From the Editor

This issue of The Pool commemorates CalArts’ 50th anniversary in Valencia. Or, as I and many others on campus like to affectionately call it: our 50ish anniversary (with an emphasis on the -ish). CalArts has long been associated with myth, legends, and lore—a history that’s sometimes hazy and chaotic— and our origin story is no different. In fact, there are several firsts associated with the formation of the Institute:

• 1961: When California Institute of the Arts was incorporated as a result of a merger—guided by Walt Disney and his brother, Roy O. Disney—between the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music, founded in 1883, and the Chouinard Art Institute, founded in 1921.

• 1969: Marking the groundbreaking of the campus in Valencia.

• 1970: When CalArts classes began at the interim campus at Villa Cabrini in Burbank.

• 1971: When the Valencia campus opened.

• 1972: When the first class graduated from CalArts. In a perfect world, we would have celebrated our 50th anniversary in Valencia in 2021. But we all know the world had other plans and hit pause for a couple years. So, as we return to the new normal, we’re celebrating our 50th … in 2023. CalArts has always made its own rules anyway: We operate on CalArts time.

In its return to print, this issue of The Pool is “Based on a True Story.” Flip through the pages to find pieces of CalArts’ (alt) history between our feature interviews, profiles, and news. We’ve unearthed items from the archives, researched rumors, and included factoids that may or may not be true. One story takes a fun peek at CalArts’ cameo appearances in film and TV shows from the 1970s and ’80s.

But this issue doesn’t solely dwell on the past. We also focus on CalArtians who are shaping the future—and looking at the bigger picture—through their work, from alums such as Don Cheadle (TheaTer BFa 86) and Jazmín Urrea (arT MFa 17) to faculty including our Herb Alpert School of Music Dean Volker Straebel. As artist-advocates, they’re modeling the world and the ways they want to see it. Like so many of our alums, they speak to the CalArts identity: forever a home to free expression and a place for artists to experiment. That part of CalArts is definitely based on a true story.

I hope you enjoy the stories and surprises in this issue of The Pool—and happy 50ish to the alabaster labyrinth* on the hill.

Christine N. Ziemba, Editor-in-Chief

*from CalArts’ alma mater find full lyrics in the magazine

From the President:

There are a few constants that CalArts has come to love during our first 50 years in Valencia. Of them, change may be the most important.

After all, constant change drives the relentless creative experimentation at our core. Almost instinctively, we know that we’ll learn, transform, and push closer to truth and understanding only by continually testing—and shattering—our limits.

Now, over a half-century since California Institute of the Arts opened its doors to the world, our standing as the home for the most forward-thinking contemporary arts education hinges on how we engage with one another and the world in our next 50 years. In this one thing is certain: We can remain the leader in experimentation only if we become the standard-bearer for inclusivity, too.

Some call it radical inclusivity. I call it essential to our future. Our growth and artistic reinvention—our very ability to help the world see itself and its future—depend on how well we put our ideals around inclusivity, diversity, equity, and access into tangible action.

Our Inclusivity, Diversity, Equity, and Access (IDEA) Cooperative has taken the lead on these and related goals. Its first action plan, now available on our website, explains the specific steps in the works and already underway.

To connect, we will amplify our historical strengths in collaboration across disciplines, finding more ways to link CalArts and CalArtians with networks and communities outside our own around the world. And to build, we are growing and improving our physical footprint. Renovations and new facilities will help bring our community of artists together for generations to come, equipping each with advanced tools to explore and fulfill their potential.

Together, these action axioms will support CalArts’ evolution into a new era—and affirm our community as an exemplary hub of insight and vision for a changed world.

Meeting minutes from Academic Council circa 1974.

In practical terms, this means executing on “Shaping CalArts’ Future,” the 2020 Strategic Framework that we began developing together, and the trustees approved, just before the COVID-19 pandemic. This roadmap for our future is unambiguous: Our highest priorities for the next few years center on diversifying, connecting, and building.

To diversify, we will continue to strengthen representation of a multitude of identities and perspectives among our faculty, students, and staff; enrich our curricula with cultural competencies; and reduce our dependence on tuition as we increase other revenue streams. By leaning less on tuition, we can begin to open new paths to the CalArts experience for more of the most promising, talented artists.

As we celebrate our 50th anniversary, we embrace our history to inform and reenergize the direction ahead. To be CalArts—to be a CalArtian—is to be in perpetual forward motion, to cultivate and raise up the world as we imagine it can be. Especially in this moment, there is no more important calling.

For alumnx, faculty, and staff across many generations who have brought us this far, and to our students who will help create our future, my gratitude is deep. The transformation starts with all of us. Thank you for being part of it.