Andrea Arden
“I cant imageine anyone more effective. She is amazing.”
ANDREA ARDEN is a Senior Facilitator and Executive Coach for Inspiring Educators and The Ariel Group, and has facilitated programs in leadership presence for clients including educational institutions such as Harvard, Columbia, Darden, and Duke, as well as such clients as Royal Bank of Scotland, Cox Enterprises, CITI, American Express, Novartis, BCG, General Electric, COACH, and United States governmental agencies.
Andrea received her BFA in drama from the Experimental Theater Wing, New York University, and her MFA in directing from Rutgers University. Andrea has served on Adjunct Faculties at Columbia University, Drew University, and is currently at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. She was an Artist-In-Residence at the Somerset County Performing Arts Conservatory for over 14 years, and was a featured teaching artist in the Annenberg Foundation/CPB channel The Art of Teaching the Arts video series. She is also a certified Feldenkrais “Awareness-Through-Movement” teacher.
Andrea has been living and working as an actor, director and teacher in the New York City area since 1987. She was Co-founder and Artistic Director of the theater company Pendulum, where she directed and performed work that toured throughout the New York area and to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Andrea has worked with such companies as the New York Shakespeare Festival, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Primary Stages, American Stage Company, the National Playwrights’ Conference, the Women’s Project and Productions, New Jersey Repertory, the Shoestring Players (winning the coveted Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe) and Cafe Theater, Inc. in residence at George Street Playhouse. Andrea traveled through Europe and Russia in an original duet performance piece, Eggs in a Briar Patch, as well as created, performed and toured her one-woman show, The Cry of the Children. She spent a year in residence with Théâtre du Soleil in Paris in conjunction with the Experimental Theatre Wing, NYU. Andrea is now the Artistic Director of the theater company, THEATRE LILA, producing work throughout the country and in residence in New York City. Andrea’s company, THEATRE LILA, has an outreach component whose mission is to collaborate with community-based organizations to develop educational arts programs enabling the building of empathetic bridges and offering cultural exchange within communities. Committed to this mission, she has developed curriculum and lead workshops with schools, theaters, and community centers in New York, Massachusetts, and the Mid West. Andrea has also served as an Artist-In-Residence with the Women’s Project running Arts in Education programs throughout New York City.
Andrea has devoted her life to exploring the power of theatrical storytelling and what makes theater a vital link to our humanity in modern society. Maintaining her belief that theater has the possibility of transforming a community, she is committed to challenging and moving people beyond their everyday realities. As a teacher, Andrea is committed to arousing her students’ curiosity to explore the many landscapes of their creative point of view in order to help them discover who they are as human beings in the world. Above all else, she believes in creating a safe and supportive environment in which students are allowed to take giant leaps into the creative unknown.
