who we are
We are a collective of professional artists passionate about inclusive education.
Adam Kritzer, Founder & Director
Adam is an artist and educator. His films have won awards, screened at festivals worldwide and been released theatrically and on-demand. He is also a published writer and exhibiting multimedia artist. In 2016, Adam founded the Art Detectives. He has worked with hundreds of artists of all ages and abilities in one-on-one, small group and classroom settings, both independently and with VSA VT, Vermont’s state organization for Arts and Disability. He is also on the Board of Trustees for the International School Theatre Association (ISTA), a UK-based non-profit that works with over 240 schools in 100 countries worldwide. Adam graduated from Middlebury College and holds a Master's degree in Education from the University of Pennsylvania. He lives on the Upper West Side of Manhattan with his partner-in-crime and their standard schnauzer, Upton Sinclair.
Dyer Rhoads, Teaching Artist
Dyer is an artist, theatremaker, teacher and performer from Portland, Maine. In 2021, Dyer was a guest artist with Spindleworks. Dyer is also a dramaturg and production associate for Nile Harris, most recently on This House Is Not A Home: fill it with air call it self care/there's a leak in this house, and for Cricket Brown on Hooters Play. They have also collaborated with and learned from Lincoln Center Education, the Children's Theatre of Maine, the Celebration Barn Theatre, Figures of Speech Theatre Company, Shakespeare & Co, and the North Carolina Symphony. Dyer is also Psychic Wolf. Psychic Wolf works with an ever-expanding community of collaborators to produce one-off performance events. Dyer was a Kenan Fellow at Lincoln Center Education in 2019 after graduating from University of North Carolina School of the Arts.
Finnegan Shanahan, Teaching Artist
Finn Shanahan is an educator, interdisciplinary artist and member of boio, a musical duo that explores group expression using song, dance, puppets and props. He also creates mixed media visual artworks and recorded music. Since 2010, he has been a founding member of 23-person NYC new music ensemble Contemporaneous, and he released his first solo album with the group in 2016 on New Amsterdam Records. Finn received a BA in Music Performance from Bard College, and has spent the past decade performing internationally as a violinist, violist, guitarist and vocalist with a multitude of artists across different genres and art forms. During this time he has also regularly worked with people of all ages and abilities as a private teacher and participated in educational outreach in public and private schools. Finn’s creative and teaching practices are informed by a strong belief in lifelong learning through exploration, self-education, collaboration and play.
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Influences
What we do is deeply shaped by the following thinkers and texts:
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"Neurotribes" by Steve Silberman
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"Teaching to Transgress" by bell hooks
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"Art as Experience" by John Dewey
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"Teaching as a Subversive Act" by Neil Postman
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"Visual Thinking Strategies" by Philip Yenawine
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"Eye of the Beholder" by Abigail Housen
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"Visual Thinking Strategies for Pre-Schools" by Philip Yenawine
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"Pedagogy of the Oppressed" by Paolo Friere
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"Art and Visual Perception" by Rudolf Arnheim
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"Century of the Self" by Adam Curtis
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"Conflict is Not Abuse" by Sarah Schulman