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The founder and president of Step Into Art, Inc., Abby Rischin holds a BA from Smith College and a Ph.D. from Yale University. Recognized for her outstanding teaching, she has been the recipient of a Yale College Prize Teaching Award and has had the opportunity to create and teach a popular Yale College Seminar, “Narratives of Art: Ninteenth-Century Fiction and the Visual Arts.” Abby has also garnered generous research and study grants from the U.S. Department of Education, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Koret Foundation, and la Fondation Lourmarin, as well as a public service fellowship in Israel from Project Otzma. Over the years, she has had the joy of teaching children in communities as wide-ranging as San Francisco, New Haven, Haifa, and Paris. When she moved to the Boston area, she became affiliated with the education department at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, where she worked on programming for visitors of all ages, including after-school programs for city youth, family programs, a pilot preschool program, and a junior high school program entitled “Art and Poetry at the Gardner.” Abby founded Step Into Art, Inc. in January of 2005. She has created art education programs bringing children and young teens to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum; the Fogg Museum at Harvard University; and the Busch-Reisinger Museum, also at Harvard. Abby lives in Newton with her husband and two daughters, all of whom participated in the creation of Step Into Art, Inc. back to top
Marla Libraty’s passion for children’s issues, her professional experience and her community involvement make her especially well-suited for her role in Step Into Art. As a Board Member, Marla provides kids-oriented guidance on marketing, program content, and organizational development. Marla is Vice President of Marketing for Extend Fertility (www.extendfertility.com), a revolutionary women’s healthcare company that is helping women to effectively slow down the biological clock through advanced techniques in egg freezing. Armed with an M.B.A. from UCLA, Marla helped launch Mattel Toys’ Becky in 1997, the first-ever 11 ½” fashion doll in a wheelchair. The doll, a close friend of Barbie, was cited as garnering the most press of any product the world’s largest toy maker had ever launched as well as accolades from affiliated organizations and kids around the world. Marla’s experience with international brands with kids-appeal includes the initial development of the Eveready Battery Company’s Energizer Bunny sales promotion materials leveraging the ad campaign’s widespread success. Always up for an adventure, Marla and her husband lived in Bangkok, Thailand for over four years with their three children. While in Thailand, she initiated and structured the Pizza Company (formerly Pizza Hut, Thailand’s largest fast food pizza company) Birthday Party Program. Marla’s community involvement includes producing International Night at Newton’s Ward Elementary School, where over 250 students, parents and faculty receive "passports" and "travel" to various country booths celebrating international cultures. back to top
Ashley Davidoff is Clinical Professor of Radiology at the University of Massachusetts and a clinical radiologist at Caritas St Elizabeth’s Medical Center. He received his medical training at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg South Africa. Dr. Davidoff combines his professional medical interests with artistic endeavors, focusing on form and function in nature. His artwork portrays and incorporates the structure of the body and structure in nature in a variety of media. His photography and digital art renderings are currently on view in the “Art of Imaging” exhibit at the Boston Museum of Science. His sculptural pieces produced from natural structures were displayed at Newton Open Studios 2006 in his award- winning garden, and he was selected to participate in Newton Open Studios again in 2007. He is happily married to Naomi Fisher and has four wonderful children. He has participated in Step Into Art programs with his youngest daughter and provided a lasting visual record of them in his photographs. back to top
Janet Echelman builds sculptural interventions which respond to environmental forces like wind and water. Recent commissions include the 1.6 million dollar waterfront wind sculpture in Porto, Portugal, and selection of her artist team’s design for the September 11th Memorial for Hoboken (NJ), which will be a free-standing island in the Hudson River. Her previous work includes solo exhibitions of painting, prints, and sculpture in museum and public spaces in Venice, Madrid, Rotterdam, Vilnius, Bombay, Jakarta, Hong Kong, Kyoto, Miami, Houston, and New York. Janet Echelman, M.A., M.F.A., teaches Public Art at New School University in NYC, and previously taught at Harvard University Graduate School of Design. She graduated from Harvard College, Harvard University, with Highest Honors in Visual and Environment Studies, and received a Masters of Fine Arts from Bard College. She lived and worked on the island of Bali, Indonesia from 1988-1993. She currently lives with her husband David Feldman and their children Sam and Lillian in Brookline and maintains an art studio in New York City. back to top
Stephanie Khurana is a Managing Director of Higher Aims, LLC. Higher Aims connects high caliber talent with employers seeking to leverage a flexible workforce for high impact results. Previously, she was Co-Founder, CEO and Director of Surebridge, Inc., a pioneer in providing outsourced business application management and business process improvements to mid-market companies. Ms. Khurana received a B.S. in Applied Economics from Cornell University, an M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School and a M.P.P. from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. She is on the Board of MIT’s Technology Capital Network, and also advises entrepreneurs through the Commonwealth Institute’s technology advisory board. Ms. Khurana received a “Top 40 under 40” award from the Boston Business Journal in 1999 and was selected 44th among the top 100 led businesses in Massachusetts in a 2002 study by Babson. She is also a lecturer and panelist at various graduate schools, including M.I.T., Columbia, and Kennedy School of Government. She is married with three children. back to top
Sarah Perry has worked extensively in the social enterprise sector, and as a consultant to for-profit businesses. She holds a BA from Yale University, an MBA from the Harvard Business School, and a Masters in Public Administration from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. She has most recently served as Executive Director of The Community Action Partners of the Harvard Business School Alumni Association of Boston, which provides pro bono consulting services to non-profit organizations. She also served as Managing Director of Community Wealth Ventures, a for-profit subsidiary of Share Our Strength. Perry is a frequent lecturer and panelist on social enterprise for non-profits, and is an active supporter of numerous non-profits, The Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum, The Boston Foundation, and WBUR public radio. She serves on the Temple Emanuel Sisterhood Board of Directors and, in 2006, joined the Board of the Jewish Women’s Archive, a Brookline-based non-profit committed to chronicling and transmitting the rich history of American Jewish women. back to top
Amy Silberstein holds a BA in American Studies from Brown University. Her work and community involvements center on the arts, education, and social action. For the past ten years, she has worked in the Office of Development and Alumni Relations at Brandeis University. As Associate Director of Leadership Gifts, she focuses on major gift fundraising in the arts. Amy comes from a family with a unique art legacy. Her maternal grandmother, Hilde Gerst, ran New York’s Hilde Gerst Gallery on Madison Avenue for over 50 years. Amy and her mother continue this tradition by showcasing the work of French Post-Impressionist artists and some of the major American artists of our time at the Ruth Silberstein Gallery, which they own and operate. In addition to serving on the Step Into Art Advisory Council, she is Co-Chair of the Care Committee for Social Action at Newton’s John Ward Elementary School and a member of the Temple Emanuel Religious School Committee. Amy lives in Newton with her husband and 3 children. back to top
Deborah Stanhill is a graduate of Harvard and Radcliffe College with considerable experience in educational non-profit administration. She has two daughters who are big fans of Step into Art. back to top
Anne Kindseth is a 2007 graduate of the Arts in Education master’s degree program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. In conjunction with Harvard’s Field Experience Program, she worked as a Step Into Art intern throughout the 2006-7 academic year, collaborating with Abby Rischin to design and teach a range of programs. Having completed her academic studies, she maintains an important role in Step Into Art as a teacher and program consultant. Anne also holds a BA in Art History from the University of Texas at Austin and a MA in Art History/ Museum Studies from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Prior to coming to Step Into Art, she worked in the Department of Museum Education at the Art Institute of Chicago, where she developed and taught programs for many different audiences. In the summer of 2007, she served as a lead educator for one the classes offered by the New York City Museum of Modern Art’s “In the Making” program for high school students. back to top
Susan Foster is a master's candidate in the Arts in Education program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She received a BA in Art History from Mount Holyoke College in 2002. For the last five years, Susan has been the Education Coordinator at the Commonwealth Museum in Boston (www.commonwealthmuseum.org). As a museum educator, she creates and teaches programs for students who visit the museum each year on field trips. Susan has also worked for the Discovery Museums in Acton and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. back to top
Sharon Thurston is an early childhood teacher whose longtime involvement with the visual arts has included painting, pottery, and photography. She is a graduate of the New England School of Photography, where she developed an interest in photo screen-printing. She worked in commercial screen- printing for 15 years and started a line of children's screen-printed clothing. After taking time off to raise a family, she shifted her focus to teaching. For the past ten years, Sharon has taught at Temple Emanuel Nursery School, where art is an important part of the curriculum. Sharon has contributed her time to help with numerous Step Into Art programs. She lives with her husband in Newton and has two grown children. back to top
Julie Sherman is the owner of J Sherman Studio LLC, a graphic design firm specializing in work for the nonprofit sector and architectural graphics. Julie’s work and study experience includes a strong emphasis on studio arts (photography and painting), art history, museum experience, architectural graphics and textile design. She holds a bachelors degree in fine arts from Cornell University and is currently pursuing a masters of science in communications management at Simmons College. Julie volunteers her professional services to the Arts and Business Council of Greater Boston and enjoys working with arts nonprofits who ordinarily could not afford design services. back to top
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Step Into Art is quite unique – an interactive art history class for kids. It is a program that challenges, educates, and inspires students to engage with paintings actively, not passively. The program is intellectually stimulating and a whole lot of fun. I will continue to recommend it to everyone.
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