Available Potential Enterprises, Ltd. (A.P.E.) is run by a small, highly energized group of volunteers, artists, and paid staff striving to incur very little overhead while serving a large community of artists.
STAFF
Kathy Couch; Co-Director/Steward
Kathy Couch is an artist, educator, arts administrator/advocate, and Bessie Award-winning designer based in Northampton, MA. Working in mediums of light, space, collaboration, and improvisation, Couch creates visual landscapes for performance and installation with/in traditional and non-traditional spaces both nationally and internationally. She has recent and ongoing collaborations with Yanira Castro/a canary torsi, Vanessa Anspaugh, Adele Myers + Dancers, Scapegoat Garden/Deb Goffe, Sara Smith, improvisation ensemble The Architects, and musician Batya Sobel. In her work, Couch uses language, light, and readymade objects to craft experiences of engagement that allow audiences to contemplate moments of being and activate their vital role as contributors to the work and the world. Her work has been seen at Danspace Project, the Chocolate Factory, New York Live Arts, the ICA in Boston, LaMaMa, the Prague Quadrennial, the New Museum in New York City, and the Immigration Museum in Melbourne. Kathy is a founding and current board member of the Northampton Community Arts Trust. She received her MFA in Visual Arts at the Vermont College of Fine Arts and her BA from Amherst College where she eventually taught and mentored students for over 15 years. Kathy first began tending and curating space at A.P.E. in the mid-nineties and is honored to step into this more official role as Co-Director/Steward after her decades of learning and imagining with the many artists and leaders that have shaped A.P.E. Contact Kathy HERE.
Kathy Couch is an artist, educator, arts administrator/advocate, and Bessie Award-winning designer based in Northampton, MA. Working in mediums of light, space, collaboration, and improvisation, Couch creates visual landscapes for performance and installation with/in traditional and non-traditional spaces both nationally and internationally. She has recent and ongoing collaborations with Yanira Castro/a canary torsi, Vanessa Anspaugh, Adele Myers + Dancers, Scapegoat Garden/Deb Goffe, Sara Smith, improvisation ensemble The Architects, and musician Batya Sobel. In her work, Couch uses language, light, and readymade objects to craft experiences of engagement that allow audiences to contemplate moments of being and activate their vital role as contributors to the work and the world. Her work has been seen at Danspace Project, the Chocolate Factory, New York Live Arts, the ICA in Boston, LaMaMa, the Prague Quadrennial, the New Museum in New York City, and the Immigration Museum in Melbourne. Kathy is a founding and current board member of the Northampton Community Arts Trust. She received her MFA in Visual Arts at the Vermont College of Fine Arts and her BA from Amherst College where she eventually taught and mentored students for over 15 years. Kathy first began tending and curating space at A.P.E. in the mid-nineties and is honored to step into this more official role as Co-Director/Steward after her decades of learning and imagining with the many artists and leaders that have shaped A.P.E. Contact Kathy HERE.
Mollye Maxner; Co-director/Steward
Mollye Maxner (director, dramaturg for new work, choreographer, educator, mother) has made original performance work in collaboration with artists of many disciplines. Artistic highlights include Occupied Territories (Washington DC 2015 / Off-Broadway 2017 / Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Choreography) and Still Life with Rocket (Washington DC 2017 / North Carolina 2019 / Helen Hayes Awards for Outstanding Choreography and for Outstanding Production), as well as The Trojan Women (Franklin Stage Company 2011), Reading By Lightning (2005-2007), The Silicon Dance Project (2002), The Table Piece (1994-2010) and working as choreographer at American Players Theater in the summers of 2021 and 2022. With a dedication to the intricacies of theater craft and creative practice, Mollye is passionate about new work in theater and multidisciplinary performance. She currently collaborates with her partner to homeschool their two children and revels in her time with them, learning and running through the woods. Maxner is the recipient of the Kenan Fellowship at the Kennedy Center, a Massachusetts Cultural Council Artist Grant in Choreography, and a DanceWeb Europe Scholarship for Vienna’s ImpulsTanz Festival. Mollye created and performed new work at A.P.E. in the early 2000’s, finding an artistic home amid the people and philosophy of A.P.E. It is an honor to steward A.P.E. in this next phase. Contact Mollye HERE.
Mollye Maxner (director, dramaturg for new work, choreographer, educator, mother) has made original performance work in collaboration with artists of many disciplines. Artistic highlights include Occupied Territories (Washington DC 2015 / Off-Broadway 2017 / Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Choreography) and Still Life with Rocket (Washington DC 2017 / North Carolina 2019 / Helen Hayes Awards for Outstanding Choreography and for Outstanding Production), as well as The Trojan Women (Franklin Stage Company 2011), Reading By Lightning (2005-2007), The Silicon Dance Project (2002), The Table Piece (1994-2010) and working as choreographer at American Players Theater in the summers of 2021 and 2022. With a dedication to the intricacies of theater craft and creative practice, Mollye is passionate about new work in theater and multidisciplinary performance. She currently collaborates with her partner to homeschool their two children and revels in her time with them, learning and running through the woods. Maxner is the recipient of the Kenan Fellowship at the Kennedy Center, a Massachusetts Cultural Council Artist Grant in Choreography, and a DanceWeb Europe Scholarship for Vienna’s ImpulsTanz Festival. Mollye created and performed new work at A.P.E. in the early 2000’s, finding an artistic home amid the people and philosophy of A.P.E. It is an honor to steward A.P.E. in this next phase. Contact Mollye HERE.
Meredith Bove; Program Coordinator
Meredith Bove is a dancer and dramaturg based in western Massachusetts. Her practices move between and across performance, writing, dance, and audio. Through each of these mediums, she is devoted to engaging the tensions between language and embodied experience. She approaches her work in writing, performance, and dramaturgy as possible sites for the excavation of embodied archives, the destabilization of hierarchies, and for the cultivation of increased care, interdependence, and creative kinship. Meredith has taught dance & performance studies at Hollins University (2011-2012 & 2016), Montgomery College (2014-2016), Springfield College (2016), Keene State College (2017-2020), Smith College (2021-2022), and most recently as Visiting Artist in Dance at Mount Holyoke College (2022-2024) where she leads seminars on dance writing, dramaturgy, and queer & feminist performance. She has collaborated as a dramaturg with choreographers Barbie Diewald, Rebecca Pappas, and Lailye Weidman, and has performed in the work of Jérôme Bel, Luis Lara Malvacías, Sharon Mansur, Stephanie Miracle, Jillian Peña, Sara Smith, and Karinne Keithley Syers. Her writing on performance has been published inThINKingDANCE, Culturebot, and Contact Quarterly; forThe Making Room (2018), a collaboration between choreographers Bebe Miller and Susan Rethorst; and by Keene State College's Redfern Arts Center for Reggie Wilson's POWER (2021). She was Associate Editor for Contact Quarterly between 2018-2020, and continues to be influenced by the publication's legacy and commitment to the articulation of the unfolding experience of embodiment. Currently she is Program Coordinator and "unofficial dramaturg" at A.P.E. in Northampton, Massachusetts where she collaborates with co-directors Kathy Couch and Mollye Maxner to steward a number of programs, including Making Ground and the newly formed Workroom Cooperative.
Contact Meredith HERE.
Meredith Bove is a dancer and dramaturg based in western Massachusetts. Her practices move between and across performance, writing, dance, and audio. Through each of these mediums, she is devoted to engaging the tensions between language and embodied experience. She approaches her work in writing, performance, and dramaturgy as possible sites for the excavation of embodied archives, the destabilization of hierarchies, and for the cultivation of increased care, interdependence, and creative kinship. Meredith has taught dance & performance studies at Hollins University (2011-2012 & 2016), Montgomery College (2014-2016), Springfield College (2016), Keene State College (2017-2020), Smith College (2021-2022), and most recently as Visiting Artist in Dance at Mount Holyoke College (2022-2024) where she leads seminars on dance writing, dramaturgy, and queer & feminist performance. She has collaborated as a dramaturg with choreographers Barbie Diewald, Rebecca Pappas, and Lailye Weidman, and has performed in the work of Jérôme Bel, Luis Lara Malvacías, Sharon Mansur, Stephanie Miracle, Jillian Peña, Sara Smith, and Karinne Keithley Syers. Her writing on performance has been published inThINKingDANCE, Culturebot, and Contact Quarterly; forThe Making Room (2018), a collaboration between choreographers Bebe Miller and Susan Rethorst; and by Keene State College's Redfern Arts Center for Reggie Wilson's POWER (2021). She was Associate Editor for Contact Quarterly between 2018-2020, and continues to be influenced by the publication's legacy and commitment to the articulation of the unfolding experience of embodiment. Currently she is Program Coordinator and "unofficial dramaturg" at A.P.E. in Northampton, Massachusetts where she collaborates with co-directors Kathy Couch and Mollye Maxner to steward a number of programs, including Making Ground and the newly formed Workroom Cooperative.
Contact Meredith HERE.
Sophie Gill; Social Media/PR Associate
Sophie Gill is a Northampton native who returned home to WMass after graduating from Clark University (2023). She received her bachelor’s degree in Media, Culture, and the Arts and Community, Youth, and Education Studies. Having worked at another community-centered art gallery during her time in undergrad, she is thrilled to be back working within the local arts scene—this time at A.P.E.. Sophie, who produced her honors thesis on the transformative nature of community art projects, is the creator of a
small community art and literary magazine, TRACKS, based out of Worcester, MA and finds magazines and other forms of print media fascinating. Most days you can find her behind the counter at the Florence Pie Bar slinging pie and practicing her latte art! Contact Sophie HERE
Sophie Gill is a Northampton native who returned home to WMass after graduating from Clark University (2023). She received her bachelor’s degree in Media, Culture, and the Arts and Community, Youth, and Education Studies. Having worked at another community-centered art gallery during her time in undergrad, she is thrilled to be back working within the local arts scene—this time at A.P.E.. Sophie, who produced her honors thesis on the transformative nature of community art projects, is the creator of a
small community art and literary magazine, TRACKS, based out of Worcester, MA and finds magazines and other forms of print media fascinating. Most days you can find her behind the counter at the Florence Pie Bar slinging pie and practicing her latte art! Contact Sophie HERE
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Anne Love Woodhull; President
Anne Love Woodhull is the Executive Director of Available Potential Enterprises (A.P.E.) and the President of the Open Field Foundation that owns Bramble Hill Farm in Amherst, Massachusetts. She also works with children and adults as a play therapist and teacher. Anne has coauthored five children’s books and is the author of This Is What We Have (March Street Press, 2001),a poetry chapbook. In 2013 a book of her poems, Night With Its Owl, was published by Hedgerow Books, Amherst, Massachusetts. In 2021 a book of her poems, Racing Heaven, was published by Open Field Press, Northampton, Massachusetts.
photo by Carol Lollis
Lisa Thompson; Vice-President and Clerk
Lisa Thompson’s first introduction to A.P.E. was in 1976 as a member of Dance Gallery, a contemporary dance company that was in residence on the top floor of Thornes Market, the original home of A.P.E. It was there that she met Gordon Thorne and Anne Woodhull, the founding directors of A.P.E. After leaving the Northampton area for a number of years, she returned in 1996 and was invited to help Gordon manage A.P.E.’s programs. Since then she has worked as A.P.E.’s Associate Director, stewarding and directing its programming until December, 2022. In her other roles as an arts leader, she is an original member of the ArtSalon steering committee and has been instrumental in the formation of the Northampton Community Arts Trust whose mission is to create and preserve affordable spaces for artists into the future. She is very excited to continue to be part of A.P.E.’s future as a board member and to support the new leadership of Mollye Maxner, Kathy Couch and Meredith Bove. Contact Lisa HERE.
Lisa Thompson’s first introduction to A.P.E. was in 1976 as a member of Dance Gallery, a contemporary dance company that was in residence on the top floor of Thornes Market, the original home of A.P.E. It was there that she met Gordon Thorne and Anne Woodhull, the founding directors of A.P.E. After leaving the Northampton area for a number of years, she returned in 1996 and was invited to help Gordon manage A.P.E.’s programs. Since then she has worked as A.P.E.’s Associate Director, stewarding and directing its programming until December, 2022. In her other roles as an arts leader, she is an original member of the ArtSalon steering committee and has been instrumental in the formation of the Northampton Community Arts Trust whose mission is to create and preserve affordable spaces for artists into the future. She is very excited to continue to be part of A.P.E.’s future as a board member and to support the new leadership of Mollye Maxner, Kathy Couch and Meredith Bove. Contact Lisa HERE.
Johanna Higham, CPA; Treasurer
Johanna Higham started working with Gordon Thorne and A.P.E. in 1999 and was referred by an advisor. She has been a Certified Public Accountant for over forty years. She has extensive experience in accounting and taxes in many business sectors including non-profit organizations. She has had her own accounting practice since 1992. She has served on several boards including the Massachusetts Society of Certified Public Accountants.
Johanna Higham started working with Gordon Thorne and A.P.E. in 1999 and was referred by an advisor. She has been a Certified Public Accountant for over forty years. She has extensive experience in accounting and taxes in many business sectors including non-profit organizations. She has had her own accounting practice since 1992. She has served on several boards including the Massachusetts Society of Certified Public Accountants.
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ADVISORY BOARD
Javiera Benavente Donnabelle Casis Carla Costa Matthew Glassman Trenda Loftin Catrin Lloyd-Bollard Art Middleton Mary Ramsay Read more about our Advisory Board and Associate Artists HERE |
ASSOCIATE ARTISTS
Jil Crary-Ross Robin Doty Roy Faudree Andrea Olsen Sheryl Stoodley Jen Polins Michael Tillyer |
A.P.E. was founded in 1977 by Gordon Thorne.
Click here to learn more about Gordon and his work. |