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About Us
Boyz With Apple is a cooperatively owned artist collective founded by Frances Rippy and Naomi Friedman in 2022.
Their last year of college the Boyz didn't have a TV, so they started collaging the top of their coffee table—okay fine, it was a storage container they were using as a coffee table. Quickly Naomi's corner of the shipping container started to stand out and before they knew it, their house was filled with collages. Frances started an Instagram page, and Boyz With Apple was born.
The Boyz
Meet the Partners!
Frances Rippy
Director of Theatre and Finance
Frances Rippy is a director, producer, dramaturg, and cooperative theatre-maker based in NYC and originally from Louisville, KY. They hope to create complex work infused with a sense of humor and play which inspires, excites, and expands our collective imagination. Recent directing credits include Designs for Living (932collective), True Crime (The Tank), $$$ Pig (Classic Stage Company), Purgatorio (Edinburgh Fringe), Kabaret Purgatorio (Villa Godiola, Arezzo, IT) Mercury (Vassar College Experimental Theatre), and Pericles (Vassar College). Assistant directing and devising credits include Good Luck Fortune Cookies (dir. Satya Bhabha, Town Hall Theatre), The Contention (dir. Tina Packer, Shakespeare & Company), Promenade Sogni, (dir. Sam McGhee, Meliciano, IT), The Crucible (dir. Charlie Sexton, Walden Theatre), and HappyLove/SadLove (Villa Godiola, Arezzo, IT). They graduated with a post-baccalaureate certificate in physical theatre from the Accademia dell'Arte in Arezzo, Italy and Cum Laude from Vassar College with Bachelor's of Arts in Drama and International Finance.
Naomi Friedman
Director of Visual Art and Communications
New York based collage artist, Naomi Friedman, has been working through the medium of physical and digital collage art for the past few years. Through their work with social justice and arts nonprofits, such as the Youth Justice Network, the Newburgh LGBTQ+ Center, and the Williamstown Theater Festival, Naomi has worked to combine their passion for prison activism with a commitment to emergent political and artistic praxis. Naomi dedicates themselves to centering found object art and community testimony in their work—including the curation of materials and resources, as well as the creative process. Naomi graduated Cum Laude from Vassar College with departmental honors, and has participated in two artist residencies following graduation—with the Arquetopia Foundation and Kolaj Institute—to further expand their collage practice. Naomi co-founded the Boyz With Apple Artist Collective and serves as a Producer, Scenographer and Manager for the Clownz With Apple Production Company. As a part of the collective, Naomi has created and shipped unique pieces of analog collage art globally, as well as created art installations and graphic design campaigns for a variety of arts and non-profit organizations.
