Jurors

John Cusano was the Community Development Coordinator for the Connecticut Office of the Arts (DECD), where he worked with artists and arts organizations throughout Connecticut and New England. Prior to state service, he directed the Farmington Valley Arts Center, a community school for the arts in Avon, CT, and the Bridgeport Artisan Center, to support artisan-owned, craft micro-enterprises for emerging craftspeople of limited means. Cusano has designed and managed arts and arts education programs, co-founded and directed an urban arts festival and directed his own art gallery, John Cusano Fine Art, as the first commercial tenant in the South Norwalk, CT, redevelopment (SoNo). He has been an independent curator and worked with many national and international contemporary artists.

Cusano is currently an independent advisor merging his deep and varied professional experience in the nonprofit, social benefit field with practical applications synthesized from formal studies in systems science, related scientific fields, integral studies, and human development. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Industrial Design from the College of Engineering at the University of Bridgeport, CT, and a Master of Arts Degree in Consciousness Studies from The Graduate Institute in Bethany, CT.
Harold Shapiro is a well-known photographer and respected teacher in the New Haven region.

He has been a full time professional photographer for over 36 years. Now as Photo Department Head at The Creative Arts Workshop in New Haven, where he has taught classes since 1984. Harold has also taught at the University of New Haven, and offers special workshops at Milford Photo. He uses photography and music to reach people in need and shares this with many of his students.

Harold holds degrees from The New England School of Photography with Honors in Color & Portraiture and has been an active volunteer for many years, recently honored by the American Hospital Association for his work playing music for patients at Yale-New Haven Hospital and the Ginger Calhoun Volunteer Service Award from SARAH – where he helped adults with Down Syndrome explore their world with photography. He also received the Arts Award, given annually by the Arts Council of New Haven and is an Associate Fellow at Jonathan Edwards College at Yale University. 


Stephanie J. Coakley is Executive Director of Pequot Library in Southport, Connecticut. Prior to joining Pequot Library, Stephanie's experience in art museums spans 20 years. Stephanie began her career first at the Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington, Connecticut, and then for nearly five years with the Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston, South Carolina. In Charleston, she worked as Director of Development and later Director of Redux Contemporary Art Center. Between 2004 and 2011 Stephanie worked as Director of Education and Community Partnerships with Tucson Museum of Art in Arizona, where she co-founded the Museum School for the Visual Arts, a public high school for artistically talented teenagers and the first of its kind in the U.S. Here in Connecticut between 2013 and 2016 she worked as an educator and curator with the Mattatuck Museum in Waterbury.

Throughout Stephanie's career she has managed studio art programs, including photography courses and workshops and has developed countless learning opportunities for all ages, many in conjunction with photography exhibitions, and is proud to have had the opportunity to have worked with established photographers J.D. Cummings, co-founder of the Charleston Center for Photography and longtime photography educator Harold Jones in Tucson, just to name a few. Stephanie has also reviewed photography portfolios for the American Society of Media Photographers in NY. Stephanie earned her BA in Art History and English from the University of Connecticut and her MA with honors in American Studies from Trinity College in Hartford.