AVA STAFF
Lars Hasselblad Torres
Executive Director
Email: executivedirector@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117 X108
Lars began his career in the arts in 1998 when he and several other artists established the Center for Collaborative Art and Visual Education in Washington, DC. He went on to develop arts programs with support from the Mayor’s office, which eventually led him to help establish the Booker T. Washington Public Charter School for Technical Arts, the city’s first trade school. Over the last ten years, he has contributed to the growth and success of numerous maker spaces in the northeast, including Artisans’ Asylum in Boston, where he led a significant turnaround and relocation effort, securing $5.2M in investment and a 22-year lease for the organization’s new 52,500 sq. ft. facility. In Vermont, he founded Local 64 in Montpelier, helped to grow Generator in Burlington, and led HatchSpace in Brattleboro. Most recently, he served as Entrepreneur in Residence at Do North, the coworking space of Vermont State University in Lyndonville.
Nick Gaffney
Education Manager
Email: nick@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117 X102
Nick Gaffney received his M.F.A. in Fine Arts/Photography from the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY, in 2002. Since then he has taught Photography, Studio Art, and Digital Media at a variety of places. He has exhibited his photography throughout the country, including solo shows at AVA and the Vermont Center for Photography, in Brattleboro, VT. He is currently on the board for the Vermont Center for Photography and is also a member of the Lebanon Arts and Culture Commission. He lives in Lebanon with his wife, two daughters, and dog Ruby. ngaffney.net
Samantha Eckert
Exhibition Manager
Email: sam@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117 X109
Samantha Eckert is a Vermont-based emerging artist. She earned her MFA in Visual Art in 2015 from Vermont College of Fine Arts in Montpelier, VT. Additionally, she holds a Certification in Museum Studies from The Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM. She received a grant to attend Anderson Ranch Art Center in Snowmass, CO, attended residencies at the Vermont Studio Center, in Johnson, VT, was a two-time artist in residence at The Studios at MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA, and recently spent six weeks as artist in residence at La Macina di San Cresci, Greve in Chianti, Italy. In her employment, she has held positions in visual art higher education in varied roles as an adjunct, administrative programming, and exhibition coordination. samanthaeckert.com
Sheryl Trainor
Office Manager
Email: sheryl@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117 X101
Sheryl Trainor has a B. A. in English and served as AVA’s Board of Directors’ Secretary from 2009 to 2015. She studied painting at Massachusetts College of Art and was introduced to printmaking after moving to Vermont in 1995. She is an artist member of Two Rivers Printmaking Studio in White River Junction, Vermont, and the Monotype Guild of New England. Her work is in private collections internationally as well as the collections of the Boston Public Library, Plymouth State College, the Hood Museum of Art, and Smith College as part of Two Rivers Printmaking Studio’s Portfolio 2008 and 2011.
Travis Paige
Communications Coordinator
Email: travis@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117 X105
Travis Paige is a landscape, nature, wildlife, and the occasional portrait and wedding photographer in the Upper Valley. A lover of exploring nature, he one day discovered that combining his passion for the outdoors and photography was the perfect mix.
Before AVA, he began his career in retail, working as a sales manager for over fifteen years. He then moved on to the world of renewable energy for a small company importing European wood-fueled boiler systems. He enjoys spending time with his family, traveling, and doing anything to do with the outdoors. You can check out his work at travispaigephotography.com.
Claire Geno
Outreach Coordinator
Email: claire@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117 X107
Claire is an art lover from Alabama who is currently calling New Hampshire home. She has been creating since childhood, learning new techniques and practices along the way in school and from Bob Ross on sick days. She earned a BFA in Graphic Design from Auburn University and has enjoyed a career in sales and marketing. She loves meeting new people, traveling, and painting watercolor scenes from her travels. When not at AVA, Claire can be found outside in New England with her husband, Aaron, and corgi, Petey.
Karl Neubauer
Youth Education Coordinator
Email: karl@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117
Karl Neubauer has been a studio artist and artisan for thirty years. Karl’s work is in shops and galleries throughout the US and locally at The Artisan’s Hand in Montpelier, The North East Kingdom Artisan’s Guild in St Johnsbury, Catamount Arts Gallery in St Johnsbury, and AVA Gallery. He has been teaching art to young people in and out of public schools for over seven years. www.karl-art.com.
Roff Harroff
Sculptural Studies Program Coordinator
Email: roff@avagallery.org
Phone: 603-448-3117
Roff grew up in southern New Hampshire, where she taught metalsmithing in high school. While at college in Philadelphia, Roff danced between the metal, wood, ceramic, fiber, sculpture, and print departments and found romance in the film department. Roff and her animator husband moved back to New Hampshire, where she taught in the arts and humanities and became a League member while consulting across the continent in C/SCSC. Roff was lured to Nashville in the 90s, where she spent time teaching art and Spacial Dynamics, became a TACA member, as well as working as an 18th-century first-person historical interpreter and federal, state, and private arts grants, where she picked up blacksmithing via several ABANA groups and JC Camphill. After moving back to northern New Hampshire, she worked in the Human Resource field as a Transition Specialist untill friends told her to check out a job at AVA. Roff’s approach to the world is the glass is refillable.