Liz Allen
Liz started off at Paier School of Art right out of high school, then began working at what was then SNET, where she stayed for 31 years. While at SNET, Liz went back to school at Post College and studied management, but didn’t pursue an MBA; instead, she eventually got a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies with a concentration in art from Wesleyan University. Her plan was early retirement from SNET and then to use her education to become an art teacher after getting a teacher's certification at University of Bridgeport. After hearing about and being inspired by the concept of choice-based art classrooms, Liz attended the TAB Institute, whose philosophy focuses on advancing the creative confidence of all learners through choice and student agency. Liz is a great addition to the AMP teaching crew, bringing her skills with the TAB philosophy as an instructor and mentor to the students in our after-school programs.

Meredith Arcari Luciano

Meredith is a certified teacher and master gardener. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Art Education and Regional Geography. As a teaching artist, Meredith creates inclusive programs that aim to provide students in underserved communities access to the arts. Her programs integrate higher-order thinking while providing opportunities for participants to tell their stories and connect deeply to their artwork.

Meredith grew up in Hartford, CT, where her family cultivated small vegetable gardens in their tiny backyard. Her grandmother instilled in her a love for gardening, and they enjoyed getting their hands dirty in the soil.

 After realizing that even a small space could produce abundant fresh food, Meredith created an edible garden at the New Britain Museum of American Art. Her current focus is rebuilding the soil and preserving native flora and fauna.

Watch Meredith’s AMP video.

Shana Bazelmans

Shana is a visual arts educator with eleven years of experience in the art classroom. She has taught in several different capacities from the public arena to the private sector, with students K–12 and with adults. She has written art curriculum for schools and has designed a sensory-based art curriculum for special education students. She attended The Fashion Institute of Technology and New College of California, and graduated from Ramapo College with a BA in Visual Arts and Art History. Shana believes the key to being a good educator is to always be actively learning. She continues to learn new art forms and hone her skills through classes and is currently enrolled in graduate school. “I want to help build creatively confident learners. Fostering and facilitating the collaborative, creative process is one of the things I was put here to do. In my mind, it’s the little piece that I’m adding into a much bigger framework.” 

Watch Shana’s AMP video.

Vance Cannon
A teacher for more than twenty years, Vance holds a B.S. from Western Connecticut State University in English and secondary education and an M.A. in media studies from New School University. He has specialized in teaching film studies, television production, and media literacy, as well as traditional English classes. He is currently the library media specialist at Housatonic Valley Regional High School in Falls Village, Connecticut. He has two adult daughters and lives in Falls Village, Connecticut, with his wife, where he enjoys making music and being outdoors as much as possible.

Ed Fast
Ed has become a celebrated figure through his band Conga Bop and its many well-received appearances in Hartford, including its soulful, sizzling sessions at Firebox Restaurant. As a versatile, Hartt School-trained percussionist, he is also right at home sitting in on occasion with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra, touring with premier Broadway road shows throughout Russia, China, Japan, and South Korea, or gigging in backup bands at Foxwoods or Mohegan Sun, accompanying big-name, casino favorites like Aretha Franklin and Paul Anka. In addition to performing, Ed has been teaching percussion and coaching Afro-Cuban jazz ensembles throughout the region for more than thirty years.

Watch Ed’s AMP video.

Chip Heuer
Chip has been playing in the woods and building things since he was a small child. Growing up on a farm with several old barns full of random materials gave him an environment to express himself through these treasures. Starting with things like forts built out of found materials, he learned how things went together. At fifteen, he built one of the largest skateboard ramps in the Chicago area. He developed a love for the spaces around him and their potential, often redesigning the barns in his head for other uses. He wanted to be an architect and an artist. Now, Chip is a professional woodworker and has built everything from cabinets to guitars. He is involved with the Collinsville Halloween parade, building most of the props (including the candy cannon) and setting them up every year. He has also retained a love for the land and growing things, including select trees to be used by future generations. He gardens extensively and works hard at preservation. “In combining attention to a need (inspiration) and respect of the environment (harmony) with one’s skills, beautiful and useful things result.”

Christine Mitchell
Christine enjoys nothing more than engaging others in the exploration and appreciation of art-making from materials not always considered media for creation. Thirty years as an art teacher and art therapist, she has taught in Montessori and public schools, psychiatric facilities, and museums, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and The New Britain Museum of American Art. In her own work, she derives inspiration from “cave painters from long ago” and explores “an explosion of impressionistic color in a snowstorm or harvest moon. These serve as backdrops for the animals who intertwine allegory and story with the everyday themes of a middle-aged single mom—love, death, divorce, and empty nest.” Her work can be described as a collaboration of the natural and the manmade. “Chunks of rusty steel, discarded brake drums, and I-beams…twigs, leaves, and rocks—these are like clouds in the afternoon sky forming images to inspire [her] painting and sculpture.” Christine seamlessly weaves her connection to the beach after an upbringing on Cape Cod and her modern life as a mother, teacher, and farmer.

Ted Perotti
Ted is a filmmaker from East Canaan, Connecticut, and has worked in the commercial and documentary film industry for five years as an intern, production assistant, sound mixer, camera operator, and editor. While at Endicott College, he worked on the MTV Documentary Series: 16 and Recovering, as well as assisted Copperhound Pictures with a variety of ads for schools, hospitals, and biotech companies. Upon graduating, he started a production company in the northwest hills of Connecticut called Pig Iron Films, where he uses branded storytelling techniques to market local businesses.

Justin Truskauskas

Justin has been a carpenter since he was 13 years old, just like the Outdoor Design & Build kids at AMP. He is also a seasoned sports coach for rec and travel basketball and baseball and a member of the Colebrook Recreation Department. 

When he is not teaching, helping Ellen install art, or constructing things (like AMP’s program room), Justin can be found gardening or fishing on the mighty Farmington River with his family. He’s excited to join Chip and the Summer @AMP teaching team.