SPRING 2025
ALUMNI
Director’s Message
Dear Friends,
I’m excited to reach out to you as I approach my five-month mark as director of the School of Art and Design. First, let me say a warm hello and express just how meaningful it is to have alumni like you as a part of our community. The role you’ve played in shaping this school is truly invaluable, and I’m grateful for the opportunity to connect with you.
In my brief time here, I’ve been deeply inspired by the energy, curiosity, and dedication of everyone in our community. The fall semester was a whirlwind of firsts for me—from participating in Convocation and learning the significance of orange and blue to welcoming our new freshman cohort into the world of art and design. I also had the privilege of attending the FAA Legacy Awards ceremony, where I met Art and Design alumni Kenneth Carls (BFA 1972), Taekyeom Lee (MFA 2014), and Omar Lamar (BFA 1994); and attended the Distinguished Alumna Lecture by Mary Coffey (PhD 1999). Each of the award recipients spoke about how their experiences at the school shaped their careers. These stories are essential to my understanding of the history and spirit of our school, and they play a key role in strengthening the connections our alumni have to this incredible institution.
There were so many memorable moments from the fall semester, it’s hard to choose just one. However, one that stood out to me was the inaugural “Waffles on Reading Day” event. With the help of my wonderful colleagues, we celebrated our students’ hard work by serving them waffles in the Link Gallery to fuel them up for final critiques and exams. This new tradition was a fun way to bring everyone together through food and conversation in a space that encourages exchange daily, and I’m excited to see it continue to strengthen our sense of community. Events like this, along with the many exhibitions, lectures, collaborations, and friendships that flourished, remind me of how vibrant and dynamic this place truly is. And this is just the beginning—I’m looking forward to all that we have planned for 2025!
Thank you for being a part of this journey, and the next time you are in town please stop by and say hello! If you time it right, we might even make you a waffle!
Warmly, Director, School of Art and Design
Art & Design Picnic 2024
Photo credit: William Hohe
College of Fine & Applied Arts Legacy Award Winners from Art & Design
In celebration of both past legacies and emerging voices in the arts, the College of Fine and Applied Arts sponsors the FAA Legacy Awards. These awards recognize college alumni and friends who have demonstrated courage, curiosity, and passion in their work. We are honoring lifelong learners and advocates, individuals who have impacted their fields in transformative ways—catalysts with distinguished service to the arts.
Emerging Legacy Award
Recognizes FAA alumni early in their careers who have made outstanding professional contributions to their field since graduating.
Taekyeom Lee MFA 2014 Graphic Design Emerging Legacy Award 2024
Taekyeom Lee is a distinguished interdisciplinary graphic designer and visionary design educator known for his innovative integration of emerging technologies into visual communication design. He is currently an associate professor of graphic design at Indiana University Bloomington. He received an MFA in Graphic Design from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a bachelor’s degree from Keimyung University in South Korea.
His pioneering work in tangible graphic design has greatly influenced educators and researchers by demonstrating the potential of mediums such as digital fabrication, various materials, and alternative methods to transform design practices and research. The University of Illinois UrbanaChampaign has been the starting point for many impactful projects. His journey into the realm of tangible graphic design began during his MFA studies. After facing the lifealtering challenge of vision-related health issues, he turned his experience into an opportunity for creative exploration, combining tactile experiences with graphic design. This personal adversity fueled his commitment to accessibility and playfulness in design, leading to innovative projects that utilize diverse materials, including 3D printable plastics, metals, soap, ceramics, and more. Since graduating in 2014, he has continually pushed the boundaries of digital fabrication, even building DIY ceramic 3D printers to work with conventional and unconventional materials. This selfinitiated project went viral, inspiring many around the world to build their own 3D ceramic printers and significantly contributing to the democratization of design technology.
Professor Lee’s academic career is marked by diverse teaching experiences at institutions such as Appalachian State University, Illinois State University, Iowa State University, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Throughout his academic career, he has had the privilege of visiting over twenty esteemed institutions across the nation and abroad to give talks and workshops. He actively engages with the art and design community through conferences, having presented at the AIGA National Design Conference, AIGA DEC (Design Educators Community), SEGD (Society for Experiential Graphic Design), CAA (College Art Association), UCDA (University & College Designers Association), Design Incubation, DEL (Digitally Engaged Learning), ISEA (International Symposium on Electronic/Emerging Art), IEEE VIS (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Visualization), ATypI (Association Typographique Internationale), TypeCon, Tipografia México, SPARKS – ACM SIGGRAPH DAC (Digital Arts Community), EVA (Electronic Visualisation & the Arts) London, and NCECA (National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts). His work has received recognition, including a judges’ choice award and an honorable mention from the STA 100, a typography competition hosted by the Society of Typographic Arts in 2022, and the Scholarship: Creative Work Award from Design Incubation in 2022.
Beyond his creative practice, Professor Lee is deeply committed to fostering inclusive and innovative design
education. His dedication to diversity and inclusion, rooted in his experiences as a first-generation college student and a foreign-born designer, serves as an inspiration. He is determined to create opportunities that appreciate and embrace diverse cultural, social, and economic backgrounds. His current research project, “Graphic Design for Accessibility,” is a testament to his commitment to inclusion, diversity, and education. It aims to craft better experiences for people with low vision and vision impairments, and it has been developed as a regular course to embed his research into his teaching, helping students enhance their creative practice, advance their competence, and promote responsible innovation for accessibility.
Professor Taekyeom Lee’s visionary research, personal resilience, and dedication to expanding the boundaries of graphic design make him a leading figure in the field. His work, which continues to inspire and influence the next generation of designers and educators, is a beacon of hope for the future of inclusive, creative, and technologyenhanced design practices.
Illinois Art Legacy Award
Recognizes volunteers, staff, loyal performers, affiliated artists, etc., who are not necessarily graduates of FAA but whose contributions have made a significant impact in the arts at Illinois.
Kenneth Carls BFA 1972 Graphic Design Illinois Arts Legacy Award 2024
Ken Carls earned a BFA in Graphic Design at UIUC and an MA in Graphic Design from Kent State University. He began his career as a packaging designer in Chicago, before taking a teaching position in the School of Art and Design at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. During his tenure at UIUC, he headed the Graphic Design program, and before ending his academic career in 2005, he served three years as the school’s interim director and one year as associate director.
As a resident in the arts community of Saugatuck-Douglas, Michigan, Carls has been deeply committed to the advancement of that area’s arts and cultural not-for-profits. He has served on the boards of Saugatuck Center for the Arts, the Saugatuck-Douglas Historical Society, and Ox-Bow, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s century-old summer art school on the shore of Lake Michigan at Saugatuck. He has served as grants reviewer for the Ohio Arts Council and has juried exhibitions for the Holland Area Arts Council and the Department of Art, Art History, and Design at Michigan State University.
Although Carls’s professional focus throughout his career was graphic design, since leaving academia, he has concentrated on art making. Several extended periods of living in Europe, and the continuing urban/rural contrasts created by his Illinois farm upbringing and maintaining residences in both Southern California and West Michigan, have shaped his unique perspective and vision—and his varied artistic expression. Ken’s work has been shown in exhibitions in Illinois, Michigan, and California, and he has received numerous awards.
Upon his retirement, he established the Kenneth R. Carls Endowment which will in perpetuity provide support for international travel for undergraduate students in the School of Art and Design.
Omar Lamar Francis BFA 1994 Photography Illinois Arts Legacy Award 2024
Omar Francis, 2nd degree instructor in the Urasenke Tradition of Chadō (Japanese Way of Tea), started his formal art training at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 1990. During his time earning his BFA in Photography, he was exposed and introduced to the other arts featured on campus. His fiery adventures in glass blowing still hold a special place in his stories of the art program. Halfway through his time on campus, Francis enrolled in Prof. Kimiko Gunji’s (MS ’71, MA ’79) class on chanoyu (the Japanese tea ceremony). When asked, he would describe that time as a “homecoming” because Japan House was “a place where I could open my heart wide and share it with others.”
“For me, studying the art and culture of tea [chanoyu] has never been about amusing myself with something exotic. What really drew me in was discovering that what I believed to be my own personal ideas about life, art, and relationships, already existed outside of myself in the Way of Tea.”
After graduating with his BFA, Francis moved to Chicago to continue work in the commercial photography industry, building on experience gained from internships under Douglas Busch (BFA ’74) and Big Deal studios. While working in this field, he continued his weekly studies of the Urasenke Tradition of Chadō under Joyce Kubose in Chicago. This led up to his taking a year-long break from work to enroll in the Midorikai program in Kyoto, Japan. Midorikai is the intensive full-time program of the Urasenke Tea Tradition for nonJapanese students. Days were filled with lectures, kimono wearing, Japanese traditional culture, and a most serious study of the Way of Tea.
Since returning, Francis has been a longtime member of the Urasenke Chicago Association, including 16 years as Vice President of the organization. Some of the many places he has taught and/or presented chanoyu over the past 30 plus years include Loyola University, Notre Dame University, Chicago Botanic Garden, Anderson Japanese Garden, and Japanese Information Center (Consulate of Japan). Through his work at the Japanese Culture Center, he has worked to expose the Way of Tea and culture to high school aged students and younger. In 2008, Francis was granted the prestigious level of instructor and given the name Sōbin by the Urasenke Grandmaster Sen Sōshitsu XVI. Simultaneously, during this time he was diagnosed with a slowly progressing form of ALS but his commitment to chanoyu did not slow down. Due to his many activities spreading tea culture, Omar Francis was awarded the Cultural Achievement Award by The Japanese America Society of Chicago in 2017.
In addition to the achievements above, Francis would say that he has been greatly fortunate to be able to contribute to the programs of Japan House on the Urbana campus. “Even when asked to teach or present chanoyu at Japan House, I find that I am the one who is learning and growing each and every time that I am there.” Most recently, Francis has also been teaching a course for the U of I, ARTJ 397 Zen, Tea, and Power. This course uncovers how the mutually beneficial relationships of religion, war, politics, and the arts gave rise to the tea ceremony in Japan.
“The influential people of pre-modern Japan didn’t study tea as a hobby only after they became powerful. I believe that the study of tea helped make them powerful. It has also been my goal to present this subject in a way that encourages the students to see how their own hobbies and private pursuits are not side notes to their lives but powerful forces that shape who they are and who they will become.”
Currently Omar Francis is one of only three instructors of the Urasenke Tradition of Chadō in the Chicagoland area. Going on ten years, he continues to teach regular classes at the Japanese Culture Center.
Program Recognition
Art Education Art History
Laura Hetrick (professor of Art Education), Stephanie Ceman (professor of Cell & Developmental Biology), and Tracey Wszalek (director of Biomedical Imaging Center) were recently interviewed in Smile Politely: “An unlikely team with a new approach to autism research,” by Laura Cravens.
Current Faculty and Graduate Students
Tim Abel (Art Education PhD candidate) had a oneperson exhibition in the Illini Union Gallery in the summer of 2024.
Grace Bae (Art Education PhD student) is an Interseminars 2024-25 fellow at the Humanities Research Institute, UIUC. She presented the paper “Multicultural Art Education for Improving Mental Health of Immigrant Children” at the 2023 Illinois Art Education Association (IAEA) conference.
Natalia Espinel (Art Education PhD candidate) has been curated into the 15th Havana Biennial (2024).
Rachel Gu (Art Education PhD student) curated an exhibition and presented a paper for the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA) conference in Richmond, VA (2024). She also presented papers at the Illinois Art Education Association (IAEA), United States Society for Education through Art (USSEA), and the National Art Education Association (NAEA) conferences.
Umar Hameed (Art Education PhD student) had a paper presentation on October 14, 2024, for Uniting Human-Computer Interaction for a Hyperlocal and Global Experience at NordiCHI 24 in Uppsala, Sweden.
He is also conducting a workshop in October 2024 at the Illinois Art Education Association (IAEA) conference. Laura Hetrick (associate professor of Art Education), Natalie Smith (Art Education PhD student), and Jean Carlos Valentin Velila (Art Education PhD candidate), presented on “Neurodivergent Narratives of Navigating Graduate School: Recognizing and Accommodating Different Neurotypes” at the 2024 National Art Education Association in Minneapolis, MN.
Laura Hetrick (associate professor of Art Education) initiated, moderated, and presented at the UIUC Autism Research Panel with Commentator Temple Grandin, with Temple Grandin, Nien-Pei Tsai, Marie Channell, Amy Cohen, Tracey Wszalek, and Stephanie Ceman at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology on April 17, 2024.
Somi Lee (teaching assistant professor of Art Education) published the article “Asian Diaspora: Understanding Toronto Public Spaces Through Art and Performances” in the journal Studies in Art Education (2024).
Alumni
Shivani Bhalla (PhD 2024 Art Education) published the article “Through the Looking Glass: Locating My Disability Experience Through Artworks” in the journal Art Education (2024).
Albert Stabler (PhD 2018 Art Education) published the article “Stoic Indulgence, Gratuitous Restraint: White Feelings and Campus Art” in the journal Studies in Art Education (2023).
Emily Edwards (MA 2014 Art History) was appointed Registrar for Exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago.
Christina Michelon (BFA 2007 Art History) was appointed the Pamela and Peter Voss Curator of Prints and Drawings at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Xuxa Rodríguez (PhD 2020 Art History) was appointed Curator of Contemporary Art at the Nasher Museum at Duke University.
Tammie Rubin (BFA 1999 Art History and Crafts) was named a United States Artists Fellow for 2024.
Alumni
Faculty
Jennifer Chuong joined the Art History faculty at UIUC! Her essay, “Love and Chance in the Plantationocene,” will be published by the Henry Art Gallery this fall in conjunction with the exhibition Lucy Kim: Mutant Optics.
Kristin Romberg published a Russian translation of her book Gan’s Constructivism: Aesthetic Theory for an Embedded Modernism (University of California Press, 2018) as Konstruktivizm Gana: Esteticheskaia teoriia vovlechennogo modernizma (Academic Studies Press, 2024).
James Pilgrim was guest faculty at the Johns Hopkins University/University of Warwick/Ca’ Foscari graduate summer school in Renaissance Studies in Venice, Italy.
Cassandra Smith is Guest Curator for the exhibition Txem-sym: A Tribute to Northwest Coast Carvers at the Spurlock Museum.
Hermann von Hesse was awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Council of Learned Societies for his project “Love of Stone Houses”: Urban Merchants, Ancestral Spaces and Sacred Objects on Africa’s Gold Coast, 1700-1890.”
Industrial Design
Current Students
Jori Bassett (BFA in Art & Art History student) is Project Assistant on the exhibition Txem-sym: A Tribute to Northwest Coast Carvers at the Spurlock Museum.
Ivan Cherniakov (PhD student) received the Graduate College Dissertation Travel Grant to conduct research in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Georgia this summer.
Sharayah Cochran (PhD candidate) received a Humanities Research Institute fellowship for her dissertation project, “Dangerous Photographs: What’s the Harm in Documentary?”
Maria Grimaldo (BA in Art History student) was selected to participate in the Art Institute of Chicago’s Summer Intensive.
Lilah Leopold (PhD candidate) published the article “Crop Seed Movements as Feminist Infrastructure” in FKW//Zeitschrift fur Geschlechterforschung und Visuelle Kultur.
Evan Price (BA in Art History student) received the Jo Ann McNaughton-Cade Undergraduate Art History Research Award and a FLAS fellowship to study Yiddish and do thesis research at YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York City this summer.
Associate Director of Design Lynne Dearborn received a 2024 Architectural Education Award. Dr. Dearborn received a Distinguished Professor Award, which recognizes individuals that have had a positive, stimulating, and nurturing influence upon students.
Cliff Shin was quoted in the February 19, 2024, article, “Apple’s freshest design might just be this puffy space-age carrying case” by Aaron Mok of Business Insider
Graphic Design
Eric Benson, Fresh Press co-founder and associate professor of Graphic Design/DRI; e. ainsley (MFA 2021 Sculpture), co-studio manager and program coordinator; and Meredith Hislope (Art Education major), co-studio manager were featured on WILL’s Mid-American Gardner. Fresh Press was also featured on PBS’s Prairie Fire on Thursday, September 19, 2024, and may be viewed on demand on YouTube or PBS Online.
Nekita Thomas, Eric Benson, Joshua Pridemore, Holly Strickland, Noelyn Stephens, and Yiqi Xiao had their article, “How to Explain Design Research To Your Friends” in the Design Research Society Digital Library published.
Jena Marble is presenting with Isabel Bo-Linn (Portland State University) at AIGA Design Conference 2024 on the Design Educators Track. Our panel is titled Sticky Icky AI: Preserving Creativity in the AI Tar Pits. Her visual essay Reimagining Tenure: Bringing Clinical Professors in from the Margins will also be on display at the conference.
Studio Art
& Design Studio
an
BFA 2016 in Studio Art: Sculpture Alumna Jade Williams
Art Forms) is also a recipient of an Illinois Arts Council Artist Fellowship.
Student Recognition
Congratulations to Ali Ibanez (BFA 2024 Graphic Design) for competing in the Paris Paralympics on the women’s basketball team. Also to be congratulated are Phillip Croft (BFA 2025 Industrial Design) and Isaiah Rigo (BFA 2024 Industrial Design) for making it to the paralympic trials for Track and Field.
Kuangming Qin (MFA 2024 Industrial Design) received a 2024 merit award from the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA).
National Portfolio Days
The School of Art and Design faculty again participated in undergraduate National Portfolio Days in San Francisco, Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Louis, and Washington, DC.
Art
Art Faculty Ben Grosser (Digital Arts), Patrick Hammie (Visual Arts), and Laurie Hogin (Visual Arts) recently received
Illinois Arts Council Artist Fellowship Award
(New
Charlene Teters Distinguished Alumni
Presentation and Lecture
Art & Design Distinguished Alumni Lecture: The Painted Line
Thursday, March 21, 2024 / 5:30 p.m.
Plym Auditorium, Temple Buell Hall, 611 E Lorado Taft Dr, Champaign
A member of the Spokane Nation and an artist, writer, educator, and activist, she rose to national prominence as a graduate student at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign where she led protests against the degrading depictions of American Indian caricatures used as sport team’s mascots and was the subject of the award-winning documentary In Whose Honor? by Jay Rosenstein. She has been honored as “Person of the Week” by ABC News and received a New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. She is the recipient of two honorary doctorates from Mitchell College in Connecticut in 2000 and from the Institute of American Indian Arts in 2021.
CHARLENE
CHARLENE TETERS
Fall 2024 Distinguished Alumna
Wednesday, October 16, 2024 / 5:30 p.m.
Plym Auditorium, Temple Buell Hall, 611 E Lorado Taft Dr, Champaign
Mary K. Coffey is Professor of Art History and Latin American, Latino, and Caribbean Studies at Dartmouth College. She received her MA and PhD from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 1999. She is a scholar of the modern art of the Americas, with a particular focus on Mexican muralism. Her first book How a Revolutionary Art Became Official Culture: Murals, Museum and the Mexican State (Duke 2012) won the College Art Association’s Charles Rufus Morey Prize in 2012. She published her second monograph Orozco’s America: Myth, History, and the Melancholy of Race (Duke) in 2020. In addition to these books, she has also published articles and essays on the politics of transnational exhibition, folk art, and more recently, the printmaking of Jose Clemente Orozco. Her most recent research concerns the relationship between visual culture, discarded populations, extraction, and the creation of zones of sacrifice through the modernization and development projects of the postrevolutionary state.
MARY K. COFFEY
Takeover VI
TAKEOVER is an annual extravaganza/ experimental showcase of art and design where all 180+ first year students take over the bathrooms, hallways, stairwells, ceilings, galleries, classrooms, Link Gallery, Bloc Gallery, and Gallery 003, across the School of Art and Design for one night only.
TAKEOVER VI was held on Friday, March 22, 2024, and TAKEOVER VII is scheduled for Friday, April 4, 2025.
Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education Art Award
A new Vice Provost for Undergraduate Research Art Award was established last year. Awards in the amount of $1000 per work will be provided by the vice provost for up to three awards each year. Any continuing student in the School of Art and Design is eligible to submit work. Work will be installed for one year in the offices of the vice provost and will be returned to the student at the end of the year.
The 2023-2024 recipients are Sarah Atmore, Graphic Design; Alexander Brown, Studio Art; and Rosie Martinez, Graphic Design.
2024 Art & Design Summer Educator MicroResidency
Due to faculty shortages, the Summer Educator Micro-Residency was on hold this past year. The 2025 Micro-Residency will be held Sunday, July 13–Saturday, July 19, 2025.
In this program, educator-artists from a broad range of disciplines live, work, and collaborate to push the boundaries of their practices. Art and Design faculty mentors guide mentors guide resident artists through critiques, offer challenges, make presentations, provide demonstrations, and engage in one-on-one sessions. The program culminates with a public exhibition.
The residential program fee includes a private room in a new residence hall, all meals, a large, shared studio space, faculty mentorship, and use of School of Art and Design facilities. Additional resources such as 3D printing and laser printing are available at student rates.
We offer the following media/techniques: all 2D studio art media (drawing, painting, etc.); printmaking; digital design; fibers; installation; digital photography; wood; plaster; mixed media 3D (not clay).
Licensed IL educators receive Professional Development Hours (PDH) for studio hours completed. Non-IL licensed educators receive a letter of completion for their respective state board agency. Graduate credit is not available for this program.
Space is limited and criteria taken into consideration include full-time status at a public or private K–12 school; passion for the proposed residency project; compatibility with a faculty mentor.
For more information and to apply for 2025, stay tuned for updates here
Alumni Spotlight
Alethea Busch
Hello fellow alumni!! My name is Alethea Busch, and I graduated from UIUC with a degree in Art Education in 2018. I’m very proud of finishing my sixth year teaching visual arts at Niles North High School and still often find myself thinking back to the people that got me here. I miss being constantly surrounded by the most inspiring students and professors, always just a short walk away.
My core memories were moments when we were all together. I remember hosting an art exhibition called Radical Optimism with my bestie and roommate Veronica Clements at our apartment. (Sorry to our landlords who are still probably trying to recover from all the holes we put in those walls.) So many people from all different parts of the art and design community came out to mingle and it was a special night. Being radically optimistic was really important to us, to the point where it’s still the core of my practice today. It means that we understand the millions of reasons one could be discouraged at the state of our world today, but we need to be hopeful and never stop creating a more beautiful world for each other and our students.
Being able to bring this love of experimentation and collaboration that grew at UIUC to my students has been very rewarding. Building community within my classroom is always my first goal, because then the skills and creativity develops more naturally. It’s very humbling to be able to work with students with such raw talent that eventually surpasses my own. They keep me on my toes, and I love that they challenge me to keep finding new artists for inspiration and ways of creating.
In my own art practice, my love of photography continues to be the most natural form of art making for myself. I’ve been working on a never-ending photography project called “Wistful Permanence,” which focuses on photographing people and places that I know I’ll miss one day. The thought of being able to recognize things I have in the moment that won’t always be there continues to drive my need to capture these singular moments. My photography is typically meant for my future self, family, and friends as the viewers.
If you are a recent graduate, my advice would be to do what feels right for you. You don’t have to compare yourself to any of your peers in terms of success. What I can see after six years is that some people found their perfect fit a day after graduating, while for some it took a year, or even six years to find their groove. Enjoy each day, don’t stress about the future, keep building a community for yourself, and don’t forget to check in on old friends!
Laura Today
My name is Laura Today. I graduated in 2016 with BFAs in Graphic Design and Photography.
After graduating, I began working at a small design studio focusing on brand identity and packaging before transitioning to an art director role. Currently, I am working in house as a creative manager at Stanley, Black & Decker. In my free time, I like to express my creativity through DIYs around the apartment and painting on any walls that I’m allowed to—or sometimes not allowed to!
Some of my favorite memories in the A&D program were the years I spent in Studio Problems. Linda Robbennolt was a fantastic professor, and the course taught me so much about creative problem solving. Even though I currently don’t work in a studio, I regularly apply knowledge learned in that course when I’m working with photographers and directors to this day.
Participating in the 2024 Dunkin’ Super Bowl spot was a highlight! It was kept very under wraps, and we were only allowed to know parts of the big picture which made it challenging to work on, but it was so exciting to see it come to life in one of the most watched TV events of the year.
Currently in my free time I’m painting a mural in my sunroom. It’s a black and white floral and typography piece to complement vibrantly colored furniture.
There is creativity to be found in a large variety of positions, even if a job posting doesn’t seem like traditional ‘art.’ Balancing a creative job and your personal work is challenging. Be kind to yourself, don’t burn out by forcing yourself to do side projects if your creative spark needs a rest.
Alumni Acomplishments
Marilyn Kay Austin (BFA 1962 Industrial Design) will have some work displayed at an architectural pottery show at the American Museum for Ceramic Art in Pomona California. Austin worked for them following graduation from UIUC. There is a book being issued about architectural pottery in which she will be mentioned and pictured. In 2012, Austin was one of forty women recognized for her work in architectural pottery by a show called California Designing Women. The show covered women from 1896 to 1986.
Brittany Bindrim (BFA 2007 Graphic Design) just dropped her debut album Velella Velella. The album may be purchased here: brittanybindrim.bandcamp.com/ album/velella-velella
Jennifer Cronin (BFA 2008 Painting, BFA 2009 Art Education) was one of three artists featured in the show ExtraOrdinary at the Beverly Arts Center in Chicago. The show takes inspiration from the night sky and the cosmic mystery of our existence and brings it down into the realm of our everyday landscapes. More can be found at jennifercronin.com/news and on social media @jennifercroninart.
Jennifer Cronin is a Chicago-based visual artist known for her realistic paintings that explore the mystery and complexity of everyday life. Cronin’s work has evolved many
times over, delving into psychology, income inequality, and climate change. Her most recent work celebrates the mundane, infusing quotidian scenes with a sense of magic and mystery. In support of her forthcoming body of work, Cronin was awarded grants by the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation and Chicago DCASE. Her work has been featured on NPR, Newcity, and Sixty Inches from Center, and included in exhibitions at the Elmhurst Art Museum, Museo Internazionale Italia Arte, and the Grand Rapids Public Museum. Cronin received her BFA in Painting from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She is represented by Elephant Room Gallery in Chicago.
The artwork in this series was funded by a grant from The Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation and partially supported by an Individual Artists Program Grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events.
Glen C. Davies (MFA 1981 Painting) gifted over 100 works of his art and archive to the Kohler Foundation in 2022. The Foundation continues to distribute the works to museums and other non-profit spaces. The exhibition Glen C. Davies: Moments of Mystery, comprised of works gifted to the Kohler Foundation and given to the Illinois State Museum, ended in October 2024 at the ISM Galleries in Lockport after a sixmonth exhibition run in Springfield. Learn more at glencdavies.com
Breaking the Code, the recent award-winning documentary film on artist Vernon Fisher, was published online by Glasstire on Wednesday, September 18, 2024.
Nick Hand (BFA 2005 Painting) was cited in Forbes in “The Bicycle Day Dream Bike: A Carbon Fiber Hommage to Albert Hofmann” by Rob Reed. This bike was an homage to the discovery of LSD and Bicycle Day (April 19, 1943). Hand owns TW Carbon in Kirkwood, MO. TW Carbon repairs damaged carbon fiber bicycles and custom paint on high end bicycles of all kinds. His shop works with non-art-based endeavors and all his employees are classically trained artists with degrees from four-year universities. There is a metals and jewelry maker, a lithograph artist, a photographer, and Hand, an oil painter. Follow TW Carbon on Instagram and Facebook
George W. Lundeen (MFA 1973) has been selected as one of the 2024 Alumni Award recipients through the Illinois Alumni Association.
Bea Nettles (MFA 1970) was inducted into the 2023 International Photography Hall of Fame. The IPHF annually awards and inducts notable photographers or photography industry visionaries for their artistry, innovation, and significant contributions to the art and science of photography. See more at beanettles.com.
Kaila Pettis (BFA 2014 Industrial Design) was the first Black female creative director in professional sports. Learn more at Kpology.com.
Elaine Palutsis (BFA 2014 Graphic Design), associate creative director at VSA Partners, spoke at PaperSpecs LIVE in Chicago on September 26, 2024. Learn more about the event
Chitra Ramanathan (BFA 1993 Painting, MBA 1997) received The International Tagore Award for “Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Fine Arts” in January 2024, and Artist of the Year Award by Circle Foundation for the Arts, Lyon, France, in February 2024. A painting by Chitra Ramanathan in dimensions of 61” (H) x 78” (W) which was selected through the Art in Architecture Program National Artist Registry
was acquired for installation at the Steven S. Wymer Hall, which is a new facility in partnership with the Gies College of Business and UIUC. Wymer Hall is set to open in 2025. The Chitra Ramanathan original was acquired through the University Office of Capital Programs and Real Estate Services at the University of Illinois. Vermilion Campbell SCCIL LLC, Chicago, the developers for the project, transacted the purchase.
Preetika Rajgariah (MFA 2018) was featured this past April in Expo Chicago’s ‘Exposure’ section with a solo show at Bill Arning Exhibitions, Houston. Read more at prajgariah. com/home.html
Jay Rosenstein (MFA 2018) released a new EP from his band Woke Mountain Boys. This is the first album since 1988. Where to listen: Spotify, iTunes, Apple Music, and Bandcamp
Tammie Rubin (BFA 1999 History of Art and Crafts) received a Berresford Prize from United States Artists.
The work of Eve Sonneman (BFA 1967 Graphic Design) is on display at Fondation Cartier pour l’Art Contemporain in Paris. They acquired Eve Sonneman’s French Garden series in 1989.
Chris Waegner (MFA 1991) was recently nominated for an Academy Award, Television Academy Emmy award, and Visual Effects Society award.
New Faculty
Katie Blazek, Teaching Assistant Professor of Graphic Design
Katie Blazek holds a BFA and MFA in Visual Communication Design (VCD) with a minor in User Experience Design (UXD) from Kent State University. Her research focuses on how graphic design and mediation can be used as communication-based approaches to creative problemsolving. Katie believes creative thinking can be applied to every aspect of life and often explores design theory and practice in interdisciplinary research. She spent the past 2 years teaching at Kent State and is very excited to join the University of Illinois faculty!
Jennifer Chuong, Assistant Professor of Art History
Jennifer Chuong’s research centers on the art, architecture, and material culture of the transatlantic world as they relate to histories of environment and race. In her work, Dr. Chuong prioritizes the intelligence of makers and making in order to expand our understanding of what art is, and who makes it.
Current projects include a book manuscript, “Surface Experiments: Art, Nature, and the Making of Early America,” which recovers the artistic, scientific, and philosophical fascination with surfaces as sites of physical transformation in the eighteenth-century transatlantic world. In this project, Dr. Chuong explores a range of experimental surface techniques, including mezzotint engraving, paper marbling, veneer furniture, and oil painting.
Prior to joining the Art History Program at UIUC, Dr. Chuong held postdoctoral fellowships in the Harvard Society of Fellows and at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.
Juan de la Rosa, Assistant Professor of Graphic Design
Juan de la Rosa was born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia, where he became a Graphic Designer, working in areas like corporate identity, magazine illustration, and web and interaction. He later did a professional specialization and a master in multimedia design. As an academic, he has been an associate professor at the Graphic Design Department of the Universidad Nacional de Colombia for over 10 years, leading the academic community as GD Chair, Head of the GD Department, and Dean of the School of Arts, Design and Architecture. As a design researcher, he holds a PhD from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and his scholar work has focused on the methods and models for the construction of new knowledge in design from a systemic perspective, participatory design for public infrastructure and policy making, and the way embedded values of designed objects can affect human behavior. He is currently involved in a new Policy Lab for the Colombian government and a Futures Lab for the city of Bogotá.
Rachel Heaton, Assistant Professor of Industrial Design
Rachel Heaton uses computational and experimental methods to study the impact of cognitive psychology on design. The goal of her research is to better understand how people mentally represent and reason about the objects they see in the world. Her interests include the ways that perception and cognition influence human responses to designed artifacts and the psychological processes that underlie design and creativity.
Her work includes computational models of object recognition, perceptual grouping, visual attention, eye movements, reasoning via visual analogy, and the perception of visual affordances, as well as the study of the generative capabilities of artificial intelligence and general issues in neural computation. She received a PhD in the psychology of attention and perception, an MFA in industrial design, and a BS in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois UrbanaChampaign. She previously worked in the semiconductor industry designing integrated circuits for CPU and network processor architectures at IBM and LSI.
Ruth Lantz, Adjunct Lecturer of Studio Art
Ruth Lantz is an artist and educator living in Champaign-Urbana, IL. She received her master’s in visual studies from the Pacific Northwest College of Art (PNCA) in Portland, OR, in 2010. Her work has been featured nationally at numerous galleries and institutions including Rockford Art Museum, Northern Illinois University, Governors State University, Portland OR International Airport, Southern Oregon University, Oregon Contemporary, and Russo Lee Gallery. She presented at the “Making a Better Painting” Symposium at the Hoffman Gallery at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, OR, discussing painting and technology in 2020.
Lantz founded Crit Connection in 2021, a project providing networking opportunities to mid-career artists through monthly one-on-one connections that foster ongoing conversation and critique. She is a collaborator in Creative Lattice, a project providing free or low-cost professional development opportunities to emerging and mid-career artists.
Lantz has taught courses at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Washington State University Vancouver, and Portland Community College.
She explores how the history of landscape painting has helped to shape our use and understanding of our current virtual spaces. Her works collapse the tension between the traditional canvas and the digital screen, both of which engage in flattening, visual manipulation, and mapping by technical programs. She aims to depict and reimagine at once, investigating our past and present relationships with landscape and technology while leaving room for possible futures.
Joshua Pridemore, Teaching Assistant Professor of Graphic Design
Joshua Pridemore is a graphic designer with a visual identity focus and a keen interest in the interplay between design and societal constructs. His professional journey is characterized by a commitment to exploring how design shapes and is shaped by social narratives, particularly in the realms of gender and masculinity.
Pridemore holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Emerging Media, specializing in Graphic Design, from the University of Central Florida, and a Master of Fine Arts in Design for Responsible Innovation from the University of Illinois UrbanaChampaign. His research interests include gender design, the impact of design on social issues, and the concept of “Discontainment of Masculinity” through design practices.
At UIUC, Pridemore teaches core courses in design methods and design foundations for non-majors, undergraduates, and graduate students in Graphic Design. His approach to teaching blends practical design skills with an exploration of design’s role in addressing social issues and promoting responsible innovation. Pridemore’s teaching philosophy centers on the belief that design education transcends technical skills, nurturing critical thinking and an understanding of design’s societal role. He advocates for a studentcentered approach that values diversity, encourages questioning of societal norms through design, and emphasizes ethical practices. By integrating interdisciplinary learning and practical application, Pridemore cultivates a learning environment where students are not only technically adept but also socially conscious, ready to innovate responsibly in the real world. Central to his philosophy is fostering reflective practice, ensuring students become thoughtful, adaptable, and impactful designers committed to lifelong learning.
Mania Taher, Assistant Professor of Industrial Design
Through studying commodities, buildings, and landscapes, Mania Taher’s research discusses the cultural histories of places and people manifested in their everyday place-making. Her research interests focus on intersectional identities to foreground the current histories of marginalized people and their spatial agencies to transform their occupied spaces. Everyday objects play an important role in her research investigating the cultural landscapes of new immigrants with queries of displacement, gender, and race. As part of Taher’s design, research, and teaching principles, she visits, documents, and analyzes the built environment and hears the user voices to draw a holistic experience of the larger social, cultural, historical, and ecological landscape.
Taher’s academic background lies at the intersection of architecture and urban design, and currently, she is a PhD candidate of architecture at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Her dissertation research highlights the place construction of first-generation immigrant Bangladeshi women living in New York, mainly by examining their dwellings and a network of locations within their residential environments. Taher analyzes her research participants’ physical and sensory ways of reconstructing spatial memories and their bodily experiences of transnational displacement through ethnographic studies. Her pedagogical principles directly address racial and ethnic inequalities at the background of anti-feminist framework and environmental injustices, which informed her teaching practices for the last twelve years in the United States and Bangladesh. In this process, she often collaborates with design professionals and organizations working in the field. Very recently, Taher collaborated with BNMO Architects towards an invited micro-exhibit at the Time Space Existence exhibition, organized by the European Cultural Center (ECC), in conjunction with the 2023 Venice Biennial. The exhibit highlights the transition of immigrants living in the United States and their
engagement in an already existing urban built landscape within the historic Devon Avenue neighborhood of Chicago. Taher’s broader research interest also focuses on architecture and urban histories of South Asia and the human-built environment relationship.
Mania Taher authored several book chapters and journals and contributed essays to a wide range of international publications. She is currently a fellowship recipient of the American Institute of Bangladesh Studies and a serving member of the Society of Architectural Historians Graduate Student Advisory Committee (GSAC). She has been involved in professional architectural practice in Dhaka for several years. Taher taught at undergraduate and graduate architecture programs of the University of WisconsinMilwaukee (UWM) and American International University-Bangladesh (AIUB).
New Staff
Joey Hartz, Student-Industry Relations Coordinator, Industrial Design
Joining the Industrial Design program as the new student-industry relations coordinator, Joey Hartz (he/him) is a leader, innovator, and entrepreneur passionate about creating programs and experiences that improve the lives of people and communities. He is a proud alumnus of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, with a Bachelor of Science in Information Sciences concentrating in user experience and human-computer interaction.
Hartz has worked with Fortune 500 companies, startups, and nonprofit organizations, building innovative products that support the lives and work of others. He has a wide range of knowledge and experiences that allow him to approach complex problems or opportunities with creativity, technical skills, and a human-centric focus. Hartz enjoys collaborating with and providing mentorship to others, especially bright and talented students, while continuing to learn from them as well.
In his free time, Hartz enjoys traveling with his fiancée Sydney, playing with his cat Saoirse (pronounced ‘sir-sha’), and enjoying Illini sports!
Erin Kristovich, Business Services Specialist
Erin Kristovich is the new business services specialist for the College of Art and Design. She has a bachelor’s degree in organizational and professional development and is currently working on a master’s degree in talent development from Eastern Illinois University. Her specialty is office work particularly in the areas of purchasing, contracts, and travel arrangements. Kristovich has been at the University of Illinois for approximately five years and has worked at the College of Law, Electrical and Computer Engineering, and the Parking Department. Her family has been involved in the University of Illinois for many years with both of her parents graduating from UIC and her father currently working at UIUC.
Kristovich lives with her partner Cory and their three cats, Georgia, Whiskey and Oly. Outside of work she is often found volunteering for various organizations and spending time with family and friends. Her hobbies include playing video games, reading books, watching documentaries, and working on her house. Kristovich is an avid animal lover with a weakness for special needs animals. Other interests include graphic novels, comic books, and collecting swords and challenge coins.
Faculty Promotions
Retirement
Director Alan Mette retired on July 31, 2024, after 43 years of service and leadership to the School of Art and Design. During those years, Mette served as assistant, associate, and full professor, as well as executive associate director for the school. He also chaired the Foundations Program and Studio Arts Division as well as co-chairing the Metals program. From 2014-2015, he was associate dean of Academic Affairs in the College of Fine and Applied Arts. He became director of the school in June 2015. His goal when becoming director was to view the position as both facilitator and steward by actively encouraging his colleagues to challenge themselves in reaching the school’s goals.
Mette’s record of scholarship, teaching, service, and leadership is exemplary. He received a campus Executive Officer Distinguished Leadership Award in 2022 and was also invited to participate as a Campus Fellow and University of Illinois representative to the Academic Leadership Program, Committee on Institutional Cooperation (Big 10 Academic Alliance). Under his leadership, the school successfully promoted twenty-one tenure track faculty and completed multiple searches for specialized faculty and staff positions. In addition, eight successful nominations for College of Fine and Applied Arts Awards were initiated between 2016-2023.
As director, he set the goal of increasing undergraduate enrollment through the development of an aggressive multi-stepped recruitment and communication plan to prospective students in tandem with the FAA recruitment office. Since 2015, the school has increased enrollment by 46%, while also increasing the diversity of the student body to 25% of our current majors.
His long-time colleague Peter Mortenson former interim dean of the College of Fine and Applied Arts, commented on Mette’s final day:
“I have had the pleasure of working with Alan in various capacities for over twenty years now. He is, I can testify, one of those very special campus citizens whose commitment to our educational mission—especially and importantly at the undergraduate level—is widely recognized and deeply appreciated. This commitment has been effective for so many years because Alan has approached each of his leadership assignments as an opportunity to learn: about our institution, about its faculty, about its staff, and about its students. In this way, Alan continually equipped himself to support the aspirations of all around him”
We ask you to join us in celebrating Alan Mette’s achievements. Thank you, Alan. You will be missed!
Patrick Hammie, Studio Art, to full Professor
Jorge Lucero, Art Education, to full Professor
Catherine Wiesener, Unit One, to Teaching Associate Professor
Student Acomplishment
Art and Design lab assistant, tour guide, and photographer William Hohe, won the 2024 Campus Student Employee of the Year Award.
Faculty Acomplishments
Conrad Bakker participated in an artist residency at Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, France, from May–June 2024, where he engaged in research and produced new work, including Untitled Project: Bouquiniste /Bookseller, an installation consisting of carved and painted sculptures of specific French used-books, inspired by the cellophane wrapped titles sold by antiquarian booksellers along the banks of the Seine river. Toward the end of his residency, Conrad Bakker gave a public presentation of his research titled: l’opacité des choses /The Opacity of Things at a salon hosted by Barbara Polla/Galerie Analix Forever.
Eric Benson presented “Climate Justice in Design Education” at Design Research Society 2024, at Northeastern University in Boston, MA, on June 28. The panel consisted of Natacha Poggio, Dan Vlahos, Rachel Beth Egenhoefer, and Sue Huang.
Jennifer Bergmark received funding under the Provost’s Initiative on Teaching Advancement (PITA) for her 2024-25 research project Supporting & Assessing Social Emotional Learning Towards a Professional Disposition in Art Education.
Cristóbal Bianchi received a project completion grant in August 2024 to finish the Digital Archive of Casagrande Art Collective (1996-2024) through support from the College of Fine Applied Arts at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
In 2024, Molly Briggs co-founded the Panoramic & Immersive Media Studies (PIMS) Yearbook, a digital and hardcover book series published by De Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston. She serves as executive editor alongside Thorsten Logge (Universität Hamburg) and Nicholas C. Lowe (SAIC).
The PIMS Yearbook surveys the historical and contemporary landscape of panoramic and immersive media, an interdisciplinary field that includes optical and haptic devices; 360-degree paintings; long-form paintings, photography, and prints; dioramas; museum displays; games; gardens; literature; maps; music; printed matter; still and moving images; virtual and augmented reality; and theatrical productions. Whereas the notion of the panoramic describes extensive, expansive and/or all-embracing vistas, immersion refers to porous interfaces between representation and the real, observer and observed, nature and culture, and past, present, and future. Together, the concepts of panorama and immersion have catalyzed time- and space-bending strategies for creating, experiencing, and transforming culture, ideas, and built social space across the arc of human history. Scholarly essays are subject to double-
Photo by Kiley Reed Black
blind external peer review; conference papers are subject to single-blind internal peer review; other sections (visual & creative essays, restoration, management & field reports, reviews, reprints, and the forum) are edited by named section editors.
Volumes 1–3 (2024–2026) will be published open access (OA) and in full color. Volume 1 (2024) is in production and will be released in December 2024 with 380 pages and 190 figures. Learn more at degruyter.com/document/ isbn/9783111335575/html?lang=en and panoramacouncil. org/en/publications/the_panoramic_immersive_media_ studies_yearbook/.
Anne Burkus-Chasson was invited to present “Qi Biaojia at Yushan: The Pleasure of Construction in a Late Ming Garden” at the annual meeting of the College Art Association in February 2024 for the panel “Art and Empirical Inquiry in Late Imperial China.” Revised for publication and currently under review.
Lynne Dearborn co-authored two chapters in the 2024 EDRA Achievement Award-winning book Built Form and Culture: Theoretical Legacy of Amos Rapoport, edited by Kapila Silva and Nisha Fernando (Routledge, 2024). 1) With co-author Angelina Tsoukala, “Residential Choice and Fit in a Milwaukee Refugee Enclave;” 2) With co-author Widya Ramadhani, “Aging in Place: The Roles of Food-related Activities Engagement among Older Indonesian Women.”
Ryan Griffis’ collaborative project “Over the Levee, Under the Plow: An Experiential Curriculum” (with Sarah Kanouse, Corinne Teed, Heather Parrish, and Jon Lund) was exhibited in the traveling exhibition Insurgent Ecologies in 2023, shown at Antenna in New Orleans, and Macalester College in St. Paul.
Patrick Hammie’s solo exhibition Gnomon was on display in the Bryan Art Gallery at Coastal Carolina University in Conway, SC, from October 16–November 10, 2023.
In summer 2024, Laura Hetrick received affiliation with the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology in the Gene Networks in Neural and Developmental Plasticity Research Theme to study the neurogenetics of autism.
Somi Lee received the Provost’s Faculty Retreat Grant of $4,000 for “ArtistAI for Absenteeism Management and Makeup Work in Large Lecture Courses.”
Emmy Lingscheit was awarded an international artist residency for the month of June 2024 at St. Michael’s Printshop in St. John’s, Newfoundland, and Labrador.
Sarah Travis and Jorge Lucero, along with alumni Azlan Guttenberg Smith (MFA 2022 Creative Writing) and Dr. Catalina Hernandez Cabal (PhD 2022 Art Education), co-edited a striking new volume called Experiments in Art Research: How do we live questions through art? (Routledge, 2024). This book spotlights the scholarly advancements of twenty-three alums from UIUC’s Art Education program over the last decade. This next generation of Art Education scholars serve as faculty all over the world including the University of Iowa, University of Arkansas, University of Kentucky, UIUC, Virginia Tech, Illinois State University, UIC, Brigham Young University, University of British Columbia, and la Universidad de Los Andes in Bogota. A panel about the book was then presented at the University of Cambridge during the Art Education Research Institute 2024 Annual Symposium.
Jena Marble’s review of the book Human-Centered AI by Ben Shneiderman has been accepted for publication in the journal Design and Culture tandfonline.com/doi/full/1 0.1080/17547075.2024.2386752
Guen Montgomery completed a month-long residency at Stove Works in Chattanooga, TN, and will participate in their fall exhibition. Her daughter Lou learned to sit upright on her own and is investigating babbling techniques.
The Royal Society of Chemistry selected the graphic created by Savio Mukachirayil and student Reiss Christensen, in collaboration with Professor Braulio Rodriguez from Food Science and Human Nutrition, for the cover of their journal Soft Matter, Vol.20, No.14.
David O’Brien is the Reviews Editor at NineteenthCentury Art Worldwide
Shannon Percoco had a solo exhibition Mediations on Beauty at the University YMCA located at 1001 S Wright St, Champaign, IL.
Melissa Pokorny and Lucy Puls held the two-person exhibition ECHO at SHED Projects in Cleveland, OH, from June 22–August 3, 2024.
Sharath Chandra Ramakrishnan presented at the proceedings of the 29th International Conference on Auditory Display (ICAD) held June 24–28, 2024, at the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, NY. The title of the paper was “Temporal Imagery for Aural Diversity: Auditory Displays as artifacts of sonic art encounters between unaided and cochlear implant listeners.”
Juan Salamanca is a summer researcher in residence at
the Siebel Center for Design together with Dr. Maximilian Schrapel from Karlsruher Institute of Technology, Germany. Their research project is Flocking Bicycles – Automated Two-Wheeled Urban Mobility. It was sponsored by VEO micromobility and the Interdisciplinary Health Science Institute, in collaboration with Champaign County Bikes.
Suresh Sethi was invited to serve as a judge for both stages of the Terra Carta Design Lab competition, hosted by the Sustainable Markets Initiative. The first stage was held online on April 28, 2024, while the second stage took place at the National Institute of Design (NID) in Ahmedabad, India, on May 23-24, 2024. NID was one of four prestigious design schools – alongside the Dubai Institute of Design and Innovation, Royal College of Art, and Rhode Island School of Design – participating in this global competition. Sir Jony Ive and Sustainable Markets Initiative CEO Jennifer Jordan-Saifi will preside over the final judging round, selecting two winning projects from each school. The winners, to be announced this autumn, will each receive £100,000 in funding and the invaluable opportunity to be mentored by Sir Jony Ive and the Sustainable Markets Initiative’s extensive network. This support aims to accelerate the commercialization of their innovative sustainable solutions.
Cliff Shin is in the final prototyping stage for his design Safety Device Development and Re-Design for Marmon Holdings, Berkshire Hathaway Company. The company intends to file a design patent.
Cassandra Smith presented her paper “Pottery Mound Kiva Murals: Conduits Between Realms” in the “Visual and Material Surfaces in the Ancient Americas” session at the 112th College Art Association Conference in Chicago, IL.
Lindsey Stirek was invited to participate in a twoday symposium and workshop hosted by UCLA and USC entitled “Teaching Tea” in April of 2024. Lindsey presented “Chanoyu in Manga and Anime” at Japan House Los Angeles and participated in a panel on the Japanese practice of tea in media, literature, and poetics. Subsequently, they were part of the planning committee for media materials and have contributed content for the Teaching Tea project within the Japan Past and Present open-access online repository.
Buildings Survey (HABS-U.S. National Park Service). This fellowship award enabled her to complete a survey and report documenting the physical and social histories of the Dearborn Mosque building and community in Dearborn (est. 1938), Wayne County, MI. This building, only the second mosque built in the United States, serves as a case study of early American mosque architecture. The Dearborn Mosque engages significantly with resettlement histories of the 20th-Century Arab immigrants of Dearborn and Detroit who were predominantly industrial workers at the Ford automotive company.
Nekita Thomas held the exhibition Supergraphic Landscapes at the 2023 Chicago Sukkah Design Festival for the Chicago Architecture Biennial from October 1–26, 2023.
Sarah Travis, assistant professor of Art Education, presented “Flashpoints as Moments of Embodied Unsettling in Art Education” at the World Congress of the International Society for Education Through Art, Çanakkale, Turkey, in September 2023.
Oscar E. Vázquez was on sabbatical leave during 2023-24 academic year. As a Fulbright Global Scholar recipient, he spent several months in Mexico and Spain researching his book project Copying the Body: the practice and politics of life drawing in Mexico and Spain, 1780–1900
Chiara Vincenzi, clinical assistant professor, has received $43,300 in funding from the Student Sustainability Committee (SSC) for the “Digital Fashion Design: Teaching and Learning for a Sustainable Future” project, in partnership with the CITL Innovation Studio. The funds will be used to enhance the Fashion Concentration curriculum within Studio Art by introducing new courses that incorporate cutting-edge tools to promote sustainability in fashion education. Additionally, the project will engage students in collaborative workshops focused on responsible design and waste reduction in fashion design and production.
Hermann von Hesse received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship (NEH) and an American Council of Learned Societies award.
Deke Weaver and his collaborators presented the interdisciplinary performance CETACEAN (The Whale) for five nights in Sept/Oct 2023. In April 2024, highlights of the work were featured on a special hour-long episode of WILL-TV’s program Prairie Fire. Recent work includes Summer 2024 residencies in Nova Scotia and Crystal Bridges/The Momentary (Bentonville, AR) where they worked on a condensed, touring version of CETACEAN; and the start of research for The Unreliable Bestiary’s seventh performance FOREST.
Terri Weissman’s book Global Photography: A Critical History (co-authored with Erina Duganne and Heather Diack) (Routledge, 2020) will be translated into Chinese for publication in 2024.
In 2023-2024, Catherine Wiesener initiated and completed the total renovation of the darkroom into a Ceramic Glaze Chemistry Lab.
This summer, Mania Taher received the 2024 Sally Kress Tompkins Fellowship, awarded jointly by the Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) and the Historic American
Staying Connected 2024
Brenda Nardi Senior Director of Advancement College of Fine and Applied Arts, Visual Arts bnardi@illinois.edu
We are most grateful for your continued interest in the School of Art and Design and for all the ways you show your support. We appreciate the time, talent, and treasure you share with us year after year as we continue to grow our programs and support our students.
Please contact me directly at bnardi@illinois.edu if you would like to discuss the myriad ways you can stay connected to your alma mater and to the school. Or visit art.illinois.edu/alumni/ give-a-gift to see the variety of ways the School of Art and Design is being supported by alumni and friends.
With great appreciation, Brenda
Events
Please know that you are always welcome back to campus to participate in our activities.
(please check art.illinois.edu for updates)
Thursday, February 13, 2025 | 5:30 p.m.
A&D Visitor’s Series: In Conversation: Millie Wilson and David Evans Frantz Location TBD
Thursday, February 20, 2025 | 5:30 p.m.
A&D Visitor’s Series: Cynthia Robles, “Emotional Intelligence Through the Arts: A Focus on Crearte as an Alternative Pedagogical Model” Plym Auditorium, Temple Buell Hall, 611 Lorado Taft Dr, Champaign, IL.
Friday, April 4, 2025 | 5:00 – 8:00 p.m.
TAKEOVER VII
School of Art & Design Link Gallery, 408 E. Peabody Drive, Champaign, IL
Saturday, April 12, 2025 | 4:00 p.m.
School of Art & Design 2025 MFA Exhibition Opening Link Gallery, School of Art & Design, 408 E. Peabody Drive, Champaign, IL Krannert Art Museum, 500 E. Peabody Drive, Champaign, IL
Saturday, May 10, 2025 | 4:00 p.m.
School of Art & Design 2025 BFA Exhibition Opening Link Gallery, School of Art & Design, 408 E. Peabody Drive, Champaign, IL Krannert Art Museum, 500 E. Peabody Drive, Champaign, IL
Saturday, May 10, 2025 | 6:30 p.m.
School of Art & Design Re-Fashioned Fashion Show Siebel Center for Design, 1208 S 4th St, Champaign, IL
Stay In Touch
Website art.illinois.edu
Calendar http://illinois.edu/calendar/list/1447
Alumni keep in touch go.illinois.edu/ARTalumni
Facebook facebook.com/ARTatIllinois
Instagram instagram.com/illinois_artanddesign/
Graphic Design FB facebook.com/gdatillinois
Art History FB facebook.com/ArtHistoryatUIUC
Credits
Editors: Melissa Pokorny, Anne Jackson, Audra Weinstein
Designer: Hallie Thomas