Spotlight Six Summer 2025

  ^{Based in Medford, MA}

The Royall House and Slave Quarters function as a site of memory. In the 18th century, the plantation, which once made up most of what is now modern-day South Medford, was 504 acres and home to the Royall family. As the largest slaveholding family in Massachusetts history, the Royalls and those they enslaved are central to the state's connection to slavery and how it functioned in the northern colonies. As one of the only remaining freestanding quarters where enslaved people lived and worked in the North, the museum bears witness to their lives, to the intertwined stories of wealth and bondage in pre-Revolutionary Massachusetts, and the resistance and political and legal activism of enslaved and free Black people in the eighteenth century. Today, the museum focuses on exploring the experiences of the enslaved by placing them at the center of the tours and understanding this history from their perspectives.

^{Based in Providence, RI}

Andy Russ creates work that moves freely between the genres of dance, theater, music and video, challenging the conventions of performance practice and audience expectation. Andy is also actively involved in helping others explore the process of creation, leading workshops and residencies with students of all ages and backgrounds. As a designer, he has created soundscores, lighting, and projections for over 100 dance, theatre, film, and radio productions. He is a founding Co-Director of Motion State Arts, a Visiting Lecturer at Harvard University, an Adjunct Professor of Dance at Roger Williams University, and most recently a teacher of Integrated Art and Music at the Wolf School. Since 2014, his home for invention is Passive Aggressive Novelty Company.

  ^{Based in Conway, NH} 

Phyllis owned an interior design company for over 20 years and turned her focus to artistic works during the Covid years. Her focus is oil painting in an expressionistic / traditional style of a variety of subjects including landscapes, seascapes and capturing the joy of childhood play.  She also paints watercolor but in more of a botanical illustrative style. Phyllis draws from her experiences as an avid outdoors woman and from the joys of motherhood, often painting plein-air and finishing in her studio.  She can take commissions and work from photos as well.