New York
about
LABA NY, the first and longest-running LABA hub, is based at the 14th street Y, in the East Village of New York City. This location is rich in history, from Yiddish theater houses that used to dominate the neighborhood a century ago, to the avant-garde punk rock halls that were popular around 50 years ago. LABA helps keep that spirit of artistic innovation and rebellion alive in this century,
LABA NY was founded in 2007 by Stephen Hazan Arnoff, the former Executive Director of the 14th Street Y in the East Village, writer and teacher Basmat Hazan, and artist Anat Litwin. In 2010 LABA became more formalized under the helm of Ronit Muszkatblit, Elissa Strauss, and Becky Skoff with a curriculum, application, DRUNK night of study and wine flights, the LABAlive performance season, and an artists-based Tikkun for Shavuot which eventually morphed into “Into the Night,” the most popular downtown Tikkun in New York City. In 2019, Laura Beatrix Newmark took over as Artistic Director of LABA NY.
LABA NY gives culture-makers in one of the most fast-paced cities in the world a chance to stop and immerse themselves in a rich source of inspiration and a tight-knit community. Yes, New York is one of the most creative, and Jewish, cities in the world. Still, LABA scratches an itch. There are few other opportunities for culture-makers with any background to go this deep into the ancient Jewish canon and to be told that these texts belong to them as much as anyone else. When LABA NY gets together in a classroom at the 14th Street Y and becomes absorbed in a passage from the Torah or Talmud, it’s as if all the lights of New York have dimmed, if only for an hour, and all they can see, all they can feel, is the page in front of them and the people around the table wrestling with the words.
The 14th Street Y, a Jewish community center in the East Village, is a vital neighborhood resource that welcomes people of all backgrounds. We provide a variety of programs with a distinctive downtown point of view, emphasizing excellence, innovation, creativity, and a questioning spirit. We are inspired by Tikkun Olam, or repair of the world, in all that we do — a value that represents and renews the vitality of our Jewish heritage and its place in our diverse and vibrant community. The 14th Street Y is a proud part of Educational Alliance’s network of programs throughout downtown Manhattan.
staff
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Chanan Ben Simon, Director of LABA NY
Chanan Ben Simon is a LABA Alumni, from the year BROKEN 2021-2022. He is a vocalist, composer and a multimedia artist, born in Jerusalem, currently Brooklyn based. Chanan’s work combines voice, sound, visuals, installation art and new media. His former works includes the TV operas - "The Weather Channel" and "Fire Heart", his discography includes 'Toy Store' (2016) and 'Party Tears' (2021) and many collaborations with different contemporary composers, orchestras and ensembles.
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Ruby Namdar, Resident Scholar NY, Senior LABA scholar
Ruby Namdar is an Israeli-American author born and raised in Jerusalem to a family of Iranian-Jewish heritage. His latest novel “The Ruined House” (2013) won the Sapir Prize, Israel’s most prestigious literary award. The English edition of “The Ruined House” (translated by Hillel Halkin) was published in the US by Harper Collins in November 2017. The French edition of the novel (translated by Sarah Tardy) was published in September 2018 by Belfond, and was nominated for the Prix du premier roman étranger 2018. He currently lives in NYC with his wife and two daughters, and teaches Jewish literature, focusing on Biblical and Talmudic narrative.
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Ronit Muszkatblit, Executive Director of LABA, Senior Director of 14Y Arts + Culture,
Ronit Muszkatblit was born in Germany and raised in Israel. She is a theater director and has filed senior artistic and managerial positions and overseen the development and growth of LABA into an national and international renown organization. Ronit curates and directs in various capacities with a focus on opera, theater and multi disciplinary events. Her most recent directing credits include LABALive events.”The Magic Letter” (Haifa Theater festival - best play), “ Name Game” by Yehuda Hyman and Sara Felder (Zoom Theater Play), Hanna and the Moonlit Dress (Theater Row NYC). Ronit received her MFA in directing from the Actors Studio Drama School, trained at La Mama Umbria (Italy) and with Siti Company.
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THE 14TH STREET Y STAFF: Kryssy Wright is the Production Manager for Arts & Culture at the 14th Street Y. Since relocating to Brooklyn she has designed and built sets, designed and hung light plots, stage managed, set up audio and video systems, production managed, tech directed, and swept a lot of floors. While in NYC , Kryssy has worked with the Ensemble Studio Theater, Columbia University, INTAR, Noemie LaFrance, PS122, Danspace, Abrons Art Center, and many others. Outside of NYC she went on tour with The Civilians. Currently Kryssy is the Technical Director of the Theater at the 14th Street Y. She is an Associate Artist with Third Rail Projects, whom with she was awarded a Bessie, Avant Media, and LABA. Her degree is from Bennington College.
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Shoshana Torn is an artist & designer based in Baltimore, MD. This is her sixth year contributing to LABA as a graphic designer. Her current design projects run the gamut of international event branding, conceptual and end-to-end production for non-profits, and websites for emerging businesses and initiatives. Shoshana holds a B.A. in Art History with honors from NYU in addition to surviving six years of art school.
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ABOUT THE 14TH STREET Y: The 14th Street Y, a Jewish community center in the East Village, is a vital neighborhood resource that welcomes people of all backgrounds. We provide a variety of programs with a distinctive downtown point of view, emphasizing excellence, innovation, creativity, and a questioning spirit. We are inspired by tikkun olam, or repair of the world, in all that we do — a value that represents and renews the vitality of our Jewish heritage and its place in our diverse and vibrant community. The 14th Street Y is a proud part of Educational Alliance’s network of programs throughout downtown Manhattan.
2023 New York LABA FELLOWS
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Mikhl Yashinsky
Mikhl Yashinsky, a meshugener Michiganer by birth, works as a theatre artist in Manhattan. These days, he often creates in Yiddish, the language of his ancestors. He performs in Yiddish (with National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, “Fiddler on the Roof,” the title role of “The Sorceress”); he writes Yiddish plays (lately performed at the Lower East Side Play Festival and New Yiddish Rep); he sings in Yiddish late at night and bothers his neighbors.
To learn more about Mikhl and his LABA project go here
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Rebecca Katz
Rebecca Katz is an artist and educator from Brooklyn, NY. She’s spent the past decade working in the Jewish social justice movement with teens through adults. Through community art projects and cultural organizing, she creates spaces where people can access their creativity and explore their connection to community, identity, and place. A creative facilitator with the Jewish Studio Project, Rebecca works at Lilith magazine.
To learn more about Rebecca go here
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Jenny Pommiss
Jenny Pommiss is a Brooklyn-based choreographer, performer, filmmaker, and teacher. She studied Dance at Oberlin College and received an MFA from the Ohio State University. She has choreographed over 30 live performance works and has made 6 dance films. Her work has been presented in NYC, San Francisco, Connecticut, Miami, Philadelphia, Toronto, Germany and Switzerland. In 2012, she developed a dance program at the Grace Church School in NYC.
To learn more about Jenny go here
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Layla Klinger
Layla Klinger is a hole maker, working with fiber, light and electric currents to investigate intimacy, erotic compulsions and beauty as merit. She created site specific installations for the art festivals internationally, exploring textiles, space and light through public engagement. They have an MFA in Textiles from Parsons School of Design, where they are currently an adjunct faculty Member.
To learn more about Layla go here
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Hannah Epstein
Hannah Epstein (AKA hanski) is a hybrid artist who uses the traditional craft of rug hooking and interactive technology. With an artistic practice grounded in independent game design and video art, Epstein’s use of textile remains the central medium where she pulls together a vast array of interests into a refracted reflection of our media saturated landscape. She is currently represented by Steve Turner LA.
To learn more about Hannah go here
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Damien Olsen Berdichevsky
Damien Olsen Berdichevsky is a multi-disciplinary artist who throughout his life has consistently created art and music. He was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1961 to a Ukrainian Jewish immigrant family. He studied Psychology and Dance Theater at the University of Buenos Aires and at the University of Santa Catarina, Florianopolis, Brazil. Damien has continued to work in sculpture, painting, photography, video and music. He studied musical composition and free jazz improvisation with Raol Bjorkenheim. He also has performed at a variety of venues in the NYC area, both solo and collaboratively.
To learn more about Damien go here
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Ben Nadler
Ben Nadler is the author of “The Sea Beach Line: A Novel” and “Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side, 1981 – 1991.” He holds an MFA in fiction from the City College of New York and a PhD in English from SUNY Albany. His short stories and essays have appeared in numerous publications. He lives at the very top of Manhattan with his wife and dog, and teaches developmental English in the City University of New York’s community college system.
To learn more about Ben go here
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Danielle Alhassid
Danielle Alhassid is an Israeli multidisciplinary artist, living and working in New York. Her works involve stop motion animation, installation, print making and performance. She focuses on the intersection of memory, identity, immigration and the urban experience as her main subjects of investigation. Danielle’s works have been presented in various venues in Israel, the Netherlands and New York.
To learn more about Danielle and her LABA project go here.
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Tusia Dabrowska
Tusia Dabrowska is a Jewish Polish American artist who works at the intersection of storytelling, performance and media. Her collaborations have been seen in the US (BRIC, TAFNY) and internationally (PrintScreen TLV, AlphaNova BLN). She is the co-founder of Temp. Files, a video publishing cooperative. Tusia was the artist in residence at Signal Culture (2017), BRICWorkspace (2017-2018), BRIClab video art (2022-2023), and Wave Hill (2023).
To learn more about Tusia and her LABA project go here.
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Rona Tamir
Originally from Tel Aviv, Israel, Rona moved to Brooklyn in 2012 with her husband and two kids. Living, thinking and dreaming in both languages and trying to balance multiple identities on the Israeli-American spectrum.
To learn more about Rona and her LABA project go here.
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Melissa Weisz
Melissa Weisz is an actor, writer, producer and consultant based out of NY. They are a native yiddish speaker having grown up in the chasidic community in Brooklyn . Melissa is passionate about authentic nuanced representation with their work often focusing on giving voice to marginalized peoples and communities.
To learn more about Melissa and her LABA project go here
LEARN MORE ABOUT OUR PREVIOUS FELLOWS:
Michael Gac Levin was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He received is BA in Classics from the University of Chicago, where he wrote his undergraduate thesis on the construction of the “Barbarian” in Ancient Roman Literature. He had his first solo exhibition in 2013, entitled “Jews of Today,” at 109 gallery in Williamsburg. “Jews of Today” was a multi-year research project in which he explored Hasidic codes of dress, first in paintings, and ultimately in an illustrated book of the same name, published in a small edition by the gallery. The same year he finished “Jews of Today,” he enrolled in Pratt’s MFA program. He graduated in May of 2015, and in November of that year, he attended the Vermont Studio Center as an artist-in-residence. He has since been working in Brooklyn as an artist and illustrator, and remains active in Pratt’s alumni community. 
Gordon Haber abandoned an early career in marketing for the more rewarding, if less lucrative, fields of writing and publishing. Gordon has an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University. His awards include a Fulbright Fellowship to Poland, and he has received support from the Queens Community Arts Fund and the MacDowell Colony. His nonfiction religion writing on topics like circumcision, atheism, and the Jefferson bible appears frequently in the Jewish Daily Forward, Religion Dispatches and Killing the Buddha. His recent fiction includes two best-selling novellas published by Amazon as kindle singles: False Economies and Adjunctivitis. Other stories have appeared in the Normal School, The Parenthetical Review, Jewish Fiction, Zeek and Heeb magazine. His forthcoming kindle single, his grandmother’s memory, will be published this summer. His agent is currently submitting his novel, With Perfect Faith: a novel of the Apocalypse (Jewish Division), to publishers. The novel is the fictional memoir of Gershon Halpern, a skirt-chasing, alcoholic marketing executive whom god chooses to prophecy the imminent arrival of the messiah. After the success of his own e-books, Gordon started Dutch Kills Press, LLC, an e-book publishing company. Since 2014, Dutch Kills Press has sold thousands of e-books, marrying the editorial precision of traditional publishing with the convenience of the digital world. Contributors earn 50% of the profits. Gordon does not live in Brooklyn. 
Abigail Katz serves as Director of New Play Development for Atlantic Theater Company where she has been on the artistic staff since 2009. In 2014 she expanded Atlantic’s play development program by creating the Amplified Reading Series and Launch Commission for early career writers. She was previously Literary Associate and Dramaturg for The Civilians, where she worked on productions Brooklyn at Eye Level, This Beautiful City (The Vineyard Theatre) and Paris Commune (The Public Theater). She was also Producer for Voice & Vision, a company devoted to developing women theater artists. She currently teaches at The New School (School of Drama) and Atlantic Theater Company’s Professional Conservatory program. In addition she has taught in the MFA programs at Columbia University School of the Arts and SUNY Stony Brook/Southampton, as well as workshops at The New School, PlayPenn, Southampton Writers Conference, the Commercial Theater Institute, the Playwrights Foundation, CityWrights/City Theatre and Samuel French. Additional affiliations include the Arts Committee for the Alumni Career Task Force for The Dalton School and the New York City team for the American Theatre Archive Project. A native New Yorker, Abigail received her MFA in dramaturgy from Columbia University School of the Arts.
Michael Leibenluft is a Brooklyn-based director originally from Chevy Chase, Maryland. Michael’s directing credits include I’ll Never Love Again (a chamber piece) by Clare Barron at the Bushwick Starr (Obie Award for Direction, 2016; NYT and Time Out Critics’ Picks), How I Learned to Drive by Paula Vogel with Drum Tower West Theater in Beijing, Lost Tribe by Alex Borinsky as part of Target Margin’s Yiddish Theater Lab, The Subtle Body by Megan Campisi at 59E59 Theaters and the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center, and other projects with LMCC, The Civilians, EST, and NYU/Tisch. Michael has assistant directed at the Signature Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, Atlantic Theatre, P73, and American Theater Company. He is an alum of the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab, the Lincoln Center Directors Lab, as well as a former Fulbright Fellow, SDCF Kurt Weill Fellow, and Drama League Fall Directing Fellow. Michael graduated from Yale as a double major in Theater Studies and East Asian Studies and completed his Masters in Performance Studies at the Shanghai Theatre Academy. Michael is the founder of 
Keren Moscovitch is a multi-media artist and scholar based in New York City. Her work explores the poetics of intimacy, and the space where the spiritual and the sexual meet. She holds an MFA from the School of Visual Arts, where she currently teaches courses in art and philosophy, and a BA from Georgetown University. Continuing her exploration of the intersection of practice and theory, she is currently pursuing a PhD in Philosophy, Art Theory and Aesthetics at the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts. Keren has exhibited and given lectures internationally, and is a contributing writer at ARTPULSE Magazine. 
Laura Beatrix Newmark is the Jewish Life & Culture Fellow at The 14th Street Y. She builds community amongst the young families of the 14th Street Y through interactive and creative programming. Her intersection with the arts spans multiple decades (starting with playing the cello from age six) and includes quoting a young stand-up named Jay Leno at her bat mitzvah, watching every episode of The Jon Stewart Show and then sneaking into a comedy club to tell him she was Jewish, then managing a roster of stand-ups and improv artists and leading up to her greatest creative role yet of being the mom to Elias Pablo and Milo Liev. Laura holds a BA in Urban Studies with a concentration in English from Barnard College. 
Franny Silverman is a theatre-artist and educator who creates interactive theatre, ritual and educational experiences for humans of all ages. Franny is currently the Director of Learning and Action for Brooklyn’s independent, progressive synagogue, Kolot Chayeinu. This year she had the honor of being in the inaugural cohort of UJA’s Ruskay Institute for Jewish Professional Leadership as well as training with and facilitating conversations on Israel as a Resetting the Table Facilitation Fellow. She has created and performed in numerous new Jewish theatre works for stage and ritual settings as an actor with Jewish Plays Project; a founding member, and former Associate Artistic Director of Storahtelling-Lab/Shul; and founding member of Wisconsin-based Northwoods Ramah Theater Company. Franny directed NY and touring productions of Ayelet Rose Gottlieb’s mulit-media song-cycle Mayim Rabim/Great Waters (BRICLab, PS122, Wexner Center, Chicago Cultural Center). Her interactive Passover experience, UnSeder|DisOrder, was presented by Chashama’s “Process is Fundamental,” in 2010 and along with warner|shaw co-founder Annie Levy, she served as Indiana University’s Jewish Studies Program’s Paul Artist-in-Residence for the development of warner|shaw’s The Latvia Project in 2012. 
g is a multimedia artist and performance maker. He has created short films and video installations, video design for the stage, and multimedia performances. Sperling is a graduate of the School of Visual Theater in Jerusalem and holds a B.A. in psychology and philosophy. He also spent a year as a fellow at the Cologne Academy of Art (khm). His work as multimedia performance creator includes “shulamis or the well and the pussycat” at the Target Margin Yiddish Lab, New York, 2012, “Sotto Voce”, a multimedia musical-theater project presented in Berlin in 2011, and “Ruhe Sanfte”, a musical-visual performance performed at the Israeli Opera, 2005. Noted video design work includes “City of Glass” at the New Ohio Theater (2016), “Trade Practices” at Here Arts Center (2014), “Uriel Acosta” at the Chocolate factory (2014) and “Don Giovanni” at the Cologne Opera (2010). Video installation work has been presented at the SVA Gallery in New York, Hellerau Arts Center in Dresden (Germany), Kampo Museum in Kyoto (Japan), and Ein-Harod Museum in Israel. 
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