Staff & Board

Sophie Bréchu-West is director and founder of 571 Projects, a boutique art gallery located in Stowe, VT. A deep, lifelong love of art and a desire to promote the work of significant emerging artists drives Brechu-West’s curatorial and consulting practice. She received a BA in Art History from The College of William and Mary (cum laude) and an MPhil from Christie’s Education, London (with Distinction, accredited through the University of Glasgow). “I am constantly inspired by the creative journeys of the artists that I have the privilege and responsibility of working with. My own journey as an arts professional nourishes my soul and my curiosity. I am passionate about the arts, and the visual arts in particular. As a Vermonter, I derive a deep sense of peace and inspiration from the beauty of the natural landscapes that surround us."

Kristy grew up skiing in the “mountains” of western NY. She always dreamed of living in a ski town. She earned a BS in psychology at St. Lawrence University which led her to a sales career in Boston where she lived for 12 years. Her love of the mountains and her husband’s Vermont roots brought them to Stowe in 2013. Her 3 bosses (age 10,7 and 4) keep her very busy but in her free time she loves to ski and travel. Despite having zero artistic ability, Kristy appreciates art and the opportunities that The Current brings to Stowe and the greater community and loves promoting and encouraging involvement in the center.

Rebecca Chase was raised in Norwich, Vermont and graduated from UVM with a B.A. in European Studies and a minor in Studio Art. Post-graduation, Rebecca moved to Paris to pursue her dream of living abroad. After a short career in fashion, Rebecca embraced a new profession: that of Event Planner. After eight years in Paris, she returned stateside and settled in the Big Apple. There, she enjoyed an exciting career as an Event Planner, and went on to organize events based in Manhattan, across the United States and abroad. Love and marriage brought Rebecca back to Vermont, and to Stowe, where she is now a crazy chicken lady. As a board member, she hopes to use her skill-set as a Planner to help further the mission of The Current, and help to establish a permanent endowment that will allow The Current to make the arts accessible to all.

After growing up in Brooklyn, attending university in California and graduate school in Massachusetts, and completing a postdoctoral fellowship in Nova Scotia, Paul joined the Biology faculty of Barnard College in New York City in 1979; he retired from that position in December 2021. His research, which centered on the ecology and evolution of the Anolis lizards of the Caribbean as a model system, was supported by several grants from the National Science Foundation. While at Barnard, Paul directed a broadly based curricular program funded by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute from 1991 to 2016 and served in several administrative roles at the college. He also co-authored an introductory biology textbook, which is now in its fifth edition. Paul and his spouse, painter James Rauchman, have visited northern Vermont regularly since the mid-1980s; they finally took the plunge and bought a house in Morristown in 2017. Shortly after the
onset on the pandemic, they decided to make Morristown their permanent home. Paul has always been a lover of art and a collector of objects, including natural history curiosities, pre-Columbian artifacts from the Greater Antilles, studio ceramics, and contemporary paintings and sculpture. He previously served on the board of the Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts, and he looks forward to learning more about art and the local community through his service on the board of The Current.

Damon Lee moved to Stowe in 2018, after growing up in Toronto and living in New York and London.  His father was a University of Vermont graduate and an enthusiastic Stowe skier, so Damon enjoyed family vacations in Stowe from an early age. After graduating from Princeton University, Damon joined the Merrill Lynch investment bank.  He managed client relationships and coached teams in the United States and Europe, with a focus on raising capital for hospitals and healthcare institutions.  As a consultant, Damon currently provides corporate financial and strategic advice to healthcare executives across the U.S.  He also develops real estate in Vermont.

Damon appreciates the beauty of mountain landscapes, and their artistic representation and interpretation in visual media.  Architecture is another avenue for people to embrace and complement their surroundings in the natural world.

As a member of the Current’s board, Damon hopes to be a resource for the management team and other board members.  The Current is an attractive community asset; Stowe’s growing number of residents and visitors is a key opportunity to implement the Current’s strategic plan and build towards an ever-brighter future.

Diane Looney moved to Stowe in 2013 after spending 14 years living abroad in Hong Kong and London, where she worked as an interior designer. After earning a degree in art history, she worked at the Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C., and was a researcher and cataloguer at the Art Museum of The Chinese University in Hong Kong, organizing the Museum's ceramics collection. Additionally, she worked at Christie's Auction House in sales in the Chinese ceramic department. In addition to art, Diane's interests include historic preservation, land conservation, and recreational sports including tennis, hiking, cross country skiing, and yoga. She currently serves on the board of Landmarks West, a historic preservation group in New York City, and has been active on fundraising committees for the Central Park Conservancy, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and Sheriffs Meadow Foundation, a land trust in Massachusetts. Diane is married with three grown sons, who all learned to ski in Stowe, and four cherished grandchildren.

Sara grew up in Skaneateles, New York and she received a BFA from the University of Vermont. Sara moved to Stowe, VT in 2017 from San Francisco where she worked at Pixar as both a Production Manager and Department Manager on feature films, TV shows and DVD projects. She has also worked in 2D and 3D animation. Prior to working at Pixar, Sara worked in live action overseeing production of concert videos. Upon arriving back in Vermont Sara produced social media content for a Burlington based studio called Driven, Inc. working with with brands such as Seventh Generation, Cabot Creamery and Ben & Jerry’s. She is well versed in production process, tool development, media creation and post production. Most recently she has put her project management and marketing skills into a different area of business, real estate. Sara now works with her sister, Meg Kauffman at LandVest in Stowe.

Hinda Miller was born and raised in Montreal; she first visited Stowe with her family as a teenage city girl and fell in love with skiing, the Green Mountains, the expansive sky, and starry nights. Hinda is nourished by her family, travel, and education, which includes studies at the Parson's School of Design and NYU School of the Arts (MFA, Theatre Design). She greatly values the creative journey and has served as Jogbra's Co-Founder, Inventor & Entrepreneur Jogbra,  a VT State Senator, a Founding Board Member of the non-profit social enterprise Girltrek.org, and a Mentor & Coach of Venture Mentoring Group, where she championed the diversity of Next Gen Entrepreneurs, amongst many other roles. Hinda and two colleagues were inducted into the 2022 National Inventor's Hall of Fame and awarded the 2015 Lifetime Achievement Award by Sports Business Innovation Hub @ Sterling College, Scotland. As an additional honor, the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History houses the Jogbra Archives. She approaches life with curiosity, experimentation, imperfection, delight, and recovery and hopes to bring these qualities to The Current. 

Courtney is a ninth generation Vermonter and her love of science and nature guided her through degrees in Marine & Freshwater Biology as well as Molecular, Cell and Developmental Biology. She has worked in biotechnology research for the last 20 years and currently works for Adimab LLC in Lebanon, NH as an antibody engineer.  She has always felt a strong connection between science and art.  Stunning photographs of microscopic cell structures, diagrams of complex biological systems and recognizing the golden ratio displayed in natural phenomena are all examples she believes inextricably tie two worlds together. The combination of science and art has helped her understand and communicate ideas within her work and as a teacher in the laboratory and classroom.  She dabbles in photography, fiber art, and linocuts.  She is a field guide fanatic and loves to identify anything living in the fields, forests, waters or skies.  She moved to Stowe in 2016 after marrying her husband, Ryan and they have two lovely daughters, Lydia and Louisa.  Her family loves spending the day skiing or riding on the mountain or taking care of the many cows on the farm.  Living on a dairy farm, helping to support the agriculture that preserves Stowe's gorgeous landscape and raising children back in her home state is a dream come true.  

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Greg Popa is publisher of the Vermont Community Newspaper Group, a group of six weekly newspapers, including The Stowe Reporter, Waterbury Record, News & Citizen in Morrisville, The Other Paper of South Burlington, The Citizen of Charlotte and Hinesburg, and Shelburne News. He also publishes and edits the Stowe Guide & Magazine. Born and raised in Ohio, Greg moved to the Northeast after graduation from the University of Akron, first settling on Mount Desert Island, where he spent summers, and later migrated west to Vermont. He's worked off and on for the newspaper company since 1986, holding just about every job at the community journalism level, from paperboy to publisher. Greg, who lives on a small farm in Bakersfield with two dogs, a cat and some elderly chickens, appreciates the combination of quiet at home and the bustle of Stowe.

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Greg Popa was inducted into the New England Newspaper and Press Association Hall of Fame on April 29, 2022.

Karla was born and raised in Puerto Rico, where she obtained with distinctions a Juris Doctor from the University of Puerto Rico School of Law. Subsequently, she obtained a masters in law (LLM) in environmental law and a masters in law in comparative legal studies from the prestigious environmental program at Pace Law School in New York. She holds professional certificates in climate justice, stormwater management, sustainable land use practices, green infrastructure, and land use and real estate law. Her professional career is focused primarily on environmental and climate justice, poverty and language access in legal and non-legal settings. Currently, Karla coordinates the Vermont’s Agency of Natural Resources Civil Rights and Environmental Justice compliance work, and its diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. She comes to Vermont via Manhattan, NY, Seattle, WA, and Buffalo, NY. In Stowe, now Karla’s permanent residence, she discovered a matchless sense of place in its natural beauty, vibrancy and culture. This appreciation for Vermont’s culture and Karla’s lifelong commitment to diversity and equity drew Karla to contribute to The Current as a Trustee. She is thrilled to have the opportunity to contribute her lived experiences and professional knowledge to advance this formidable group's mission. In her spare time, Karla enjoys traveling, reading, hiking, skiing, painting, culinary adventures and spending time with her family and dog, Olive.

Berenice Fernandez Sarafzadeh is the Deputy Director of Finance & Administration at the Yale Center for British Art (YCBA). The YCBA is the largest museum outside of the UK devoted to British Art, and one of the largest university museums in the US. Prior to her current role, Berenice was Deputy Director and CFO of Shelburne Museum in Vermont, and has spent over 15 years in the accounting and audit of cultural organizations, non-profits & foundations including Georgetown University, the Meyer Foundation, the UVA Foundation, and others.

Born and raised in Saltillo Mexico, Berenice has a master’s degree from the Poole School of Management at North Carolina State University. During her time at Shelburne Museum, Berenice was the chair of the museum’s inaugural Diversity, Equity, Access, and Inclusion task force. She also serves as a member of the Vermont Governor’s Workforce Equity and Diversity Council. She was the past treasurer of the Vermont Hunter Jumper Association and has been active in the New England equestrian and polo scene for the past decade. A resident of Stowe Hollow for the past 10 years, both of her children graduated from Stowe High School.  Berenice continues to feed her love for the equestrian arts through her daughter who is a competitive polo player at the University of Virginia and occasionally catching a chu

Edee, her husband Mark, and their family first began making Stowe a regular part of their lives 25 years ago, with a visit during the summer when they were living in Boston. That led to summer rentals, then the purchase of their home in Stowe, and spending more time in town. Fast forward to 2021…. Edee is based in London, Mark is spending most of his time in Shanghai and their son and daughter live in Israel and and Costa Rica, respectively. But Stowe remains the touchstone of their lives and where the family comes together. Art, in particular contemporary visual arts, became an important part of Edee’s life when she lived in Shanghai (“as an expat who did not speak the language, art became my ‘way in’ to the contemporary culture of the country”) and has continued in London where she currently curates contemporary art programming for two expat organizations, and has made museums and galleries an integral part of her day-to-day life there. A graduate of New York University and the Harvard Business School, her past professional endeavors centered on marketing in the real estate, finance and apparel sectors. At present, her focus is on contemporary art, craft and design, in addition to her interests in yoga, travel and cooking. Edee hopes to bring her marketing skills and her experience planning art events to The Current to bring art to even more Stowe residents and visitors!

Molly Triffin is a freelancer who currently lives in Stowe with her husband. Between snowshoes alongside her dog and children, she writes for magazines and websites about everything from women's lifestyle topics to parenting to careers. But she didn't always live in fleece jackets and Sorels. Before her move, she was based in NY, where she served as the features director at Cosmopolitan. In addition to writing and editing for the magazine, she oversaw special projects and events, including Cosmo's campaign against sexual assault on college campuses and the award-winning Practice Safe Sun campaign, and authored two books. She graduated magna cum laude from Georgetown University with a double major in English and French, and later attended the Columbia Publishing Course. Although prose is the fulcrum of Molly's artistic fervor, she also has a life-long love for the visual realm: Her parents own a furniture store in her hometown of New Haven, CT, part of which is a gallery featuring local artists that Molly helps out with. She also volunteered for the nonprofit "Free Arts NYC," which delivers art programs for inner city kids.