BOARD

Maxine Davidowitz is a painter and printmaker, whose works have been shown in galleries throughout the Hudson Valley and in collections throughout the US. For over 40 years she served as Creative Director for major consumer magazines such as Redbook, Parents, TV Guide, Health, Prevention, More and Modern Farmer, garnering many awards from the Society of Publication Designers and The American Society of Magazine Editors.  Her consulting practice included work for Country Living, Consumer Reports’ ShopSmart, Reader’s Digest, Real Simple, and other newsstand publications.

Her non-profit volunteer efforts include a 5-year stint on the board of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, and since 2013 she has served on the exhibition committee for Gallery Lev Shalem at the Woodstock Jewish Congregation.

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Suzanne Parker has a background in nonprofit arts management as both an employee and board member. She was the Deputy Executive Director of Queens Council on the Arts (QCA) for 10 years. She was a founder and Vice President of Friends of Station Square (FOSS), an historic preservation nonprofit organization, which just celebrated its 25^th anniversary. She is also a published author of “Eating Like Queens: A Guide to Ethnic Dining in America’s Melting Pot, Queens, NY,” Jones Press 2006, and a food reporter and restaurant critic for the Times Ledger Newspaper Group (12 Queens weeklies). She currently gives cooking lessons locally under the name Cookskills.

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Tracy Phillips is a painter and a psychotherapist in private practice. Phillips considers psychotherapy an art and considers art a reflection of our intrapersonal and interpersonal worlds. Phillips’ art and psychotherapy work are deeply informed by her commitment to social and environmental justice.

Phillips received her Master’s in Creative Arts Therapy from Pratt Institute and her Master of Social Work from Fordham University. Phillips has post-graduate training from the Institute for Contemporary Psychotherapy and the National Institute of Psychotherapies.

Phillips has been painting her whole life. She received my BFA in fine arts from Parsons. Phillips has been an active member of the Brooklyn Arts Council, The Brooklyn Waterfront Artist’s Coalition, and Nurture Art. Phillips’ resume includes solo and group exhibitions and became an active member of WAAM in 2016.

William Lanford is a Professor of Physics at University at Albany. One of his interests is the applications of physics in art and archaeology and he has taught courses on that topic at Albany and at Yale. He is a member of the Board of Directors, UAlbany Foundation. He has been an external advisor for national laboratories in the U.S. and in Canada. Dr. Lanford had a deep interest in American arts, both decorative and fine. He initiated the creation of the Riders Mills Historic District, now listed on the National Registry of Historic Places. He is currently restoring a 220-year-old house known locally as the Budd Tavern. He has a 25-year interest in the art and the artists of Woodstock and has assembled a number of Woodstock paintings and sculptures, some of which can be seen on his website: www.overbrookart.com.

Dan Forlenza is a New York State Licensed Architect with vast experience in architectural design and construction project management. Dan was the university design architect for Facilities Project Design and Construction at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York for 9 years and afterwards worked for Columbia University as the Associate Director of Design and Capital Project Management at the Morningside Heights Campus in New York City for 6 years. Dan has a Master of Science degree from Columbia University in Construction Management & Administration and an Architecture degree from New York Institute of Technology. Dan is an Active Artist Member of WAAM.

Suzannah Kellner has a Masters’s degree in Art history from NYU’s Institute of Fine Arts. She has worked for the American Folk Art Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Carl Hammer Gallery, Christie’s, and Chashama. She loves art, gardening, photography, tennis, and travel. She has been part of the Woodstock community for more than a dozen years.

Diane King is a fine art photographer and mixed-media conceptual artist whose work is widely held in private collections, and has been exhibited at Art Basal Miami, Art Palm Springs, Art San Diego, The Oculus at the World Trade Center, the Southampton Fine Art Fair, The Center for Photography at Woodstock, WAAM, and in New York City galleries.  Her creative aesthetic was formed at an early age while professionally studying ballet, and her contemplative photographic compositions explore the emotional choreography between her subject matter and the voids of negative space. 

For over 15 years she worked in the publishing, film and television industries.  First as a writer, then as Creative Services Director for such publications as Time, Life, Sports Illustrated, and Instyle, where she developed and led key creative initiatives and strategies for Time Warner Inc.  She has studied extensively at The International Center for Photography, and finds everlasting inspiration in the Hudson Valley and its artistic community.

Tracy Leavitt holds a BFA degree from Maine College of Art (MECA). She is the director of Visions Art Center, which is dedicated to promoting the arts and artists.  She has traveled widely designing and conducting artist residencies and workshops, including her farthest away gig at an International School in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. She produced the Hudson Valley Storytelling Festival for 7 years in conjunction with Vassar and Bard Colleges. In 2008 Tracy received a fellowship from Woman’s Studio Workshop and earlier, produced a one-woman performance piece funded by NYFA.

Recently, Tracy retired from the art faculty of High Meadow School, an independent school in Stone Ridge, NY, and is now a fulltime painter and curator. In January, Tracy mounted an exhibition at Mid-Hudson Arts Council Gallery entitled “Hot/Cold: Expression in Wax” and is planning her next curatorial project with Wired Gallery.  Tracy is an Active Artist Member of WAAM.

Laurie Marshall is an artist, art historian, and independent filmmaker specializing in programming about art.  She was VP, International Executive Producer at Christie’s for 17 years, and previously developed and supervised departments/projects at Scholastic, Hearst, IBM/Workman Publishing, and WNET/Thirteen. Past films include Jeff Koons Speaks (featured at Art Basel); Holly Solomon: On Warhol & SoHo Story; Studio in a School (WNET/ Thirteen). Laurie is a former WAAM Board Chair and currently serves on four committees.

Website:  www.rashomonproductions.com

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Regina B Quinn is an encaustic artist who lives and paints in the Northern Catskills after three decades in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom.  Her paintings are rooted in her deep connection to the natural world and sense of stewardship for the fragile balance that allows life to exist and thrive on this planet.

Regina serves on the International Encaustic Artists Board as Director of Social Media and on the faculty of the international Painting with Fire course through the Essence of Mulranny Art School in Ireland. She has received several awards for her encaustics including the Faber Birren National Color Award, the Cooperstown Art Association’s Grand Prize, and the WAAM New Visions Award. Her work is displayed at the Carrie Haddad Gallery in Hudson and included in the permanent collections of the Williamsburg Art and Historical Center, in Brooklyn and the Museum of Encaustic Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

In addition to her art career, Regina has had a parallel career in education as an elementary and middle school teacher, a K-12 principal, and administrator of a variety of statewide initiatives to strengthen STEM education in Vermont and New York.

Website: www.reginaBquinn.net
Instagram: @GinaBQ
Facebook: Regina Bernadette Quinn,  https://www.facebook.com/reginabernadette.quinn.5

Janis Staggs is the Director of Curatorial and Manager of Publications at Neue Galerie New York, where she has worked for more than twenty years. She has prior experience at other institutions, including the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, and the Walters Art Museum. Staggs has organized numerous exhibitions during her career and has lectured and written extensively on the intersection between modern fine and decorative arts with a special focus on the period of fin-de-siècle Vienna. She has a Master of Arts in the History of Decorative Arts from the jointly-administered program offered by the Cooper Hewitt/Parsons School of Design (a division of The New School), a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Maryland, and a Certificate in Strategic Management from the Harvard Extension School.

Tom Wolf is a Professor of Art History and Visual Culture at Bard College.  His primary areas of research are the history of art in Woodstock, New York, art colony, and Asian American art.  Recent publications include The Artistic Journey of Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Smithsonian American Art Museum, 2015, “Woodstock Artists Association: One Hundred Years of Community and Art,” The Woodstock Artists Association, 2019, and “Doris Lee in Woodstock,” Weatherspoon Art Museum, forthcoming.

Gary Schuster has been an attorney with Jacobowitz & Gubits, LLP, in Walden, New York, since 2004 and a Partner since 2016. His broad practice includes corporate, partnership, LLC and not-for-profit formation, merger, dissolution and other transactions, varied commercial transactions, guardianships, estate planning, administration and litigation, and commercial and residential real estate. His arts and entertainment practice includes copyright and trademark applications, maintenance, and transactions, and representation of painters, sculptors, photographers, dancers, musicians, songwriters, music producers, film producers, publishers, fashion models, agents, galleries and non-profit arts organizations. He also serves on several charitable and non-charitable nonprofit boards, and represents dozens of nonprofits of all kinds.