Alexander Anderson (LCSW) served 15 years behind bars in New York State and earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from Syracuse University in the Auburn Correctional Facility. Upon release, Alex obtained his Masters of Social Work from Hunter College.
Alex was a member of the first cohort of R4R graduates in 2009. In 2019 he joined Kevin as the program’s first embedded social worker. Drawn to the artistic aspects of R4R, Alex cultivated his artistry and worked closely with participants as they worked to craft and stage their own stories.
In 2020, Alex founded The Reentry Theater of Harlem, which draws on many of the concepts he first learned in Ritual4Return. He continues to serve as lead social worker and arts consultant on various Ritual4Return projects.
Alexander was awarded the Patient Safety Champion Award at Lincoln Hospital in the Bronx for supporting patients seeking cessation from alcohol and drugs in the emergency room. He lives in the Bronx, New York with his wife.
Kevin Bott (PhD) is founder and artistic director of Ritual4Return. He earned his master’s degree and his doctorate, both in Educational Theater, from the Steinhardt School at New York University. In 2006 Kevin began facilitating theater workshops in several New York State prisons as a volunteer for the non-profit, Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA), and in 2007 became RTA’s first director of education. In 2019, Kevin was named the “Blade of Grass-David Rockefeller Fund Joint Fellow in Criminal Justice,” a fellowship that provided the financial support that allowed him to undertake the first women’s R4R cohort in Harlem.
Kevin is trained as a community-based theater artist and, in addition to R4R, his projects include The D.R.E.A.(M.)3 Freedom Revival of Syracuse, NY — a musical tent revival for freedom and democracy; and Every Time You See Me…, a Staten Island-based meditation on race, class, power, and privilege in the wake of Eric Garner’s death.
Kevin is the director of Rutgers Arts Online and the interim director of Rutgers Community Arts. He lives with his wife and three children in Lambertville, New Jersey.