Board of Directors

(Officer) is given free reign over all things props and sets in our indoor and outdoor traveling spectacles and seasonal Recovery Intensives. In summer 2015, she oversaw our first two week Set Design Intensive for young artists interested in creating dynamic, interactive environments in the outdoors. She is always willing, no matter the size or complexity, to give an outrageous idea a good try. Laura and her teams have created, among other things, rabbit holes, metal dragons, dragon hoards, turned trapeze rigs into castles, and footbridges into beaver lodges. She loves getting young people engaged in the collaborative process of creating the pieces - large, small, weird, and/or plain - for each production, always with an eye to use found, scavenged, and re-purposed materials. Laura slid into an arts career while living in New Orleans, where she was trained in rigorous Fat Tuesday debauchery, annually creating enough costumes and small floats for her neighborhood during the Mardi Gras season. After her banishment to a colder northern realm of four distinct seasons and stable public schools, Laura turned to community-centered theater and public art projects for her Mardi-Gras fix. In spring 2014, she brought a beloved New Orleans event to Shelburne Falls with the first annual Hilltown Draw-Around. After covering the walls and floor of the town gymnasium with 4,000 square feet of paper she hosted a 12-hour drawing free-for-all attended by hundreds. Laura is an active board member at The Art Garden, a community art making organization, where she has helped raise enough money to fund several programs, including ARTeens, and Art For A Change. She co-directs The Art Garden-to-Go with executive director Jane Wiegscheider, setting up open-ended art making venues out in the community. They bring their dark magic to The Green River Festival, River Fest, and other events and festivals around the area.