on creating a vital artistic lexicon which is in dialog with the contemporary art scene of NY while thematically reflecting on aspects of Jewish thought. Anat has showcased her work in Israel, Europe and NY and is currently working on her upcoming solo exhibit in NY in Fall 2007.
Andy Bachman is Rabbi at Congregation Beth Elohim in Park Slope and co-founder with his wife Rachel Altstein of Brooklyn Jews. From 1998-2004, he was Executive Director of the Edgar M. Bronfman Center for Jewish Student Life at NYU.
Avi Fox-Rosen (Musician) is a singer, guitarist and songwriter. He has a BA from NYU in Jazz and Jewish Studies and leads the Avi Fox-Rosen Group, The Diasporic Condition Septet, the Frosen Ox Trio, and plays with many other musical incarnations. He also works in many Jewish contexts as a music educator, songleader, shaliach tzibur, and text educator.
Basya Schechter is an instrumentalist, singer and songwriter. She is the founder and leader of Pharaoh's Daughter, an eclectic groove ensemble.
Bronwen Mullin (Associate Artist) is a playwright and musician. Her plays and original music have been produced with the Philadelphia Fringe and the Cygnus Ensemble. Bronwen is also an avid student of Judaism, studying at the Conservative Yeshiva in Israel. A recent graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, she plans to pursue a fusion of Art and Judaism in her life.
Chana Rothman (Musician/Storahteller) is a genre-crossing musician, songwriter and educator originally from Toronto. Her music and approach to interactive education/dialogue are informed by travels across the globe and commitment to social justice. Chana was recently selected to perform as one of New York’s Best Emerging Jewish Artists. www.chanarothman.com
David Kalb is a Teaching Fellow on the Faculty of CLAL – The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership. A popular educator, he has created curricula, developed programs, and taught extensively. David has also directed a number of research projects for CLAL on pluralism, politics, education and gender. He is also the founding Rabbi of Yavneh – The Jewish Living Project. Yavneh – The Jewish Living Project is a warm and spiritual Makome (Place) of Tefilah (Prayer), Talmud Torah (Torah Study) and Tikkun Olam (Fixing The World or Social Action) based on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. As the Rabbi of Yavneh he is a member of the Synagogue 3000 Working Group on Emergent Sacred Communities.
Deanna Neil (Sr. Storahteller) Highlights: The Night of The Hunter Workshop (Dir: Robert Falls/The Goodman Theater, Chicago), Hidden Voices (Dir: Terrence Mann/The Minetta Lane Theater, NYC) Wesleyan University: Ghetto (Dir: Joshua Sobol), No Exit, Our Town, An Opera for the Post-Madonna Prima-Donna, Dido and Aeneas, concert of American Opera and Musical Theater in the 1950s. Awards: 1st Prize, Wesleyan Concert Competition; IES vocal scholarship for study in Milan.
Dore Ashton- Dore Ashton is a professor of Art History at the Cooper Union, she is the author of 30 books on art and culture including: A fable of Modern Art, Noguchi – East and West, Rauschenberg’s Dante, About Rothko, Picasso on Art, Yes, But: A Critical Biography of Philip Guston.
Elie Kaunfer is the executive director of Mechon Hadar: An Institute for Prayer, Personal Growth and Jewish Study. A Wexner Graduate Fellow, Elie is completing ordination at the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he recently received an MA in liturgy. Elie is a co-founder of Kehilat Hadar (www.kehilathadar.org), an egalitarian community committed to spirited traditional prayer, study and social action. He has taught for the Wexner Heritage Foundation, the Dorot Fellowship in Israel, Limmud NY and Lishmah. The Forward Newspaper recently named him one of 50 Top Jewish Leaders.
Esther Perel - Marriage and Family Therapist , Faculty member ,The International Trauma Studies Program , Columbia University. Author of Mating in Captivity: reconciling the Erotic and the Domestic.
Eve Keller is a professor in the Department of English at Fordham University. Specializing in the literature, science, and medicine of the English renaissance, she is currently president of the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts (SLSA), an academic association that brings together scholars in the humanities and sciences who share an interest in the cultural and social dimensions of science, technology, and medicine. Her new book, Generating Bodies and Gendered Selves: The Rhetoric of Reproduction in Early Modern England, is due out from the University of Washington Press in December.
Franny Silverman (Assoc. Artistic Director/Sr. Storahteller) has collaborated on over 30 original productions with Storahtelling since 2002. Selected regional and NY credits: Northwoods Ramah Theatre Co., Triple Play, Ripple Productions, Harbor Theatre, The Human Race Theatre and The Phoenix Theatre. Franny has BFA in acting from Univ. of Cincinnati Conservatory (CCM) and has studied with the SITI Co. She was a ‘02 recipient of The Spielberg Fellowship in Theatre Education from the Foundation for Jewish Camping.
Hannah Pressman is a doctoral student in modern Hebrew literature at New York University, where she has earned an advanced certificate in Poetics and Theory. An alumna of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship program, she is currently a MacCracken Fellow at NYU. She has presented her research at National Association of Professors of Hebrew conferences, and her reviews of contemporary Israeli literature have appeared in Lilith Magazine.
Irit Koren, the Director of Alma NY, has just finished her dissertation in Gender Studies and Jewish Studies at Bar Ilan University, writing on the ways in which religious women challenge and resist the traditional Jewish wedding ritual. Previously, she completed her M.A. in Jewish Education at Hebrew University. She has taught at numerous institutions in Israel and has published articles, book chapters, and a book, entitled Closet Within a Closet: Stories of Religious Homosexuals (in Hebrew, Aron Betoch Aron, Yediot Aharonot Press, 2003). Koren's research and teaching are concerned chiefly with the intersection of modernity and tradition, and in particular the situation of women at this juncture.
J. Rolando Matalon studied at the Seminario Rabinico Latinoamericano in Buenos Aires, the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he was ordained in 1986. A disciple of Rabbi Marshall T. Meyer, Roly has been a rabbi of Congregation B'nai Jeshurun in Manhattan since his ordination. He serves on several boards including American Jewish World Service, Brit Tzedec v'Shalom (Honorary Board) and American Friends of Parents Circle. Roly is the recipient of awards from The New York Board of Rabbis, The Jewish Peace Fellowship, and the New Israel Fund.
Jake Goodman (Associate Artist) is an actor, director, writer, and Jewish educator. He has worked at Actors Theatre of Louisville, the Berkshire Theatre Festival, and the Roxy and is a founding member of ghostLight Productions. Jake is pursuing a Master in Jewish Education at the Jewish Theological Seminary and this summer worked as the Spielberg Fellow at Camp Ramah Darom, where he guided 15-year old campers in generating two new theatre pieces.
Rabbi Jill Hammer, PhD, is the director of Tel Shemesh (www.telshemesh.org), a website and community celebrating Jewish traditions related to the earth, and a teacher in many venues around New York City. She is the author of two books: The Jewish Book of Days: A Companion for All Seasons, and Sisters at Sinai: New Tales of Biblical Women .
Leanne Darling (Musician) draws from her classical technique, her Arabic and jazz skills, and her passion for improv to break the boundaries of traditional viola playing. She has performed with Simon Shaheen and poets Robert Bly and Clarissa Pinkola Estes, and recently released her debut solo CD. She also teaches StringPlay classes, her own method of improv for strings.
Rabbi Leon Morris is the Executive Director of the Skirball Center for Adult Jewish Learning. Ordained at Hebrew Union College (HUC), he was a Wexner Fellow. Leon has taught at Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform synagogues as well as at the Drisha Institute.
Naomi Less (Sr. Storahteller/Musician) is a singer/songwriter and experiential Jewish educator. (MA in Jewish Education, JTS; undergrad - Northwestern University School of Music) Naomi develops and facilitates educational staff trainings for North American Jewish summer camps (www.jewishcamping.org) and fronts her band - Less Nessman www.LESSNESSMAN.com
Ofri Cnaani (born in Israel, 1975) lives in New York and works in video and large-scale video installations as well as drawing. Cnaani’s work blurs the boundaries between a constructed reality and reality itself and explore notions of domination, feminine bodily experiences, and spatial awareness by analyzing their formal dimensions within social and psychological spheres. Cnaani graduated from Hunter College’s MFA studio program in 2004. She holds a BFA from the Beit Berel Art College in Israel, and was twice the winner of the America-Israel cultural foundation award. Cnaani has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions in the U.S., Europe and Israel. www.ofricnaani.com
Peter Pitzele, Ph.D. (Collaborating Artist) is a writer, teacher and artist, and has developed a form of improvisational theater for the teaching of biblical narrative called The Art of the Biblical Interview. He has written many articles and two books: Our Fathers Wells: A Personal Encounter with the Myths of Genesis (Harper San Fransisco), available from the author, and Scripture Windows: Towards a Practice of Bibliodrama (Tora Aura), runner-up for the best book in Jewish Education, l998.
Rabbi Michael Paley is the Scholar in Residence and the Director of the Jewish Resource Center of the UJA-Federation of New York. He is an Adjunct Professor at the Columbia School of Journalism and a member of the faculty of the Ivry Prozdor of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Prior to his arrival at UJA, he was a professor of Jewish studies and Dean at Bard College, and the Vice - President of the Wexner Heritage Foundation. For many years, Rabbi Paley served as the University Chaplain at Columbia University. Rabbi Paley was founder and first director of the Edgar M. Bronfman Youth Fellowships in Israel, a program which brings together outstanding students from diverse Jewish backgrounds. He also served as the Jewish Chaplain at Dartmouth College.
Ran Oron - flew helicopters in the Israeli Air Force and received a degree in Political Science from Haifa University before coming to America to study architecture at Cooper Union. After graduation he established ROART, an architectural firm in New York City.
Reuben Namdar (1964) was born and raised in Jerusalem. He completed his BA (Sociology, Philosophy and Iranian Studies) and his Master’s degree (Anthropology) at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. His first book, Haviv, (a collection of short stories) was published in 2000 and won the Ministry of Culture's award for the best first publication of the year. The manuscript also won the Jerusalem Fiction award for 1998. Reuben also published short stories, book reviews and translations of medieval Persian poetry in different literary periodicals in Israel. He is currently living in New York, is working on a novel and teaches Modern Israeli and Jewish American literature in various Jewish learning centers around the city.
Roy Tzohar is a doctoral student in Columbia University's Religion Department, specializing in philosophy of Religion and Buddhist Studies. He has written for the theatre, television and various magazines in Israel. Most recently he translated into Hebrew the book "Buddhism: a very short introduction."
Ruth Calderon is Founder and Executive Director of Alma Hebrew College in Tel Aviv and Alma New York. Ruth graduated in 1985 with a BA in Bible and Philosophy from Haifa University, majoring in classic Jewish thought. In 1992, she earned an MA in Talmud from the Hebrew University, where she is currently completing her doctoral studies. In 1996, Ruth received the prestigious AviChai Prize for her pioneering work in establishing Elul, a religiously and politically pluralistic beit midrash in Jerusalem. Ruth also created HaCheder, a popular weekly TV series dealing with issues found in classic and modern Hebrew texts. A graduate of the Mandel School for Educational Leadership in Jerusalem, Ruth has written and edited several books. Currently, her book "The Market, the Home, the Heart," is being translated into English.
Saeed A. Khan teaches Islamic and Middle East History in the Department of Near East & Asian Studies and the Department of History at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. He is also teaches Modern Middle East History at Eastern Michigan University and Henry Ford College. He is the founder and Research Fellow at the Institute for Social Policy & Understanding and a contributor to the BBC, NPR and the Voice of America on Islamic issues. He is also a member of the Interfaith Scholars' Colloquium of the National Conference for Community & Justice.
Shawn Shafner (Associate Artist) is a creator, actor, singer, and storyteller originally from Aurora, Colorado. He has been seen on stages everywhere, including his hometown, Chicago, NYC, and London performing his work, other people’s work, or just looking around, and having a darn good time doing it. He is passionate about education and using drama to enrich our daily lives. Shawn was a ‘05 recipient of The Spielberg Fellowship in Theatre Ed from the Foundation for Jewish Camping.
Shira Kline (Sr. Storahteller/Musician) is a NY-based performer, music educator, and sacred technician. She works with communities throughout the US and internationally to deepen rituals, holiday celebration, and love for Jewish life and prayer. She has three albums of Outrageously Hip Jewish Kiddie Rock, for Shabbat, Chanukah, and Pesach. www.shiralala.com
Yael Erel is an architect (RA, Israel) and a graduate of the Cooper Union School of Architecture. She lives and practices in New York City and teaches architecture at the Cooper Union School of architecture and the Pratt Institute school of architecture.
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