Hannah Finkelshteyn is a mixed media artist and curator based in East Brunswick, New Jersey. She is a recent BFA graduate from Mason Gross School of the Arts, where she studied drawing and media, with a focus on ink drawing, collaged work, and media installation. Hannah often describes her artistic and curatorial work as a manner of thinking. Her individual work combines the bold ink of graphic novelization with spoken language and abstract pattern. The symbols and language in her work often draw from the Jewish tradition. Like a mind stuck on an idea, the work reiterates and repeats images and moments in time until some form of solution or narrative emerges within the layers. Thematically, her personal work often explores the push and pull of existing as a cultural and religious Jew within America, and her curatorial work further explores the relationships and emotions that arise within cultural identities and communities. She has led several collaborative communal memorial art projects and curated exhibitions, both within the Rutgers Jewish community and within the Mason Gross community, including Calling Out to God (Or a Lack Thereof), a show focusing on artistic explorations of theology from a variety of religions. Her artwork is on permanent exhibition in the Eva and Hari Halpern Hillel House on Rutgers campus, and has been exhibited in a variety of group exhibitions in New York and New Jersey.

Aakef Khan is a filmmaker and artist at Rutgers Mason Gross. His work revolves around niche minority storytelling and exists within the domains of visual arts, mass media entertainment and performance art. Aakef's creative practice works as a means of inquiry—an attempt to understand the spaces between belief, culture, and identity. His films blend personal narrative with social critique, drawing from his experiences as a Muslim American and his fascination with how inherited traditions shape contemporary life. Thematically, his work explores questions of purity, belonging, and the tension between faith and individuality. Aakef comes from a background in stage, sound and lighting design, and he aims to push the existing exhibit paradigm into the experimental realm with Open Archways. He is credited on industry projects such as PBS' American Muslims: A History Revealed and has received artistic education and training from mentors working in both Broadway design and Hollywood film production. His art heavily values inclusivity, social justice and attempt to rewrite narratives that exclude and divide. Aakef specializes in American Jewish–Muslim intracommunal advocacy, bridging the gaps between two disconnected diaspora communities. With a bold and bright future, we welcome his talent and compassion to the Open Archways curatorial team.

Amee J. Pollack is a mixed media artist with 30 years of experience in art and art education. She currently teaches ceramics part-time at Middlesex College after retiring from Mason Gross School of the Arts-Rutgers where she supervised the Art & Design undergraduate programs and advised film and art students.  Previously, Pollack taught at Creative Arts Laboratory, Teacher’s College, Columbia University, and The College of New Rochelle, New York.

Her artists’ books and constructions, under the banner “Spitz & Pollack”, are in the permanent collections of over 50 organizations such as the Cooper Hewitt-Smithsonian Design Museum, The Brooklyn Museum, The Getty Research Institute, and Yale University.  Amee holds an MFA in book arts/printmaking from The University of the Arts and received a fellowship in art education and design from Pratt Institute. 

Other current leadership includes being appointed by her town’s mayor on the Highland Park  Arts Commission, starting in 2016, where Pollack helped facilitate 50+ arts events including the Sculpture River Walk, Windows of Understanding, and the mural To Break Bread by Raul Ayala. Additionally, her bench-sculpture was re-installed in 2025 (Bench of Our Times) to help facilitate more public art in town. 

Ali Saracoglu discovered the art of Ebru (Turkish marbling) at just five years old, learning under the guidance of his father and master, Musa Saracoglu. Between 2003 and 2007, he grew up surrounded by local artists and exhibitions in Izmir that sparked his imagination and love for color. In 2013, he moved to Ankara and continued to refine his craft through the Bahtiyar school (Bahtiyar ekolü) in the historic neighborhood of Hamamönü. After a few years of practicing on and off between 2016 and 2020, he returned to Ebru with new energy in 2022. Since then, his work has reached audiences in Rio de Janeiro, Paris, Venice, and New York City. Through his art, Ali explores the harmony between tradition and modern expression, where color and movement become quiet reflections on balance and faith.

Gal Cohen (b. 1986, Tel Aviv) is a NYC based visual artist, living and working in Washington Heights.  Gal works primarily in the painting and drawing fields, incorporating mixed media and printmaking techniques in her 2D works. 

Cohen earned her MFA in Fine Arts at Parsons School of Design (2018) and her BFA in Fine Arts at Bezalel Academy, Jerusalem (2009). 

Among the exhibitions Cohen has participated in are: Sustenance+Survival 2025, Home Sick Home 2024, Spring/Break Art Show 2023, Fresh Paint Art Fair 2023, ‘Queer Calling’ at All Street Gallery 2023, NYC, Spring Break Art Show 2022, The Bronx Museum of the Arts (2021), The United Palace, NY (2022),Collar Works, Troy, NY (2021), Laurie M. Tisch Gallery,NY (2021), Arlington Arts Center, VA, 2020, Bric Gallery, Brooklyn 2019, Fresh Paint Art Fair, TLV, Israel (2020), Clemente Art Center, NY (2018), Spring/Break Art Show (2018), Westbeth Gallery NY (2018).

Cohen is a member artist and a former artist in residence at Cornerstone Studios (NYC), a Scholarship Artist at Manhattan Graphic Center studios, a recent alumni of AIM fellowship at the Bronx Museum of the Arts, and a Chashama artist in residence for 2019-2020. 

Muna Al Fadl is a New York City-based artist primarily focusing on the destruction, reconstruction, and fragmentation of memory and space within the Damascus cityscape. Al Fadl’s work overlaps architectural elements, portraiture, image transfer, and appropriated images from Google Earth in an interrogation of diasporic nostalgia in a post-war landscape. With the works primarily painted in stain on found wood, the physical basis establishes a conversation around post-war reconstruction and cautious nostalgia. 

Through the iconic Umayyad architecture, Al Fadl enters the collective and nationalistic memory of a disjointed nation, fracturing the architecture and thus separating structures from their original context. Arabic marquetry is a consistent muse of Al Fadl; the classic Damascene woodworking patterns flood the work while the handling of the paint references veneering itself. Unnatural lighting, fragmented archways, image transfer, and pattern reinforce the city’s urgent, historical, and unknown. Al Fadl’s work is an ode to an uncharted home, a response to the fall of tyranny, and a poem to the resilience of Damascus

For the last twenty years my visual artwork was primarily committed to two literary endeavors. The first involved illustrations for my novel Across Ancient Sands. It is a parallel story about an archaeological excavation in Algeria and the poem they uncover depicting a journey around the Mediterranean Sea during the time of the Odyssey, Aeneid, Hebrew Judges and last great Pharoh. The second book, Portraits of Philosophy, is an illustrated history of Near Eastern and Western philosophy from ancient times to the early 20th century. 

I have a BA in History from Dickinson College and an MBA from Baruch College. I also have participated in six archaeological excavations. I used acrylic paints for all of my artwork, although I have incorporated some other media on occasion. This included spray paint, wood, stucco, and joint compound. 

Eaint Maung is a Burmese Muslim multimedia and mural artist whose vibrant work celebrates culture, community, and storytelling. Her art practice blends traditional painting techniques with digital design to amplify underrepresented voices and transform public spaces into stories of identity and belonging.

Maung collaborated with MoMA PS1 and Malikah to create a large-scale mural honoring the North African and Muslim communities of Astoria, Queens. Through digital illustration and community engagement, she captured the experiences of women navigating immigration and cultural adaptation.

She started her mural career on the streets of New Brunswick on Easton Ave where she has already painted six murals. Her public art portfolio also includes a large scale mural for the Jersey City Central Avenue Special Improvement District, where she led a team to depict local hero Ms. Marvel surrounded by symbols of small business and family unity. Sarah has painted in various settings, from the bustling streets of New York City with Mural Painter Inc., to Umbrella Alley in San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf. Her work reflects a deep passion for using art as a bridge between people and places, inspiring connection through color, culture, and creativity.

Miki Belenkov is a mixed-media painter and fiber artist based out of NYC. In their artwork, Miki juxtaposes “old” and “new” to explore themes of embodied identity, heritage, and the role of “the onlooker” in these concepts. Miki does so through a combination of portraiture, found imagery, and by pulling from their personal and artistic background. Miki’s work functions as an outlet for them to reflect on these themes and their manifestations as they appear within Miki’s own experiences as a first-generation, queer, NYC Jew, especially in a post-October 7th world.

Miki has a BFA in Textiles from Rhode Island School of Design, a Master’s in Art Therapy from NYU Steinhardt, and additional background in classical figure drawing and computational art. Miki’s work has been exhibited in the RISD museum, The National Academy, and NYU’s galleries, and has been featured in several publications within the US.

Micah Steinerman (He/They) is a queer Jewish artist pursuing a BFA in Drawing and Animation (Rutgers University ‘26). Working across painting, sculpture, drawing, and collage, he creates vibrant and expressive works that merge personal narrative with symbolic imagery. 

Steinerman’s practice explores identity, spirituality, and everyday life. Some repeated visuals in his art are: hebrew calligraphy, pomegranates, star of davids, and animals. 

Through their work, Steinerman aims to build visual worlds that are welcoming and engaging. Their latest project is a stop motion animation that explores the journey of a bunny. The film touches on the relationship between mental health, memory loss, and found family. Collaboration and community are central to Micah’s creative practice. He finds deep joy in creating with other artists.