Rhode Island School of Design’s spring 2010
NEW
alumni magazine
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Conversations about RISD, the new magazine, art, life, the world
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Listen to reflections, opinions, what’s on our readers' minds
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Look at architecture & design, music & movies, books & fine art
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Vital Signs of Progress
The Reality of Runway
Vishnu Hoff 00 ID is helping to bring quality surgical care to people in the poorest parts of the world.
Two alumni were among the 16 contestants to face off in America’s favorite design competition.
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30
Six Degrees
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updates from clubs, the Alumni Association, Alumni Relations
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Two College Street Maeda’s message, faculty news, a glimpse of studios/student life now
Impact news about scholarships, donors, the RISD Annual Fund
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Where We Are class notes and profiles, undergraduate first, graduate second
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Drawing Board a visual commentary on a topical issue
Spring 2010
Totally Organic
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With work in the Whitney Biennial, sculptor Huma Bhabha 85 PR is beginning to attract the attention she deserves.
CONTRIBUTORS PUBLISHING DIRECTOR
Becky Bermont EDITOR
Liisa Silander lsilande@risd.edu 401 454 6349 C R E AT I V E D I R E C T I O N
Criswell Lappin MFA 97 GD devoted enormous time
Dungjai Pungauthiakan MFA 04 GD has worked
and energy to giving shape to our ideas for this new magazine. As creative director at Metropolis and head of WellNow Design, he’s clearly adept at juggling and making good creative things happen—including at home with his wife and two young sons.
as the associate art director at Metropolis since earning her master’s. When not totally consumed with collaborations like this magazine redesign, she loves to knit, eat good food and hang out with friends.
WellNow Design wellnowdesign.com Criswell Lappin MFA 97 GD Nancy Nowacek Dungjai Pungauthaikan MFA 04 GD D E S I G N/ P R O D U C T I O N
Kate Blackwell Elizabeth Eddins 00 GD C L A S S N O T E S C O O R D I NAT O R
McCurdy Miller risdxyz@risd.edu P L A N N I N G S U P P O RT
Cyrus Highsmith 97 GD let us
Kate Johnson 95 GD of Dresser
Tobias Frere-Jones 92 GD of
experiment with the beta version of his newest font family Receiver, which is used throughout with Antenna. Plus his font Ibis felt perfect for the XYZ in our masthead.
Johnson (dresserjohnson.com) developed our masthead and headers to suggest a coalescing of input from alumni—the necessary ingredients for making RISD XYZ.
Hoefler & Frere-Jones (typography.com) has designed more than 500 typefaces for major publications—including this one, which makes use of Chronicle.
Beth Garvin Christina Hartley 74 IL Candy Seel James Wolken PRINTING
Lane Press Burlington, VT printed on 80# Sterling Matte, a recycled stock
R I S DX Y Z
Two College Street Providence, Rhode Island 02903-2784 USA
Jessica Walsh 08 GD (jessicawalsh.
Lauren Nassef 01 PT (laurennassef.
Jennifer Prewitt-Freillino , an
com) now works at Sagmeister and is totally in love with doing clever, complex and enchanting photo illustrations like the one she created for us on page 2.
com), an illustrator living in Chicago, made us smile every time we opened her emails with her drawings for Listen (page 4) and the cover.
assistant professor of psychology at RISD, holds a PhD in social psychology from the University of Oklahoma and contributed our first Listen commentary (page 4).
Nicholas Felton 99 GD (feltron. com) spends a lot of time thinking about data, charts and daily routines. He also helped track some of our alumni in introducing Where We Are (page 40).
Lisa Maione 05 GD designs magazines, books, identities and other projects through Instance (lisamaione. com). For this project, she helped with visual research and image treatments.
John Maeda , president of RISD, recently won the 2010 AIGA Graphic Design Medal, making him among the most celebrated designers in the world. He did the first piece for Drawing Board.
Published three times a year by RISD’s Media + Partners group, in conjunction with Alumni Relations. Postmaster: Send address changes to Office of Advancement Services, RISD, Two College Street, Providence, RI 02903 USA.
On the cover: WellNow Design came up with the concept for the cover illustration and asked Lauren Nassef 01 PT to execute it in pen and ink. After scanning her original drawing, Lauren digitally added the blasts of color on selected birds.
Editor’s letter, letters to the editor, excerpts from online exchanges.
GREAT Expectations Welcome to RISD XYZ, a new magazine designed to show the work, ideas and faces of RISD’s alumni community. Since February we’ve been in overdrive, working with Criswell Lappin MFA 97 GD and his team at WellNow Design to make a publication that we all like a lot better than its predecessor—and hope you will, too. It’s exciting that everyone who agreed to work on this new alumni magazine did so without hesitation and with great expectations for what we could create. We willingly dove in because we recognized that creating a new magazine by and about RISD alumni is an incredible opportunity. Originally conceived as a two-color tabloid in 1989, risd views had been upgraded to a color magazine in 1995, but having undergone something of a devolution in the last 15 years, was sorely in need of rethinking. The design had run its course and the content—well, let’s just say it served RISD’s administration better than alumni. So in December, as soon as the fall issue of views was out the door, we set out to change that. The last six months has been a heady whirlwind of thinking and talking about the possibilities and looking at a lot of magazines—both college and commercial. In January, when we invited selected alumni designers to submit proposals to work with us to redesign the magazine, the responses to our RFP were amazing, which made it that much more difficult to decide whom to hire. But from the moment we chose Criswell and crew, it felt completely natural to be working together. 02
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WellNow shared our excitement about inviting other alumni to help create the first issue. And they agreed with our desire to open up the new magazine—literally and figuratively, not just through more pages for class notes, but through editorial illustration, typography, info graphics, a visual commentary page, the Look section— all ways to make it easier to show what you’re doing. Why the name? Well, we like it, for starters. To us it suggests that you, RISD’s alumni, need to fill-in-the-blank —to help make this magazine whatever it wants to be. X, Y and Z are beautiful letterforms that naturally seem to belong together (like RISD alumni). They’re also a bit exotic and enigmatic (again, a lot like RISD alumni) and are the most emblematic letters of the alphabet, with x and y used to represent intersecting coordinates in algebra, along with the chromosomes in people (who are, of course, at the core of this magazine). We like that XYZ are the ultimate letters—at the end of the alphabet— because this is a magazine focused on what happens after R-I-S-D—after you’ve moved on from here. Then there’s the silly XYZ prompt to Examine Your Zipper. And we all like that it feels a bit like FPO—a work in progress—but more poetic. In short, we grew to like the original placeholder name for the magazine so well that we chose to keep it. We hope it works for you, too. But more importantly, we hope you like this first issue and will share your ideas about how to make the next one even better—because that’s our plan as we move forward!
editor’s message by
Liisa Silander
illustration by
Jessica Walsh 08 GD
Let us know what you think about the redesign
risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: feedback)
Kinesthetics Craze An image appeared in either a RISD catalogue or an alumni newsletter with a picture of my mother Bethany (Gleason) Kallgren Marshall 44 AP and several other women in leotards with arms outstretched. It is taken from above. How would I go about getting a copy of that photo? She is 87, a big fan of the school and has been an avid donor for years and years.
WOrds
Eliza Bethany Fort Collins, CO
Total Makeover
or less
It’s a beautiful tradition. We try to keep it undead!
Thank you for including a picture from Krakow in the fall ’09 edition of risd views (above left). Erratum: Pictured is the presenter of the awards (not me) in front of a screen with my work. Award winners, encumbered with huge trophies and enormous bouquets, just faced the audience and smiled—no speeches. Could you print a correction in the next edition? My classmates will think I underwent a total makeover; whether for the better is, of course, a matter of opinion. Here is a picture of me (above right) at the Krakow art gallery with my award-winning work.
Deena (Coty) des Rioux
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63 IL
Chelsea McAlarney 11 IL RISD Zombie King in a projo.com video
NEW YORK, NY
Editor’s note: As we were about to go to press, Eliza let us know that her mother (shown above, to the upper left) died peacefully on Mother’s Day. This photo from the RISD Archives is simply labelled “kinesthetics class, 1943.” If you took “kinesthetics” at RISD or can identify any of the other women shown here, please be in touch at risdxyz@risd.edu.
Snippets
I originally selected Painting as my major, and after a year of study, switched to Film/Animation/Video because I thought it would be the best context for my education, making use of my interests over several areas (moving images, sound, interdisciplinary collaboration, etc.). Although my work today is on the web, the interdisciplinary collaboration element is critical to what I do. Leadership and management in a creative and technical business is very similar to the directing role in film/video. While holding a vision, you must be able to gather a team, impart your vision and seek the realization of your vision through the talents of others. Films are like that; so are companies.
from a long thread on LinkedIn Angel Steger BArch 05: For all of the omnivores and polymaths who do something different from your major: How did you translate your skills and passions to another medium? Angel!! Gotta tell you, I’m still working on that one. Being an architect is technically my fourth career field switch. I’m contemplating yet another one. Have to say, though, I don’t think there’s an easy answer for those of us who are intelligent and are interested in many things. We’ll always be pushed and pulled by opportunities and interests, and always have the option of excelling in any one of them (until senility and arthritis hit).
Christopher Butler 03 FAV
Like many others, I chose to study architecture because it was already a mix of the art and science/math that was of interest to me. In practicing for the past 25+(!) years, it is not the building design itself that has been the most interesting—it is the problem solving. If I find a problem, I can’t help noodling it around until I have a solution. Even this is not quite enough. I have found I still need to do real art—painting or jewelry—to keep sane. Even the best job has demands that drive you a bit crazy. But most of us are lucky if we find work we enjoy. I am still amazed at the number of people I meet who just work to make enough money to live. I could never do that…
Design has the potential to have huge impact in the world, but it could be better integrated into the global conversation of what’s going on. It’s often insular—to its detriment. I chose to go into web products primarily because I would have exposure to a lot of different facets of what makes something happen and work. I like the complexity of the work, the diversity of the people I work with and the malleability of information. While I’m learning a lot of the other facets now, what I got from RISD was: 1. To be able to listen for opportunities and to create compelling problems from them. 2. To be able to intelligently present and discuss ideas 3. The courage to adapt to any material and to be uniquely aware of language, not just visuals. 4. To work hard for the sake of the work. 5. To not take myself too seriously. The right thing for me is the thing I’m excited about, not the one that makes the most sense.
Anne Elliott (Elly Williams) Merica BArch 84
Angel Steger BArch 05
Victoria Su MArch 04
At times inactivity is preferable to mindless functioning. Jenny Holzer MFA 77 on Twitter
Everything Matters Men’s room graffiti in College Building courtesy of Professor Mike Fink
Artists are natural marketers for everyone but themselves. Oren Sherman 78 IL [quoted] on Twitter
Joining a conversation is different from just listening in. John Maeda on Twitter
Follow RISD at
twitter.com/risd and www.facebook.com/risd1877
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Readers reflect, write, shout, share what’s on their minds.
On Being Whole I have always wanted to be a mother. I always imagined that motherhood would be the most important role in my life—that my family would take priority over all other factors. Clearly, I am a family person, right? I am very close to my parents, who are to this day my closest friends and advisers (alongside my husband). I have always just believed that—for me—my family life would be what fostered meaning and kept me going. However, the great irony of my belief in the primacy of family in my own life is that I have repeatedly made choices that are at odds with this core value. In college, I fell in love with social psychology. Pursuing a career in social psychology—my passion— meant I would have to spend years pursuing a PhD and relocate to find the right job. Grad school life is tedious and frenetic. I knew very few grad students with kids and I am one of a handful of grad school marriages from my program that actually survived the transition into the “real” world. Upon graduating, I moved halfway across the country from my family to work at RISD. Flipping through my Facebook list, I see many of my female friends from junior high and high school, who settled down to have children. They are not the friends I am still in contact with. They are the Facebook “friends” who hunt you down after a decade of not having been in touch. My closest friends from high school and college don’t have children and most of them don’t even have a stable romantic partner—yet they have promising careers. Is it any wonder why women think they can’t have it all—that they must choose? My job is a dream job. I get paid to share what I am passionate about with creative and enthusiastic students. I get to watch students grow and develop new ways of thinking about the world. I have a pretty sweet gig. I wouldn’t ever want to give this up—which brings me to the challenge for many women who love their careers but want to start a family. I remember a part-time faculty member recounting that she knew she would never get hired full-time once she got pregnant in grad school. Clearly it isn’t impossible to be a full-time faculty mother, but it’s difficult. Statistics demonstrate that many female faculty in the US opt not to have children or delay children until after tenure. Conversely, many faculty mothers are denied tenure or drop out of academic life altogether. And as for romantic relationships, you better have an understanding partner who is either able to get a job anywhere or willing to put his or her career on hold to move wherever you get a job. The situation for female artists and designers is no better. One of my studio colleagues told me that her mentor 04
Spring 2010
cautioned her to never have children—it would ruin her career. My students have fears about finding a loving partner who will understand what it takes to be an artist/designer. One recently proclaimed, “I have heard you just have to find another artist, because they are the only ones who understand.” Earlier this spring, I helped to organize Women’s Focus Week at RISD. We hosted a panel discussion, where women—both with and without children—shared their experiences of balancing the many facets of life. In introducing herself, one of the panelists commented that it was the first time in her career that she had written a bio that referenced her family. Why is that? Why are these two parts of our lives—family and career—so separated? Do they have to be? Recently, my class read that relative to other countries, Sweden, Norway, Finland, the Netherlands and Denmark value nurturing, quality of life and people above assertiveness, money and things. These countries have progressive policies about parental/family leave and vacation time that demonstrate a cultural recognition of the importance of life outside of work. As one of my students pointed out, these same countries are consistently rated the happiest countries in the world. With regard to well-being, it seems there is something to this work/life balance thing. Perhaps it is worth recognizing that we are not multiple selves, but one totality—and that creating rigid boundaries between important parts of our lives does not help maintain order, but creates chaos. Research suggests that when people have the necessary cultural, social and institutional support to have fulfilling lives outside of work, they are healthier and more productive all around. Ultimately, we benefit most from being part of communities that value their members as whole people, rather than as fractured beings. I believe that change only happens by starting a dialogue about what it is we value.
article by
Jennifer Prewitt-Freilino RISD Assistant Professor
illustration by
Lauren Nassef 01 PT
“Why are these two parts of our lives— family and career— so separated?”
To submit your own commentary, email
risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: listen)
Make RISD Yours (Again)
This Summer Reconnect with RISD, or share a piece of the RISD experience with your family and friends, through our many Summer Studios + Professional Programs. Register now (and tell a friend)! Continuing Education + Young Artist Programs workshops, classes and camps for all ages Classes start June 14 Pre-College Program a full-immersion art school experience for high school artists and designers June 26–August 7 Summer Studies RISD studio and Liberal Arts courses for credit June 28–August 6
Summer Institute for Graphic Design Studies RISD Graphic Design courses for credit, in a modular, two-week format June 28–August 6 Study Abroad Programs RISD credit-bearing, cross-cultural opportunities Stir Copenhagen: Design, Culture + Your Senses July 9–19 Mapping Foundations: Rome + Its Environs July 6–August 3 Switzerland + Beyond: The Crossroads of Art, Architecture + Design July 31–August 12
risd.edu/ce RISD Continuing Education, 20 Washington Place, 1st floor, Providence, RI 800 364-7473 (press 2) 401 454-6200
Architecture & Design
Grain 07 ID
Guatemalan Good(s) A new line of Sololá purses from the design collective Grain is among the company’s newest sustainable products. Each one is unique and made by “upcycling” pieces of vintage Guatemalan blouses woven on backstrap looms. By turning the fabric inside out, Grain “creates an explosion of texture and color that exposes the complex hand work that went into these amazing textiles,” notes Chelsea Green MID 07 . A few years ago, she and fellow Grain designers Brit Kleinman 07 ID and James Minola 07 ID took an eye-opening Wintersession course in Guatemala led by designer Mimi Robinson 81 PT, who helps artisans in developing countries to market their products abroad. This year Grain (which also includes designer Sami Nerenberg 07 ID ) reconnected with the artisans they met as students to bring two Guatemalan-based products to market: these Sololá purses and a series of textile necklaces called Chi-Chi. graindesign.com
AND THERE’S 06
NEW OLD-SCHOOL Made of solid maple, the graduated hues and refreshing feel of Gradient Table (21 x 18 x 22") by Paul Loebach 02 ID is a prime example of why The New York Time’s style magazine recently chose him for T’s Nifty 50 list of up-and-coming American designers. “Loebach’s simultaneous embrace of technology and craft—as well as of thinking and making—is evident in his designs,” the Times wrote. “Firmly grounded in old-school woodworking techniques, the Brooklyn-based [designer] is also well-versed in the latest design and manufacturing technology, and revisits traditional forms with advanced
Jonathan Arena 09 GD jonathanarena.me Grace Jun 09 GD gracejun.com The 2009 RISD yearbook designed by Arena and Jun is included in HOW magazine’s 2010 International Design Annual. Created as their senior thesis project, the book is actually two yearbooks split into 12-hour segments—day and night—playing off a RISD reality: the “all-nighter.”
Paul Loebach 02 ID
processes.” For instance, he makes wall-mounted wooden shelves that undulate in ways that are only possible using CAD programs and advanced machinery. But while he admits that technology can be very liberating, Loebach reminded T’s reporter that design devoid of the human element he so naturally brings to his own work will fail the test of time. paulloebach.com
Alison Berger 87 GL Based in LA, Alison Berger Glassworks produces everything from elegant, handblown hanging lamps to thick cast-glass furniture and large site-specific installations. But regardless of scale, she manages to capture the ephemeral nature of light in her pieces, which are represented nationwide by Holly Hunt and by Plug Lighting in LA.
Martha Davis 86 SC
Kevin Cunningham BArch 05
Sculptural Footwear “Shoes are just little products or architecture for the feet,” says Martha Davis 86 SC , who first attracted attention for her design of Dialpak, the Ortho birth control dispenser. Shoes “have to be comfortable and support your weight,” but ideally they’re also sculptural and beautiful, says the San Francisco-based designer. After selling her first company to Razorfish and working with the firm until the tech bubble burst, Davis launched her eponymous line of shoes and boots in 2008. She admits it was an industry she knew “nothing about,” yet in its first two years her line has taken off in Europe, Asia and the US. martha-davis.com
Artful Ride Combining his love of surfing with structural know-how, Kevin Cunningham BArch 05 makes durable wooden surfboards as lightweight as the toxic polyurethane foam boards now dominating the market. His current obsession started at RISD, where he built his first prototype. A $10,000 loan from the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation enabled him to expand his start-up this year. Called Spirare (as in the Latin word for “breathe”), the company’s name captures both the spirit of surfing and his approach to making green boards. spiraresurfboards.com
Michael Maltzan BArch 85
Skid Row Revisited LA-based architect Michael Maltzan BArch 85 is attracting deserved attention for his latest design for the Skid Row Housing Trust. Built next to an LA freeway, the scintillating white stucco New Carver Apartments complex is setting a refreshingly high standard for low-income housing. “Mr. Maltzan may be the only American architect of his stature with significant experience in [the less] glamorous field [of] providing shelter…for his city’s poor,” noted The New York Times in a recent article. Mike Alvidrez,
James Carpenter 72 IL In March James Carpenter Design Associates accepted the VILLUM and VELUX Foundation’s Daylight and Building Component Award (for 100,000 Euros) for innovative use of glass in architecture.
louierigano.com Louie Rigano 10 ID Treehugger.com recently took note of the “funky yet great-looking rain boots” Louie Rigano developed in a Waste for Life studio at RISD. By fusing cheesecloth with the ubiquitous plastic bags that have overtaken our lives, he created a cheap, waterproof material perfect for keeping your feet dry.
executive director of the Skid Row Housing Trust, points out that Maltzan clearly understands “the therapeutic value” of good design. “On the street, the homeless wonder if anybody cares whether they live or die. But Michael understands how to [use] architecture [to] send a message to the larger community.” mmaltzan.com
Stephanie Ward 98 AP Suddenly weddings don’t look so retro when the bride wears a gorgeous Punk Rock Bride dress designed by Stephanie Ward, who’s based in Washington, DC. Her simple, classic silhouettes focus on the details, giving brides a comfortable, fashion-forward option to make the big day memorable—and worthy of all those photos.
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Chris Keating
Music & Movies
04 FAV
Michael Dante DiMartino 96 FAV
Bryan Konietzko
yeasayer’s Odd Blood Dubbed “the next weird-ass band to break out of” Brooklyn (Rolling Stone), Yeasayer set out to be “as untrendy as possible,” claims Dave Simpson in The Guardian. But “the plan backfired.” Since releasing Odd Blood earlier this year, the trio has taken off both in the US and abroad. Rolling Stone calls their second album “a dizzying, hyper-detailed mix of heady prog-rock, New Wave hooks and electro-tribal grooves”
David Byrne 74 FS* davidbyrne.com In April Byrne and Fatboy Slim released Here Lies Love, a compilation of clubby dance music inspired by the odd story of Imelda Marcos.
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98 IL
—in short, a “mind-blowing new CD.” Singer Chris Keating 04 FAV describes All Hour Cymbals, Yeasayer’s debut disc, as “a globalization album—sounding like artefacts of different times and cultures thrown together.” With Odd Blood they’ve pushed further into the future, exploring the relationship of humans to technology and presenting a more pop mix of electronic drums, industrial percussion and reggaeton beats. “We asked ourselves, ‘What will music sound like in 20 years?’” Keating says. “It’s a good way to keep your brain active.” This spring Yeasayer’s concerts have been selling out across the country. They’re now touring Europe, where the reception is equally rapturous—and then it’s on to Australia and Japan this summer. yeasayer.net
Scott Clark 96 IL pixar.com/featurefilms/up As supervising animator for Up, Clark can take real pride in Pixar’s smart, endearing film, which not only wowed audiences, but earned a Golden Globe for best animated picture, along with five Academy Award nominations and the 2010 Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film.
Russell Earl 92 ID Earl’s excellent work on Star Trek earned him a 2010 Academy Award nomination for Best Visual Effects, his fifth nomination to date, with two previous wins.
Jason Bartell 06 PR
Robert Richardson
Chris Georges 06 PR
79 FAV
From Basterds to Shutter Island For the past three decades, cinematographer Robert Richardson 79 FAV has never been out of the public eye, yet he’s never been fully in it, either. Most people (other than film directors) just don’t pay that much attention to cinematographers. But Richardson shows us why we should. After being nominated for another Academy Award this year—his sixth, of which he has won two—for his inspired work on Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds, he went on to earn well-deserved critical acclaim for Shutter Island, his most recent film with Martin Scorcese. “Richardson has an extraordinary knack of allowing physical structures to brood over us, in their solid mass, and yet to hover as ungraspably as a dream,” noted The New Yorker in its review of the film.
Fang Island Feels Just Right Fang Island first sprang up at—you guessed it— RISD. From the start, the group’s goal has been to “make music for people who like music,” says guitarist Jason Bartell 06 PR . What’s that? Uplifting, perky songs like “the music in your head at that moment when everything feels just right: that first kiss, that high score on the video game, buying your first small nation in cash… you know, good stuff.” With this spring’s release of their self-titled third album, the Brooklyn-based band—which also includes guitarists Chris Georges 06 PR and Nicholas Andrew Sadler, bassist Michael Jacober and drummer Marc St. Sauveur—has been touring the country, expanding their fan base with every stop. fangisland.com
Amy Devers MFA 01 FD*
Summer Blockbuster? Look for amazing special effects in this summer’s The Last Airbender, a 3D film from Paramount co-produced by Michael DiMartino 96 FAV and Bryan Konietzko 98 IL . Based on the hugely successful cartoon the two created for Nickelodeon, the movie (directed by M. Night Shyamalan) reveals a world ruled by “benders”—warriors who have learned to manipulate the elements. When Aang— an Airbender—discovers he is the Avatar, the one being in a generation who can learn to control all of the elements, he works to restore balance to the bender world after his people have been wiped out by the Fire Nation. thelastairbendermovie.com
laserbeast.com Brian Chippendale 97 PR* | Brian Gibson 98 IL Since the release of Earthly Delights last fall, Lightning Bolt has completed one successful tour and is gearing up for another this summer. The duo’s fifth album confirms their “remarkable technical chops” in creating a mix of “athletic drumming, cosmic noodle and heavy, middle eastern-tinged riffs,” according to the BBC.
Andy Kennedy 02 IL blessedwithbeverages.com Last summer Kennedy co-directed a fun music video of Science is Real, the first track off the new kids’ album Here Comes Science by They Might Be Giants.
TV Talk As host of Designer People on Ovation TV and co-host of the new show Fix This Yard on A&E, Amy Devers MFA 01 FD* is showing up in living rooms across the country, reminding viewers about the value of good design. She’s a veteran of cable shows Trading Spaces, Freeform Furniture and DIY to the Rescue, but calls Designer People her “dream job”—an opportunity to talk about design with people like Zaha Hadid, Emmanuel Picault, Karim Rashid and other leading architects and designers. “We’re always looking for credibility along with on-screen talent and Amy is that rare and wonderful combination of both,” says Ovation VP Kris Slava. “She manages to bring substance and knowledge to every design topic covered.” amydevers.com
Michael Riley 91 GD shinestudio.com Shine, the design and production studio Riley runs in LA, has generated a series of commendable projects in the last few months, from titles and visual effects for HBO Films’ Temple Grandin, to title designs for Modern Family, to marketing webisodes for How to Train Your Dragon.
* attended RISD but did not receive a degree
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C-ING FORM
Books & Fine Art
In ABCing: Seeing the Alphabet Differently, Colleen (Comerford) Ellis 86 IL emphasizes the negative shapes made by each letter of the alphabet as a means of encouraging people to reconsider what it really means to see. In her book and an accompanying website, she plays with the notion of looking beyond the obvious—outside each letterform, in this case—to find richer meaning and hidden nuances. By rotating and resizing the shapes made by a letterform, she’s able to illustrate the meaning of each word she has chosen to associate with a specific letter— a for abstract, b for balance, c for contrast, and so forth. Unsurprisingly, the book culminates in what we have just pronounced the most beautiful and significant letters of the alphabet: xyz. All in all, the 64-page primer to seeing and understanding the visual world offers a touch of philosophy, poetry and art all wrapped into one. abseeing.com
Grace Lin 96 IL
Flawless Gem Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, a gracefully written and illustrated book for tweens by Grace Lin 96 IL , has been a winner since hitting the shelves late last year. It earned the Parents’ Choice Gold Award and landed Lin an interview on the TODAY Show (Al Roker selected it as his Kids’ Book Club Pick for December). This year the accolades have continued, with her “flawless little gem of a book” named a 2010 Newbery Honor Book and a New York Times bestseller. Tapping in to the rich history of Chinese folktales and using “beautiful language, Lin creates a strong, memorable heroine and a mystical land,” notes Booklist. And buzz is already building for Ling and Ting, her first book for early readers, due out in June. gracelin.com
Nell Irvin Painter MFA 11 PT
Painter Writes re: Race An artist, historian and retired Princeton professor, Nell Irvin Painter MFA 11 PT is also an accomplished author—and a new grad student at RISD. Earlier this spring, the MFA candidate in Painting had fun engaging in circuitous banter with Steven Colbert when the comedian feigned confusion about whether or not she’s black in a face-to-face interview about her new book, The History of White People (W.W. Norton & Company). A couple of weeks later the New York Times’ Sunday Book Review (3.25.10) praised the tome Painter labored over for a decade as “an insightful and lively exposition” about “whiteness.” nellpainter.com
John Caserta RISD Graphic Design faculty thedesignoffice.org/ira Hot off the press: Ira Rakatansky: As Modern as Tomorrow, Caserta’s new monograph on the 90-year-old Modernist architect. In addition to archival materials, it features an essay by Associate Professor of Architecture Lynnette Widder and photographs by Caserta and Thad Russell MFA 06 PH .
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Diana Eng 05 AP fashionnerd.com After Eng published Fashion Geek: Clothes, Accessories, Tech last year, her DIY book was picked up by makezine.com as April’s prize for Geek Chic month.
Rachel Glaser 05 PT publishinggenius.com Watch for the release of Glaser’s first collection of short stories Pee on Water (Publishing Genius) this summer. The same publisher recently released the new poetry collection, The Best of (What’s Left of) Heaven by Assistant Professor of English Mairéad Byrne, her RISD mentor.
Dead or Alive Christy Rupp MAT 74 has been
Christy Rupp MAT 74
Colleen (Comerford) Ellis 86 IL
creating environmentally provocative work that “puts the stain back in sustainability”—as her rep, Frederieke Taylor Gallery, puts it—since the 1970s. Because environmental systems are much more easily destroyed than replaced, her work often challenges the premise that once gone species —or ecosystems themselves— can be readily replaced through human ingenuity. Her Extinct Birds, life-sized skeletal reconstructions (primarily made from chicken bones) of species like the Great Auk, the Moa and the Dodo, are included in the current Dead or Alive show at the Museum of Arts and Design in NYC (through October 24). The show presents work by artists who create intricately crafted sculpture and installations from organic materials that were once produced by or part of a living organism. christyrupp.com
Henry Horenstein 71 PH MFA 73 PH
Seeing Shape A prolific chronicler of pop culture, photographer and RISD Professor Henry Horenstein 71 PT, MFA 73 PH has turned his lens towards contemporary burlesque over the last decade, capturing the likes of Catherine D-lish, Dirty Martini, Jackie Beat, Dita Von Teese, Peek-a-Boo Point, Verushka and the legendary Murray Hill. His latest monograph SHOW reveals both the amusing and grim realities of the current titillation trade. Whether doing drag, fetish or sideshow acts, “these performers are today’s version of the ‘starving artist,’” Horenstein says. “They live on the margins and deliver their personal expression through sexually charged and often highly political song, dance, comedy and narrative.” show-thebook.com
Jessica Hemmings 99 TX jessicahemmings.com It may not have taken a PhD, but Hemmings got one before writing In the Loop: Knitting Now. The book presents exciting proof that knitting today is more than just a prissy pastime to occupy the fidgety.
Michael Leva 83 AP J Jill executive VP Michael Leva teams up with textile designer Nancy Parker for the newly released Recipes for Parties (April 2010), “a hip [guide to] mastering the essentials of entertaining, effortlessly presented by two fashionable personalities who love throwing parties” (says cook.com).
Mark Rabinowitz 75 SC aarome.org As one of 33 artists and scholars to win this year’s Rome Prize, Mark Rabinowitz is being honored for his work in historic preservation and conservation. The fellowship provides for a stipend, a studio and room and board for six months to two years at the American Academy in Rome.
11
SPRING 2010
“ I’m taking advantage
Vishnu Hoff 00 ID
it isn’t going to last forever. It’s a good kick in the butt to make a lot of work now!” Anna Lynett 08 PR
Huma Bhabha portrait: Chris Maynard/The New York Times/Redux
“ We knew we had to find a way to help despite our lack of experience in disaster relief.”
of the attention because
“ The hardest part has been the manipulation of my personality and character due to how the show’s edited.” Mila Hermanovski 91 AP
“ It goes back to not having so much money and not having so much space.” Huma Bhabha 85 PR
INDUSTRIAL DESIGN
photo essay by Vishnu Hoff BFA 00
VITAL SIGNS
Vishnu Hoff has found his calling in focusing an artist’s eye and designer’s mind on bringing surgical care to some of the poorest regions of the world.
Vishnu Hoff keeps his eyes trained on the world. He has seen and photographed some of the most stunning and sobering sights imaginable, “finding religion” in connecting with humanity in its most raw state. “Early on I realized I had a certain ability to tell stories through my photos,” Hoff says. But it wasn’t until two years ago when he volunteered for a humanitarian mission to Ghana that he had his first real epiphany. After graduating with a BFA in ID, he had worked to establish a design consultancy—until his fledgling business came crashing down in the wake of 9/11. But photography continued to tug at him. By day he could make a living performing diagnostic procedures and documenting surgeries for the country’s leading retinal specialists (a gig he fell into before RISD). After hours, he imagined using his photographic skills to promote healing of another kind. Hoff embraced the two-week mission to Ghana as “an opportunity to test if cultural documentary photography” was something he had a feel for and wanted to do. But, like the other volunteers, he felt that the mission was trying to accomplish too much by having a surgical team, a rural clinical team and an arts/community education team—that it had not been as well organized as it needed to be, which put the team “in a rather vulnerable position,” he says. “We were far from home, dealing with sick and desperate people from a very different culture, and yet every day we had to worry about how we were going to get a meal or water for ourselves. It caused emotions to run exceptionally high.” Still, despite the difficulties, the experience ended up being “one of those pivotal moments when you realize: This is what I really want to be doing with my life,” Hoff says. “It’s when you know without a doubt that you’re doing good work, you’re helping people who absolutely need it, and you’re expanding your personal horizons— developing a world view that most people don’t have access to.” 14
Spring 2010
Do surgeons need artists?
“I was very moved by the look exchanged between this mother and child. They were waiting to be examined by the surgeons to determine if there was anything they could do to treat his congenital inguinal hernia, and you can see the mother’s tension and anxiety, and the child’s trust and reliance.”
OF
For Hoff, the experience in Ghana proved to be so profound that he returned determined to find a way to do good work on his own terms. By photographing in the operating room, assisting the surgeons with simple procedures and putting in the same long hours, he had developed a strong relationship of trust and reliance with the team’s surgeons. “Several of us realized that we’re smart people! We should be able to organize our own missions with a primary focus on surgery and a particular sensitivity to our volunteers and the people we’re there to help,” Hoff explains. “And we knew we needed to leave our egos at the door.” So, he teamed up with G.I. surgeon Asha Bale and trauma surgeon Ziad Sifri, balancing their pragmatic approach to medical missions with the creative thinking he had honed at RISD. In May 2009 the three officially established the International Surgical Health Initiative (ISHI), an all-volunteer, nonprofit organization that set out to organize a couple of humanitarian missions a year. ISHI’s primary goals are to offer surgical care to the underserved, while respecting the peoples and cultures they serve and ensuring the safety of team members. Planning and coordinating with other organizations are also essential to maximizing their effectiveness. “We don’t just show up, do the work and leave,” Hoff says. “We work hard to understand where we’re going and the particular needs of the people and their culture. We want to develop ongoing relationships.” Since the organization got off the ground, he and Kimberly Riback, the other non-medical ISHI Board member, have taken charge of publicity, identity, websites “and anything involving design,” he says. Hoff contributes to general logistics planning and management for missions like the two winter ones to Haiti, and also serves as treasurer. In the field, his primary role is to bring an artist’s eye to telling the story of each mission visually.
“In Guatemala, I accompanied our patients back to their villages to get a feel for their lives and understand the full circle of the work we were doing. After an eight-hour drive into the mountains, we helped one of our patients who had had gallbladder surgery to walk the last stretch to get home. As we approached their simple cabin, her daughter came running up dressed in a fancy dress, but when she saw the strangers with her mom she got shy, as did the skin-and-bones dog she was leading.”
PROGRESS
15
FEATURE
Vital Signs of Progress
“A young Ghanaian girl carries her even younger sibling in a cloth wrapped around her waist in the traditional fashion. Her manner was similar to the many other girls we observed in the same role: curious and fascinated with strangers, but reserved and cautious in a protective way, obviously taking her role as caregiver seriously.” “A young boy carries dried fish on his head in the fishing port of Elmina in Ghana, a community overshadowed by the Elmina Slave Castle, where millions of Africans were held before being shipped off to the New World.”
“It was one of those pivotal moments when you realize: This is what I really want to be doing with my life.” Vishnu Hoff 00 ID
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Spring 2010
“Starving dogs on the street tend to be emblematic of thirdworld countries— a trickle-down sign of the hardships the people experience. But this dog in Antigua, Guatemala reflects efforts of countries like Guatemala to improve their condition: it’s decently fed and clean, resting comfortably on a tidy curb in front of the characteristic colors and textures of the local architecture.”
“I had to rush to get my camera ready to catch this photo when I recognized Caravaggio’s The Incredulity of Saint Thomas playing out in front of me, replete with his chiaroscuro aesthetic. Dr. Diego Reino played the role of Saint Thomas and Dr. Ziad Sifri assisted from the shadows.”
“RISD helps you think beyond and outside, which is so valuable because I’m now better able to approach unknown situations and figure my way out.” Vishnu Hoff 00 ID
“Before going to RISD, I worked for 12 years as a camera assistant and, occasionally, a cameraman,” Hoff says, “so I tend to approach still photography like a movie. I’m aware of activity outside the frame and try to capture a sense of anticipation in my photographs, so that they suggest a larger story than just what’s in the frame.” Hoff’s photos are key to explaining what ISHI does and communicating the need on the ground. “Our surgeons are very skilled at what they do and they help a lot of people,” he says, “but it’s essential that we also show people what conditions are like in less privileged parts of the world and what we’re doing to help,” he explains. “Also, when it comes to growing an organization like ours, doctors—especially surgeons—are so highly focused on very concrete details that they often need to rely on others for ‘big-picture’ thinking. So that’s where I come in.”
Top: “A Ghanaian nurse cleans a healthy-looking infant who had just been delivered via emergency C-section. The one surgeon at the hospital we used for our surgeries spent most of his time performing this operation—sometimes as many as 12 a day.”
Bottom: “The brother of a local village chief in Ghana had been carrying around this giant ventral hernia for about 23 years. It’s a situation where a large portion of the intestines escapes through a defect in the abdominal wall, and while the surgeons were able to correct the defect I was shocked to realize that for all that time most of this man’s digestive process had been happening outside of his abdomen.”
Why design thinking matters
Hoff first became fascinated with the design process by taking a few classes at Pratt. But he chose to come to RISD as an older student because he wanted an emphasis on creative thinking and problem solving. As a 30-something student with considerable life experience, he stood out from the 18- and 20-year-olds in his classes. But he made a point of maximizing the opportunity, especially since he was “painfully aware of how much each minute was costing” him—and overall the experience served him well. Besides, RISD is where he met his wife, Miranti Kisdarjono 00 AP . “RISD creates artists and designers who are thinkers in their field, not just technicians,” he says. “It helps you think beyond and outside, which is so valuable. I’m now better able to approach unknown situations and figure my way out, which is a wonderful way to navigate through life!” Such creative thinking helps Hoff handle the many unknowns involved in humanitarian relief work. In fact, when the earthquake hit Haiti in early January, “we knew we had to find a way to help despite our lack of experience in disaster relief,” he says. So, within 72 hours ISHI had organized a team of surgeons willing to go to Haiti at their own expense. But Hoff knew the team couldn’t just show up “without an infrastructure to allow us to get to where we were needed, to be able to feed and house our volunteers, and to provide a place to perform the surgeries. It was critical that we not become part of the problem.” Fortunately, ISHI was able to partner with another organization that had extensive experience in Haiti, enabling six of its volunteers to join a team of 21 assembled from hospitals in South Florida. In one week, they treated more than 1,000 patients and performed 82 surgeries. During their mission, Hoff kept in close 17
FEATURE
Vital Signs of Progress
contact with the volunteers and stepped up fundraising to cover the unexpected mission while a second ISHI team of nine was organized to replace the first. “In Haiti, relief organizations have been limiting the duration of the stay for each team, because it’s pretty grueling,” he says. “You definitely get an emotional pounding.” While Hoff had been in line to be part of both ISHI missions to Haiti, he gave up his seat in favor of a surgeon for the first trip, and for the second, new restrictions kept anyone without medical credentials from taxing the limited resources on the island. “I was very disappointed, but happy that we were able to help so many people, even if I wasn’t doing it in person,” he says. “And maybe it was just as well since my hands are full looking into possible missions to Chile and Sierra Leone, and organizing our big spring fundraiser so that we can actually afford to continue the good work we’ve started.” Although Hoff isn’t doing too much industrial design these days, he says that RISD continues to color how he interprets the world, whether it’s in his day job as director of Ophthalmic Imaging at the LuEsther T. Mertz Retinal Research Center in Manhattan, or on a mission thousands of miles away, getting to know people in the developing world and helping to tell their stories. “I’ve always had an interest in social and ecological issues, as well as in art and design,” he says. “In ISHI I realized I could combine a lot of these things simultaneously to do what really matters to me. And for every mission I’ve gone on, I’ve come back profoundly changed.”
In addition to welcoming donations, ISHI is always on the lookout for volunteers to help with medical missions and local projects. Artists and designers are especially welcomed. On medical missions, you can help break cultural barriers and document the work being done on the ground. Locally, ISHI can use help with its website (ishiglobal.org) and printed documentation, and with designing compelling fundraisers (musicians and audio people are also needed for this). “We offer a rewarding experience and the potential for excellent exposure as we grow,” Hoff says, adding “exposure is what keeps us alive.”
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Spring 2010
“For every mission I’ve gone on, I’ve come back profoundly changed.” Vishnu Hoff 00 ID
“In Ghana this group of children descended on us at the beach and proceeded to pose exuberantly in what we later realized were their interpretations of postures used in African music videos. We learned later that they were severely chastised by their parents for going near foreigners, who are suspected of kidnapping children.”
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risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: feedback)
19
PRINTMAKING
Anna Lynett BFA 08
APPAREL DESIGN
Mila Hermanovski BFA 91
For alumni Mila Hermanovski and Anna Lynett, competing on the latest season of Project Runway was sheer lunacy— and a dream come true.
The Reality
by
Liisa Silander
From the collection Mila showed in the season’s finale.
20
Spring 2010
Few people presume there’s anything “real” about reality TV, but for Anna Lynett and Mila Hermanovski the Project Runway experience was “totally surreal.” As two of the 16 designer/ contestants cast in season seven of the hotly competitive fashion design show, they fre quently felt “disoriented” enough to think they had landed in the daddy of all reality TV shows, Survivor. Both were subjected to off-camera frenzy and on-camera criticism as they attempted to survive a whirlwind series of design challenges with strict parameters, low budgets and impossible deadlines— which is where the true “reality” part comes in. The payoff? Finalists show their collection to industry insiders at New York’s Fashion Week and the winner gets to sell his or her line on Bluefly.com, is featured in Marie Claire magazine, wins a $50,000 computer package and takes home $100,000 to launch his or her own line. While Anna—an artist and printmaker who was competing against experienced fashion designers—was “hugely disappointed” to be eliminated in the fifth round, Mila made it to the finals and lived to tell the tale. Here, they share how their RISD experience prepared them for the show’s challenges, what they’ve learned about themselves as designers and where they each plan to go from here.
A high-end signature look by Anna and fellow contestant Emilio Sosa.
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FEATURE
The Reality of Runway
Why did you want to be on Project Runway?
Did your RISD experience help you at all?
A n na : I had just started making clothes a year ago because I needed to dress more fashionably at work. A few people commented about how well made they were and suggested I consider applying to the show. I never thought I’d be the kind of person who would fit reality TV, but living in LA people are very media-centric, so it seemed like an obvious thing to try.
Ann a : Absolutely. It’s funny because Mila and I talked about RISD when we met on the show. We both feel that we have a healthy relationship to our work because of RISD—that we’re able to look at it objectively.
M i la: For me, it was that I had been feeling less than fulfilled by my career in costuming, so I wanted to return to my fashion design roots to find something more creatively fulfilling. A friend of a friend who knew Project Runway was casting asked if I’d consider applying, and it just felt right; it was a very ”why not?” moment.
Going into it, was it a long shot or did you think you had a good chance of making it on? M i la: Honestly, I had no idea. The work in my portfolio was mostly from college and when I was called back, I was told I would go before a panel of judges and that I should bring up to six pieces of my most current work. So I decided I’d better get sewing and make something more upto-date. I did this in part to prove to myself that I could handle designing and making clothes quickly. I made five pieces in a week, and had a very positive response from the judges. A n na : I knew that everyone would have way more expe rience, which was intimidating. But I also had a huge amount of confidence. I took it as some thing that would happen if it was meant to be.
22
Spring 2010
Mi la : That’s true. I hadn’t been designing and constructing clothing in years, but I discovered that all the creativity and skills I needed were still there because at RISD I had absorbed everything at a cellular level.
Did the pace on Project Runway remind you of being a student at RISD? Mi la : Yes! Just take being a RISD student (lack of sleep, problem solving, tight deadlines, etc.) and amplify it times 100! Oh, and how about the fact that I’m not 20 anymore? The thing that was very different was that this was a competition, and there were a lot of “unknowns”—from new people to a new workspace, living quarters, parameters and assignments for each challenge. Most challenges needed to be done in a day (and not even 24 hours): about 12 hours the first
“I discovered that all the creativity and skills I needed were still there because at RISD I had absorbed everything at a cellular level.” Mila Hermanovski 91 AP Anna shops for supplies with Emilio.
day and just a couple hours at most the next (the morning of the runway show), in which we had to juggle finishing our garments with consulting with the hair and makeup teams and dressing our models.
Tim Gunn introduces the third challenge at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
“My favorite challenge— making a garment from a burlap sack—reminded me of RISD because it really provided a blank slate to do anything.” Anna Lynett 08 PR
A n n a : Well, I got about the same amount of sleep as when I was at RISD, but I missed the relative privacy. As a student I could make things and if they didn’t work out, it was no big deal. I didn’t have to deal with people looking at me all the time and being in this really frantic, fast-paced environ ment where you have to make instant decisions. I could think and cultivate my work more quietly at RISD.
Did the crit experience at RISD help toughen you up for on-air criticism? A n n a : In a way, but RISD crits are very intellectual. Your teachers take you seriously and try to get into your brain, which isn’t true of the judges on Project Runway. They just tell you right
Exhaustion overtakes Mila and the other designers remaining in the contest.
Marie Claire Editorin-Chief Joanna Coles (far left) joins judges Nina Garcia, Michael Kors and Heidi Klum.
away that they don’t like some thing, and then you’re sort of dismissed. So I had to adjust to that, but it was a good lesson in separating myself from the work. M ila: I thought it was really apparent when another designer on the show had not had the crit experience. They didn’t know how to differentiate between constructive criticism of the work and personal criticism, so I was very grateful to have been prepared for that. Still, the feedback was not always con structive and was sometimes over-dramatized for the sake of entertainment.
Did any of the challenges remind you of assignments you had at RISD? M ila: The hardware store challenge reminded me of my sophomore Apparel Design assignment to make a garment out of a non-traditional material for clothing. This was one of my favorite challenges on the show, because it really makes you think outside the box and still maintain your point of view. I also loved the Met “signature design” challenge, because for my designs to be in a collection like the Metropolitan Museum (or any museum collection, for that matter) is my own “holy grail.” I was so glad I won that challenge because it resonated so deeply with me. A n na : My favorite was making a garment from a burlap sack. It reminded me of RISD because it really provided a blank slate to do anything and the material was so raw and plain that it didn’t favor people with a parti cular expertise. This challenge seemed more open to personal expression—and to the kind of freedom I had in Printmaking.
23
FEATURE
The Reality of Runway
How do you feel you compared—both profession ally and creatively—with the other contestants?
How competitive versus collaborative/supportive was Project Runway compared to RISD?
M i la: Although Project Runway is a competition, many of us helped each other whenever we could. In the earlier challenges, we all felt insecure and out of sorts, and would ask each other for advice. With each subsequent challenge, we became more focused and competitive—at least I did.
A n na: This definitely ties back to RISD. Although I still don’t have the sewing skills and knowledge of fabric that most of the other designers had, creatively I was well-matched. The things I picked up at RISD are intangible—a singular vision, a pure artistic identity, confidence in my creative abilities. RISD taught me to be more industrious and take the attitude that if you can make something better than what’s available, you should. These are all things that make a real difference in an experience like this—and overall in life, too.
A n na : I thought it was a terrible environment to make friends in—not like RISD, which is a community. On Project Runway it’s every man for himself and people are very protective of their artistic identity. But working with Tim Gunn [the well-known fashion designer who mentors the contestants] was amazing because he really reminded me of some of my teachers at RISD— very personal and genuine.
M i la : I had more experience professionally than most, and creatively, felt like I was in the upper half of the designers. I know creativity is something people are born with, but I also believe that it can be exercised and enhanced by a strong arts education like the one I got at RISD.
Project Runway is obviously a hugely popular “reality show,” but how true did it feel to the realities of designing for the fashion industry? A n n a : For me, it felt completely unreal the whole time. The subject matter is fashion, but the real focus—the medium— is television entertainment, so the contestants need to be good TV characters. Some of them are naturally more dramatic so they did better at this. M ila : I don’t think many of the challenges on the show are realistic in terms of designing for the fashion industry, but this season in particular, there were good challenges that show a designer’s diversity (like designing for and fitting a “real” woman instead of models, or making children’s clothing), which I think was a good thing.
How much are the contestants coached or directed about how to behave on camera? A n n a : We’re pretty much on our own. There wasn’t much handholding at all. And nothing we did or said was censored at all. But the footage they use simplifies each of us into char acters so that viewers can quickly understand who we are. M ila : That’s so true. In the interviews/confessionals, I could tell from the questions that there were story lines developing, though they weren’t always obvious. I always answered the questions, but I thought, “This is going to be manipulated to make it sound like I’m trashtalking, isn’t it?” The thing is, I’m a forthright person. If you ask my opinion of someone’s work, I am going to give it to you. I don’t believe in candycoating! Go figure—it’s that crit experience again.
“The subject matter is fashion, but the real focus—the medium—is television entertainment.” Anna Lynett 08 PR
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Spring 2010
Once the show started airing in January, how did it feel to become an instant celebrity?
What was most challenging and rewarding about the experience?
M i la: Very surreal. I am recog nized when I go to the market now, and that takes some getting used to (like I feel like I need to look presentable all the time!). But the hardest part has been the manipulation of my person ality and character due to how the show’s edited. The blogs have been hurtful at times, so for the most part I have my boyfriend “screen” them for me!
Mila: Most challenging? The time constraints and not having a chance to decompress or creatively “recharge.” Creativity doesn’t have an “on/off” switch, but on the show you have to be “on” all the time. You have to design…now! On the plus side, I can’t even begin to describe the feeling of accomplishment from making an outfit in a day. There were times when I thought, “How did I just do that?” There’s a “survival mode” that just kind of kicks in unknowingly; you just know you have to make it work. And somehow I did, even when I was panicking that my model might not have pants to wear. But I also learned that even though I work well under pressure, I really need the creative process. It’s really important to be able to step away from your work and look at it again. I learned a lot from Tim Gunn as a mentor (one of my favorite parts of the experience), and also from some of the judges’ critiques, particularly from Michael Kors.
A n na: When people started recognizing me, it was really strange. I don’t like a lot of attention, which is true for a lot of the others, too, so we felt out of our element. We didn’t do the show because we wanted to become celebrities, we did it because we want to be recognized as professional designers.
Have you changed as a result of doing the show?
photos by David Russell / Lifetime Television
A n na: My fundamental values haven’t changed, but I think I understand myself better. How you react under pressure is a good measure of character, and I understand my limits because they’ve been pushed to the extreme. The show taught me that I can do something pretty huge—that I shouldn’t ever be afraid of this kind of challenge in the future. It showed me that you only get a big reward when you take a huge risk. M i la: Well, for one thing, I am really fast at sewing now! Being on the show made me more confident in my design and construction skills. It also made me realize that now more than ever fashion design is truly what I’m meant to be doing.
A n na : Being on the show defi nitely gives me a really con venient platform for my work, because TV is such an exciting medium. People love it, and it’s easy for them to be interested in me now. I’m taking advantage of the attention because it isn’t going to last forever. It’s a good kick in the butt to make a lot of work now!
So, what do you plan to do next?
Focus on manipulating the surface of fabrics and pushing the relationship between screen print and fabric construction with each garment. Ultimately, I would love to have my designs picked up by a larger company, so I’m working on a few leads.
A n na :
M ila: For me, it’s back to the atelier to design my collection and make samples so I can have another show and hopefully find some sponsorship and/or investment to enable me to produce the line and ultimately sell to stores. I really want to see people wearing my clothes.
Has this experience opened new doors for you? Mila: Absolutely—not only literally, but in my mind as well. I would not have nearly as great an opportunity to launch a collection without the publicity of the show and the occasion to show at Fashion Week in Bryant Park. Without the design talent, you won’t have long-term success in the industry—show or no show. But it was hugely beneficial to be able to show my work to millions of people. I was imme diately approached to make a gown for a celebrity on Oscar night, and to have a fashion show for a charity event in May. This is what made it all worthwhile: watching these wonderful opportunities unfold.
“I always answered the questions, but I thought, ‘This is going to be manipulated to make it sound like I’m trashtalking, isn’t it?” Mila Hermanovski 91 AP
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25
Untitled 2008 clay, wire, Styrofoam, wood, painted wire, duct tape, acrylic paint, skull 33 x 16 x 12"
PRINTMAKING
26
Spring 2010
Huma Bhabha BFA 85
totally
organic (and extraterrestrial, too?)
photos courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York
As the only RISD graduate with work in the 2010 Whitney Biennial, Huma Bhabha is attracting long-overdue attention for her highly evocative figurative sculpture.
Two years ago when Huma Bhabha won the Aldrich Museum’s Emerging Artist Award, The New York Times called her “the artistic equivalent of a magpie.” This year it admitted that description “was really a couth way of saying that Bhabha is the art world’s most exciting Dumpster diver.” While many RISD artists are known for their resourcefulness, the Pakistani expatriate makes extra ordinary use of ordinary materials—stuff like chicken wire, wood, metal, duct tape, ashes, plastic piping, clay. “It kind of goes back to not having so much money and not having so much space,” she told the Times, which recently selected her for its Nifty 50 list of top up-and-coming talent in America. “And it’s cheaper to find materials.” Both intriguing and disturbing, Bhabha’s work often looks like it has been excavated from an archeological dig in another galaxy. Newsweek cites it as one reason this iteration of the vaunted biennial is less didactic and weighed down by “message” art than in the past. “Some people see a political element to my work,” Bhabha says. “That’s not my intention, but if something political comes through, that’s fine.” Instead, she says, her work “is an organic process. One sculpture just leads to the next.” If so, let’s hope she keeps digging down deep and surfacing with ever more provocative finds.
The Whitney Biennial continues through May 30. Huma’s work is also on view in Statuesque, a group show of unconventional figurative sculpture at City Hall Park in New York (June 2–December 3).
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Athos 2006 wood, clay, wire, Styrofoam, metal stud, acrylic paint 77 x 28 x 29.5"
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Spring 2010
Huma Bhabha 85 PR
“Some people see a political element to my work. That’s not my intention, but if something political comes through, that’s fine.”
Untitled (2 feet) 2007 clay, wood, wire, Styrofoam, acrylic paint 14 x 13.5 x 7" each foot
FEATURE Totally Organic
risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: feedback)
To comment on this article email
29
photos courtesy of the artist and Salon 94, New York
The Price of Gold 2008 clay, wire, wood, Styrofoam, gold leaf, acrylic paint, thumbtack 23 x 14.25 x 16.25"
Bourne Darkly 2008 clay, wire, wood, Styrofoam, metal, acrylic paint 68 x 14" in diameter
did you know? RISD provides 8:1 student-faculty ratio, ensuring we get the attention we need!
Only 45% of RISD students receive scholarships. Help RISD do better!
Tuition covers only 69% of a RISD education, which is why every Annual Fund gift is important, no matter the size.
“ I believe in the Annual Fund because I know how important it is to students. After graduation, I know I’ll give because I want to support the school that has given me so much, both as a person and a design professional. The Annual Fund helps ensure that a RISD education is possible for other students. And that’s something every alum should support!”
Courtney Lizotte ‘10 IA Student Coordinator, RISD Phonathon
It takes 360 alumni, each making a gift of $100, to cover one student’s annual tuition.
Support Rhode Island School of Design’s commitment to being the preeminent art and design school in the country. Continue the legacy of RISD alumni, parents, and friends whose financial support helps make the RISD experience second to none. Make a gift to the RISD Annual Fund today!
Use the courtesy reply envelope to send your gift or donate online at www.risd.edu/give. Or call Ellen Cheston in the Office of Annual Giving at (401) 454-6107.
A glimpse of what’s happening at the heart of campus— with the president, students, faculty and staff.
On Maeda’s Mind message by
John Maeda RISD President
The longer I spend at RISD, the clearer it is that you, our alumni, consistently show the world why creativity is so important to the critical questions of the day and to making vital innovations that advance our economy. In the fall issue of risd views, the predecessor to this magazine, I pointed out how important it is to remind our country’s policymakers and other leaders that we need to complement STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) subject areas with IDEA (Intuition, Design, Emotion and Art). It’s now time for the Arts to transform STEM into STEAM to get our nation going. In the last few months I’ve had the privilege of traveling around the country and the world to promote the idea of turning STEM into STEAM. And I’m pleased to report that the notion is gaining traction. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, I led a session with Drew Faust and many Harvard deans to find innovative design solutions to the world’s systemic healthcare woes. At Davos I also found a kindred spirit in Mark Parker, the CEO of Nike who worked his way up from being a junior footwear designer and who could clearly articulate the value that his background brought to leadership. Now, National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Rocco Landesman is joining my calls to turn STEM into STEAM by advocating for art to be at the center of public education. We all know the profound emotional impact of good works of art and good teaching. At the recent RISD memorial for our well-loved Foundation Studies Professor Alfred DeCredico 66 PT (see pages 36 and 38) I heard Professor of Architecture Kyna Lesk i remark that she “wasn’t done” with her colleague
and friend—with his questioning, his feisty spirit and his enormous appetite for life (and good food). These are the individuals who make up the rich tapestry of RISD and show the world the evocative power of creativity. Finally, hats off to NY-based designer Criswell Lappin MFA 97 GD and the team of artists and designers he put together to help us realize a new vision for this magazine, which we hope you’ll embrace as a more flexible and lively forum for sharing your passions and your work. I am pleased to have been invited to be the inaugural contributor to our new end-note department, Drawing Board (page 64)—where you can see my visual take on the STEM to STEAM idea. I hope that in this issue you feel your own vibrant community of RISD alumni spring to life.
“We’ll witness a return to the integrity of craft, the humanity of authorship and the rebalancing of our virtual and physical spaces.” John Maeda in Your Life in 2020, an article he wrote for Forbes.com [4.8.10]
For more, follow John on
our.risd.edu + twitter.com/johnmaeda
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TWO COLLEGE STREET
what’s up on campus
“I’m not even sure I’ll live long enough for cigarettes to kill me.” 2010 RISD honorary degree recipient Art Spiegelman and his chain-smoking cartoon-mouse alter ego in In the Shadow of No Towers (2004)
COMMENCEMENT 2010
Tuition Up
(and so are scholarships) At its winter meeting, RISD’s Board of Trustees set tuition for the 2010–11 academic year at $38,000, with fees for campus housing and dining plans varying, but averaging $6,500 and $4,820, respectively. Although these figures represent the lowest annual increase in tuition in a decade, RISD is simultaneously working to raise new funds for scholarships, which President John Maeda considers “our highest priority. RISD’s strong values and unshakable commitment to quality have remained unchanged by the global financial crisis,” he noted in a letter sent to students and their families.
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Spring 2010
More than 75 students worked together over Wintersession to create and perform a smart and fast-paced musical satire about life at RISD.
New Musical in the Cabaret Tradition RISD: The Musical!, a student-run Wintersession workshop that culminated in two nights of sold-out performances, may have started a new tradition at RISD as popular as the annual cabarets of the 1990s. Conceived of and directed by Jean Kim 10 IL and Greg Kozatek 10 IL (who also played a hilarious RISD mom/alumna, among other roles) and realized by a group of 75 other students, the satire about life at RISD was spot on and lovingly presented, bursting with energy and fast-paced insider jokes. Scenes spanned the gamut from the undergrad application process to graduation, with plenty of memorable moments in between. Throughout the full-length production, students with great voices
and strong stage presence sang snippets of songs from musicals and movies with RISD-specific lyrics. I Can Show You the Quad was adapted from Disney’s Aladdin; La Vie RISD came from Rent; and to spoof the terror of pending crits freshman Andreas Nicholas 13 FS delivered a great rendition of the menacing, bass-booming carnivorous plant that sings Suppertime in Little Shop of Horrors. Nicholas also spearheaded the effort to make the production a fundraiser for Partners in Health’s work in Haiti. In the end, he reports, the RISD student contribution to Partners in Health totaled $18,085 of the $100K raised in February by colleges across the country.
photo by James Dempsey
More than 640 students—461 undergraduates and 182 master’s candidates—will accept their hard-earned degrees at RISD’s 2010 Commencement celebration on Saturday, June 5 (www.risd.edu/commencement). The colorful ceremony is held under a large tent set up just south of the BEB, at the southern rim of campus. As part of the ceremony, RISD also confers honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degrees on a handful of individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the worlds of art, design and education. This year the four guests who will accept honorary degrees at the ceremony are illustrator and graphic designer Seymour Chwast , best known for the groundbreaking work he produces through Push Pin Studios; art collector Paula Granoff , a longtime patron and advocate of the arts in Rhode Island and beyond; graphic/comics artist Art Spiegelman , whose landmark book MAUS tells the story of the Holocaust with Nazis presented as cats and Jews as mice; and educational leader and Brown University President Ruth J. Simmons , who will deliver the keynote address. As in recent years, Alumni Council leaders from around the country will participate in Commencement by helping to line up and lead students in the departments from which they graduated themselves. And as always, students will reimagine their standard-issue black caps and gowns in playful and highly individualized ways, resulting in a visually rewarding mix of custom-made costumes, informal beachwear, slinky dresses, elaborate native dress and next to nothing at all.
ID’s Moonbuggy Stands Out As the first art and design school ever to enter NASA’s Great Moonbuggy Race (an annual spring event now in its 17th year), RISD stood out—showing the NASA commentators just what a team of designers can do. The competition sponsored by the US Space & Rocket Center challenges students to design, build and race lightweight, human-powered vehicles that can
whiz across a simulation of a rugged lunar landscape. At the race in Huntsville, AL on April 9, the students—who designed and built their moonbuggy in a fall Industrial Design studio taught by Professor Michael Beresford —competed against more than 70 other teams and took home third place, along with the Rookie Award for the best first try by a college team.
Using paper-thin copper flashing connected around an inner core, Margaret Hinge 11 JM created this Pinecones necklace with small clusters of “cones” that reflect how they grow on a tree and can be slid to hang wherever they feel most comfortable around the neck.
NATURAL SELECTION
Witnessing History Works by 20 students made from a pecan tree that had “witnessed” the slave era were shown this spring at Hampton National Historic Site in Towson, MD. The benches, baskets, corsets and stools (like the bag show here by Ayako Maruyama 10 ID and the stools by Brittany Bennett 11 TX and Rebecca Manson 11 CR) were made in a joint furniture studio and his-
tory seminar taught by Dale Broholm of Furniture Design and Dan Cavicchi of History, Philosophy and the Social Sciences. Their partnership with the National Park Service marked the first time that wood from a fallen Witness Tree—the NPS designation for longstanding trees that have witnessed significant events in history—has been used as a teaching tool.
RISD was one of two colleges nationwide invited to showcase student work at the 2010 American Craft Council Show in Baltimore. In two fall studio courses, students from Furniture Design and Jewelry + Metalsmithing translated what they learned about structures and systems in nature into innovative furniture, jewelry and other products that are as efficient and elegant as nature itself. Some of the student work from the Principles of Nature studio and exhibition was included in this spring’s Green RISD 2010 show sponsored by the student organization Respond:Design in collaboration with the schoolwide group RISE (the RISD Initiative on Sustainability and the Environment). It was also shown again on campus as part of a late-April symposium sponsored by Furniture Design and the American Craft Council called Artonomics: New Tools for Artists and Designers.
Lui Kawasami 11 FD studied the geometry and mechanics of snakeskin to create this Stretched Bowl from a flat sheet of laser-cut stainless steel.
For more on these and other stories, go to
our.risd.edu
35
TWO COLLEGE STREET
what’s up on campus
Linda Bowab, 1914–2010
Faculty Newsbites Painting faculty member Dike Blair is one of 32 artists and scholars to win a 2010–11 Rome Prize, which means he’ll spend an all-expenses-paid year at the American Academy in Rome.
Apparel Design Professor Emerita Linda Bowab , who taught at RISD from 1950–84, died on January 14, 2010 in Providence, RI. She was 96. Bowab studied costume and textiles at RISD in the 1930s and started teaching here in the ’50s after gaining valuable factory experience in pattern making. During her 34 years at RISD, she nurtured and influenced hundreds of students and protéges, including well-known apparel designers Michael Leva 83 AP , Nicole Miller 73 AP , Leo Narducci 69 AP and Monique Robidoux 77 AP , among others. “I loved Linda because she was so generous,” says Leva. “She really was one of the people in your life that you are so lucky to meet and will never forget. She touched us all and gave of herself freely.”
On April 30 the Arts and Business Council of Rhode Island presented its 2010 Individual Achievement Award for Visual Arts to sculptor and RISD faculty member Jonathan Bonner MFA 73 SC. Printmaking faculty member Daniel Heyman continues to show prodigiously and has won a 2010 Guggenheim Fellowship, which is awarded based on exceptional artistic promise and achievement. Professor Mikyoung Kim, head of Landscape Architecture, recently won a commission to create a public art piece for the new Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami. Anthony Piermarini, who teaches in the Architecture Department, has won the 2010 AIA Young Architects Award for his outstanding design skills and leadership. He and Assistant Professor of Architecture Hansy Better Barraza run Studio Luz Architects and were recognized in March as among Boston Home magazine’s Next Generation of Designers. Better Barraza also recently won New England Home’s 5 Under 40 Award. Professor of Sculpture Dean Snyder has been awarded a Louis Comfort Tiffany Fellowship, a monetary grant given every two years to the most promising fine artists in one of six categories.
“Nothing could be further from the clammy yet vacant images of sexualized women culled from cheap advertising and girlie magazines for which Pop art is so well known.” Carrie Moyer , professor of Painting writing about Evelyne Axell’s work in a review in Artforum [April 2010]
36
Spring 2010
Professor Emerita Lorraine
Howes , who led the Apparel Design
Department from 1979–2000 and was close friends with Linda for almost 40 years, reports that “students loved her because of the pattern making and construction skills she imparted and because she was so very nurturing.” For 25 years after retiring, Bowab took yoga classes, volunteered at a local hospital and was actively involved in her church, where she was renowned for the huge number of Arabic poems and hymns she new by heart. She loved RISD, and relished gatherings of fellow professors emeriti, always arriving as elegant as ever—and serving as a wonderful inspiration for a life well lived.
alfred decredico, 1944–2009 Alfred Vincent DeCredico 66 PT,
an internationally renowned artist and longtime RISD faculty member, died in Providence on December 26, 2009 while undergoing treatment for a prolonged illness. He was 65 and is survived by his two sons, Cesare DeCredico 05 PT and Alessandro DeCredico 08 FAV . DeCredico was a powerful and controversial presence at RISD since he began teaching here in 1968. His early work included experimental photorealistic painting, drawing and performance art, in the form of spoken word poetry/essays performed with the band Liquid Slo. In later years he designed and produced box sculptures, prints, glass and ceramic works, photographs, paintings, drawings and books. His paintings grew increasingly large and incorporated materials such as fur, tar, animal bones, lighting systems, wax, carpet fragments, painters’ drop cloths and numerous cultural artifacts. DeCredico is best remembered as a generous teacher who introduced thousands of students to the pleasures and challenges of the studio. He was a tough-minded
critic who pushed his students to use the process of drawing as a laboratory for personal growth, and was one of the few contemporary painters who truly understood the power of abstraction. “He was a great teacher, friend and mentor—and also the best man at my wedding,” says Michael Oatman 86 PT , one of many former students who remained close to DeCredico throughout his life. “Although we all miss him, his ideas live on in my own teaching and studio practices and in those of many of his former students.” In a Facebook exchange following the RISD memorial for DeCredico in early April, Ian Robbins 96 ID said, “He changed the way I view art—in general—and inspired me to be open to new possibilities.” Lisa Palombo 87 IL admitted, “I still hear his voice sometimes when I paint. What an incredible artist and teacher!” And Elizabeth (Babayan) Hanulak 87 GD* summed up DeCredico’s influence with this: “No one could make you climb out of your your box and reach for the extraordinary like he could. He was a great man.”
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THE LINES OF FRIENDSHIP
38
Spring 2010
Di Bona is grateful that Jamie was among the last students to take DeCredico’s Foundation Drawing class before he got ill. “Alfred put her through the wringer like he did all his students,” he says, alluding to DeCredico’s reputation for sharp but insightful criticism. He recalls an early conversation with Jamie: “She said ‘I don’t know if I want to be in this class. I don’t know if I like Alfred. He’s really hard.’” By the semester’s end, her tune had changed to: “Oh my God, what an experience!” Both Vin and Erica can see the change in Jamie’s art. “She is willing to experiment more,” says Erica. “She is willing to go off the deep end now—often without a life preserver.” And an unexpected bonus: she even keeps her room neater—an he pioneered the field of user-generated media and in 1989 created impossible task at home. “We are America’s Funniest Home Videos, which remains ABC’s longest running so thrilled that Jamie had a chance prime-time entertainment program. to meet Alfred and work with him,” Di Bona’s wife Erica is also an accomplished producer who now serves on adds Vin. “Now she feels a bit of the Board of Trustees at RISD and is co-chair of the Parents’ Council. Her daughter Jamie Goldstein 11 PT is a painting major in her junior year at RISD. responsibility to carry on what he offered the world.” Di Bona recalls beating his friend at his own game only one time: in 8th-grade drafting class. “In drafting, you must make sure your lines meet. Alfred had one line that did not meet its partner, so I ended up with a better grade. I thought ‘Okay, As a trustee, Erica is aware that scholarship funding is a priority of RISD now I’m even,’ but that’s about as President John Maeda , explains Vice President for Institutional Engageeven as I ever got, making two ment Beth Garvin . “This gift recognizes the importance of our faculty and lines intersect.” that just doesn’t happen enough.” The December 26th phone call DeCredico’s artistic gift was obvious early on, Di Bona says. As friends the Di Bona’s received from they took Saturday classes at RISD beginning in 7th grade and continuing DeCredico’s son, Cesare, was an throughout high school. “In terms of skills, Alfred was way above me. We emotional one. He had told his attended more as friends than fellow artists.” Di Bona remembers one assignment in particular—to render the Japanese father about their gift shortly before his passing. “Dad’s gone, but I told garden at Roger Williams Park in Providence. “Mine was flatter than flat, him. I think he heard.” No matter. while Alfred’s had this grand perspective. It was humbling to see how good he The line connecting Vin Di Bona was.” Humility aside, Di Bona says the classes were invaluable to him. “Those and Alfred DeCredico is still strong, classes taught me how to focus the eye, which later helped my film career.” Just as important, he adds, “we laughed a lot—much to our demise sometimes.” and always will be. —David Enders
“This gift recognizes the importance of our faculty and that just doesn’t happen enough.”
top left, Scott Indermauer
“DeCredico! Di Bona!” It’s an exasperated teacher shouting out the names of alphabetically ordered students at Hugh B. Bain Junior High in Cranston, RI. Alfred and Vin are the two kids she’s scolding. Laughing and joking, they are not quite in the same line as the others, perhaps realizing, even then, that it only takes two points to create a new line. Alfred DeCredico 66 PT , an accomplished artist and a revered professor of Foundation Studies who taught at RISD for almost 30 years, died on December 26, 2009 (see page 36). Just that day he had learned that his lifelong friend, Vin Di Bona , a successful television producer, had made a $100,000 gift to RISD in his honor. While DeCredico graduated from RISD and immersed himself in painting, drawing and all forms of art, Di Bona graduated from Emerson College and later did graduate work at UCLA to become a documentary filmmaker. Years before YouTube,
Erica and Vin Di Bona, shown here with President Maeda when they visited RISD in April.
METCALF SOCIETY BUILDS THE FUTURE
STRENGTHENING THE CIRCLE The RISD Annual Fund has changed the name of its top giving society from President’s Club to President’s Circle. The name change is part of a larger plan to strengthen this giving society, which recognizes donors who make an Annual Fund gift of $1,000 or more. “President Maeda challenged us to strengthen the group’s strategic purpose,” says Jim Wolken , director of the Annual Fund. “This led to a number of positive changes, including a name that better suggests the
relationship and role of this group at RISD.” Other changes include a new logo, a new communications plan, an annual event connecting President’s Circle donors to RISD leaders, and a strategy to attract more young alumni to the society. “President’s Circle members are passionate leaders who are very committed to RISD’s future,” says Wolken. “So these changes are designed to increase and improve our interactions with this pivotal group.”
Class of 2010 Gives New Materials Library Led by Courtney Lizotte 10 IA and Eric Peloquin 10 ID, this year’s Senior Gift Committee is hard at work raising funds for the 2010 class gift. This concept sketch by Carolyn Presti 11 IL shows the new RISD Materials Library they’re hoping to fund with their gift. Donations can be made online at www.risd.edu/give or sent to Senior Gift Campaign, Office of Annual Giving, Two College Street, Providence, RI 02903.
Metcalf Society member Art Love 57 GD and RISD Trustee Stephen Metcalf enjoyed each other’s company at the recent luncheon held at the RISD Museum.
One normally doesn’t think of estate planning as “Future Building,” but that’s the legacy of Metcalf Society members. These were the sentiments expressed at a luncheon held at the RISD Museum in March, when RISD honored donors who use estate planning to create a lasting legacy on campus. More than 30
“Metcalf Society members are often the unsung heroes of RISD.”
alumni, parents and friends attended the luncheon, with some traveling from as far away as New Jersey and Georgia. Afterwards, Metcalf members were treated to a private tour from Alex Mann, a Mellon Fellow in the Museum’s Minskoff Center for Prints, Drawings, and Photographs. “Metcalf Society members are often the unsung heroes of RISD,” says Gift Planning Officer Molly Garrison , who works with the group. “But if you look around campus, you’ll see the work of Metcalf Society members everywhere.” Garrison points to the two largest scholarships in RISD history, as well as Memorial Hall and the RISD Museum itself, as just a few of the major contributions Metcalf Society members have made to RISD through gift planning. Stephen Metcalf, a RISD trustee, Metcalf Society member and the grandson of Helen Metcalf (for whom the Society is named), is pleased to know that the luncheon will become an annual event. “Metcalf Society members have a deep and abiding passion for the school,” he says. “So this event gives us an intimate venue in which to share our ideas and hopes for RISD and connect with other members.”
For more on giving to RISD, go to
www.risd.edu/give
39
Keep connected to RISD through the Alumni Association’s network of 38 clubs around the country and the world.
RISD Gathers Around the World
Above: President Maeda and Donald Choi BArch 82 at the launch of RISD/ Hong Kong. To the right: A glimpse of the fun and mayhem at the great Valentine’s Day Pillowfight in San Francisco, sponsored by the RISD/NorCal club.
Professor of Graphic Design Nancy Skolos and Shona Dutta 04 GD, leader of RISD/NorCal, at a RISD Road Show event in San Francisco on March 31. Several RISD faculty members took to the road this spring to share updates from RISD, along with their own work, with alumni around the country.
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Spring 2010
“When I was a student, we joked that RISD stood for the ‘Reason I’m Sleep Deprived,’” Donald Choi BArch 82 told a recent gathering of alumni. “As an alum, I now know that RISD stands for the ‘Reason I Still Dream.’” Choi was speaking at a dinner celebrating the launch of the Alumni Association’s newest club, RISD/ Hong Kong. Working with Rex Wong BArch 03 and Frank Chow BLA 92 , he was instrumental in getting the new group—which serves more than 70 alumni who live in the area—off the ground. To help celebrate the launch, Hong Kong alumni invited President John Maeda to their kick-off event. “It’s a fantastic place. Even though Hong Kong is thousands of miles away, the affection and fascination for RISD was very apparent,” says Maeda, who points out that alumni had to file formal paperwork with the government in order to organize. “Though budgets are tight, we are “It took a lot of work on the part finding creative ways to strengthen of alumni leaders in Hong Kong our clubs, including by attracting to get this club up and running, and new leadership in many areas,” she they should be commended for says. In fact, new club leaders are their terrific start.” bringing renewed energy to clubs Alumni also arranged for the pres- in Korea (Chang-Ho Han MFA 01 ident to deliver a public lecture at GD ), Los Angeles (John Kim 01 ID ), Hong Kong’s Polytechnic University San Francisco (Shona Dutta 04 GD ), during his visit. And shortly after, Chicago (Kyle Henderson 99 BArch ) the new group joined with RISD Philadelphia (Laila Ahmadinejad parents in the region to host a gathering to give incoming freshmen an opportunity to meet alumni and ask them more about the school. “For RISD to be so warmly embraced this far from campus is very gratifying,” says Maeda. “It reflects the important role alumni clubs play, keeping us connected to each other and to RISD. We are indebted to our alumni volunteers whose hard work, creativity and leadership make these organizations thrive.” According to Christina Hartley 74 IL , director of Alumni Relations, the recent growth in alumni clubs Donald Choi BArch 82 is part of a renewed focus on strengthening RISD’s network of 38 Alumni Association affiliates across the country and around the world.
“When I was a student, we joked that RISD stood for the ‘Reason I’m Sleep Deprived.’ As an alum, I now know that it stands for the ‘Reason I Still Dream.’”
01 GD ) and Washington, DC (Anthony Dihle 04 GD and Dave Ramos MFA 06 GD ). Meanwhile, RISD/New York leaders Mike Neff 04 PH and Polly Carpenter 77 PT continue to attract large turnouts at RISD After Work events and are gearing up for the annual RISD reception at the New York Textiles Show in June. Likewise, activity and attendance continues to grow in San Francisco, where the club has put an increased emphasis on events for young alumni. In addition to regular meet-and-greet events, in March the San Francisco club held a reprise of a recent on-campus tradition— a massive, group pillow fight. The group is also planning a June picnic to introduce newly accepted students to San Francisco alumni. “From pillow fights to lectures by faculty visitors, alumni clubs offer a range of activities,” Hartley says. “If you’re not already involved in your regional club, I urge you to go to the next event in your area. Chances are it will be well worth your time and you’ll be pleasantly reminded of what makes a RISD education so special.”
SCHERER WINS ALUMNI AWARD The Alumni Association has selected Vermont-based artist Deidre Scherer 67 AE as the winner of its 2010 Award for Artistic Achievement, which will be presented at RISD’s Commencement ceremony on June 5. Scherer, who was initially drawn to painting as a student, later turned to making portraits using fabric as her canvas, and needles, thread and a sewing machine as her brushes. “I never met a type of paint that made me as happy as the fabrics I use,” says Scherer. “I love the artistic challenge of cobbling together narrative and figurative pieces.” A common theme in her work is mortality, a focus that took precedence once she visited a nursing home to search for models for a tarot card series. “After I befriended my first model, I realized I was witnessing her last year,” Scherer says. Once her new friend had died, the artist was inspired to use her unusual technique of sewing portraits with fabric and thread to capture the poignancy of aging and mortality. In the two decades since, two major traveling exhibitions of her portrait series, called Surrounded by Family and Friends and The Last Year, have introduced people across the country to her work, which has also appeared on the covers of several books. Asked about receiving recognition as an artist, Scherer says, “Knowing that you have any kind of audience is gratifying. But once your hand has finished with a piece and someone else is engaging with it and finds something in it that you never noticed, well, that is a miracle. That’s magic”—which is an apt way to describe Scherer’s work as well.
Deidre Scherer 67 AE will receive the Alumni Association’s 2010 Award for Artistic Achievement. She’s known for sewing textured portraits—such as this one, In Her Room—that focus on the intimacy of death and dying.
bottom right, John Supancic
Turner Returns to Campus As part of the spring Alumni Lecture Series on campus, documentary filmmaker and photographer Rhett Turner 98 PH held an open conversation with Deborah Bright, a professor of Photography and Interim Dean of Fine Arts. Rhett runs Red Sky Productions, making TV documentaries such as his latest, Water Wars, and an upcoming film on reintegrating infant gorillas into their natural habitat. Also part of the spring Lecture Series: textiles artist Michelle Hill 77 TX, who has created costumes for the Metropolitan Opera and the Broadway production of The Lion King, worked with rural women in Sierre Leone, taught digital fabric printing in Bulgaria and worked in China. Her advice to students: Be courageous and try new things. It will lead you down unexpected paths. For clubs and contacts in your area go to
www.risd.edu/alumni_network
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INFO GRAPHIC
Nicholas Felton 99 GD
underGraduate Class Notes
411
2000 Illustration
alumnireferenced
most referenced class
John P. McCormack MFA 96 FD
most referenced major
William Kite 60 AR Linna Kendall 59 ID Jayda Uras 99 IA Don Tarallo MFA 03 GD
Colleen (Conrad) Finley 55 IL
Roger Paul Mason 00 IL
Phyllis (Croll) Goodblatt 60 AE
Sydney, Australia
New York City most referenced city
furthest location from RISD
most referenced foreign country
1940
1950
class notes activity level
states referenced
1960
1970
1980
1940 35 earliest class reference
38
Italy
Brad Buckley MFA 82 SC
countries referenced
1990
2000
2010
Don Almquist 51 IL In February Don exhibited paintings like this one in Dreaming The Landscape & Beyond, a show at Gallery 919 Market in Wilmington, DE, near his home in New Castle.
1953 Joan (Rappoport) Rogers TX (Aquebogue, NY) is exhibiting silkscreen projects, collages and monoprints at the Winter Harbor Gallery in Greenport, Long Island through the end of the year. For 35 years she has been part of a small group of artist/craftspeople who regularly exhibit at the gallery— and have set a record for their longevity in exhibiting.
Constance (Atherton)
1949
Hope (Godfrey) Newton
Edith (Griffin) Dahlstrom IL* (Narlingen, TX) is retired and working on enhancing photos of her 12 grandchildren to give them all pictures of their family.
IA/55 AE wrote in to say that she has moved to East Bay Manor in East Providence, RI and is enjoying the independent living facility, which comes replete with meals, security, activities and new friends.
1943 Henry Budlong GD* sent this update: “I still live in Cranston, RI and as a former art director, retired from a Providence advertising agency in 1983. I still do some watercolor painting and have enjoyed my 27 years of retirement.”
After 16 years, Andree Chartrand Yager IA* retired from her Conservation Commissioner position in Orleans, MA, the town where she lives. She is still on the boards of Crane Room Gallery at Snow Library and the Orleans Improvement Association, and is treasurer of the Cape Cod Hospital Auxiliary of Orleans.
1950
Jean (Young) Haley AP
Beverlie (Bensen) Tuttle
(Barrington, RI) says that “at 90 I’m still on the go. I love to drive, see my three sons often, attend the theater and eat out a lot. The golden years aren’t all that bad when one is well.”
GD/AP is in her 18th year of teaching at Timothy Academy’s Africa Inland Mission in inner-city
1945 Eileen (Forrest) Glodt AE (Glenwood, MD) lost her husband William on February 2, 2010.
1947 Sidney Chafetz IL sent a note with his Annual Fund gift saying that at age 87 he believes he is the oldest graduate still exhibiting and working in Columbus, OH. Marilyn Hall AP (Veta, CO) has four children who are now working as artists. She is enjoying life with her husband, children and grandchildren.
Philadelphia, where she lives. She is involved with Parent-Teacher Fellowship activities and with the creation of the All Nations Church Bible Fellowship. Her children live throughout the world and she now has seven grandchildren.
Powell TX (Pleasant Ridge, MI) is still exhibiting and has work at several galleries: the Detroit Artists Market, the Anton Center in Mt. Clemens, the BirminghamBloomfield Art Association and Michigania in Lansing.
1952
1955
Christine (Guarino) Jones IA (Gladwyne, PA) reports: “Christmas 2009 finds me in excellent health at the age of 81+. I continue to be active in several organizations, mainly devoted to historic or environmental preservation. I also continue to speak at Township meetings when necessary (which is often).”
Souther Barnes TX (Plymouth, MA) sent in this retirement update: “Substitute driver for Stevens the florist, home deliveries, donate two units of white platelets every month (Red Cross Blood Center). Repair lamps and furniture in my workshop at home. Very busy. Town meeting representative— Precinct 4, Plymouth MA. On the clam flats regularly for sea clams, steamers, quahogs, mussels, oysters. Yard work!”
Last fall Robert Thornton PT exhibited new paintings at Bert Gallery in Providence, where he lives.
1957 Arthur Love, Jr. GD (Ashland,
MA) is both the director of and drummer for Art Love Radio Big Band, which plays swing music from the 1940s and 50s.
1958
1954 1940
Colleen (Conrad) Finley IL (Taos, NM) is a greeting card designer for the company she sold to Allen Enterprises in Honolulu, HI.
Merle Temkin TX* (NYC) recently completed a commission for the municipality of Karmiel, Israel, installing a permanent sculpture called She made of galvanized iron, stainless steel and mirrors.
1959 Herbert Hickey MD (Somerset, NJ) included this message with his Annual Fund pledge: “I retired 14 years ago and have been enjoying my own projects, which present sufficient problems and design challenges to keep me going for a long time. I chose RISD to learn about how to develop my creative thinking and to learn about the different methods to express these thoughts. RISD helped me accomplish this and more.” Marcia (Fleishman) Moger
GD (Purchase, NY) reports that she will be celebrating her 50th anniversary on May 29. “Husband, Stan Moger, is in the entertainment business, mainly TV-related. We have four grandchildren. Our two daughters are professional photographers. I am visiting galleries, doing gardening, playing tennis and bridge. Have a busy, full, exciting life.”
David Kelley 58 GD David’s pastel painting, Windy Green Pond, was selected for inclusion in the second edition of Strokes of Genius 2: the Best of Drawing Light and Shadow (2009, North Light Books). David lives in Falmouth, MA. Submit your news for class notes to
risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: class notes)
41
WHERE WE ARE
undergraduate class notes
1962 Michael Manoogian GD
married Robin Beaman on October 11, 2009 in Hollywood, CA. The couple lives in North Hollywood. Steven Kellogg IL (Essex, NY)
sent in this update: “I continue to write and illustrate picture books. In 2009 the Pied Piper’s Magic was published by Dial Books for Young Readers and for 2010 publication I illustrated And I Love You by Ruth Krauss (Scholastic).”
1963 Alice Meyer-Wallace IL
(Havertown, PA) teaches watercolor in Greece every summer and in Majorca during the school year.
Santiago (Jimmy) Cardenas 60 PT As he contemplates his 50th reunion this fall, Jimmy sent in this photo of a piece called Colocando and wrote from Bogotá, Colombia: “I have had more than 60 one-person exhibitions in the US, South America and Europe, including at Museo de Arte Moderno de Bogotá, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Caracas and Museo Rufino Tamayo Mexico.” His work is also in the collections at MoMA and the RISD Museum
1960
50th reunion | October 8–10 Phyllis (Croll) Goodblatt AE
recently returned from a trip on the Indian Ocean, where she visited many parts of Africa, Oman, Dubai, Mozambique, the Seychelle Islands and South Africa. She has been giving tours at the Orlando [FL] Art Museum, near where she lives. This year William Kite AR and Linna Kendall 59 ID celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. The two work together at his architecture firm, Kite Architects in Providence, RI. “Has it really been 50 years?” asks Nancy (Brooks) Marculewicz
PT of Essex, MA. “Hard to believe but true. Well, I must admit that I really got a lot from my RISD experience. Not only did I receive excellent training in the visual arts, I met Bob Marculewicz 59 MD, the man I married shortly after graduation and to whom I am still happily married. We produced two wonderful children—
42
one who is also a RISD graduate, class of 1991, and a successful graphic designer. They in turn have given us three beautiful grandchildren. Along with all of this, I have managed to pursue my life’s vocation as a painter and printmaker with a fair amount of success and a great deal of satisfaction.” Amy (Hodge) Martin PT
writes: “painting has been the joy (and saving grace) of my life. I am enjoying a good life, painting a lot. Just won 2nd prize in an art show here in Clifton, NJ.” Nancy Austin Reed GD (Windsor, CT) wrote a quick update about all of the classmates she has seen and heard from since graduation. She is now taking oil painting classes and regularly keeping in touch with her former roommate Judy Arnold Gowdy TX (Cummington, MA).
For the past 12 years, Sarah (Stabenfeldt) Roche AE
(Nashua, NH) has been a photographer specializing in the trivia and destruction of the natural world. She belongs to
Spring 2010
numerous art associations in the New England area and reguarly volunteers at the RISD Museum and at WaterFire in Providence. She and David Roche 62 ID are celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary in May and have two sons and four grandchildren. Phil Stevens IA has retired to Sarasota, FL after working in commercial interiors, furniture sales and marketing. He has two children who live in San Francisco and Boston. Jean (Prignano) Winslow IL
has fulfilled her lifetime dream of opening a studio in Lowell, MA, where she makes her own art while still maintaining a small private clinical psychology practice and running art therapy groups.
Elizabeth Nelson AE (West Glover, VT) ended her career as a dairy farmer in 2005 and is now working part-time as collections manager at the Old Stone House Museum in Brownington, VT. She continues to paint and last December exhibited 19 mixedmedia works in the Vermont Governor’s Office in Montpelier.
78 PT, Michael Pasquale BArch 65, John Paquette BArch 65 and Alecia Underhill 88 IL. In 2009 North Shore Magazine named Della-Piana the Best Art Gallery in the North Shore region. In March Eric Engstrom IL exhibited Façade: Mixed Media Views of Vernacular Architecture at the Fairfax Regional Library in Fairfax, CA (the town where he lives). A solo show of her recent paintings by Nancy (Hollingsworth) Taplin PT* (Warren, VT) continues through June 28 at Flynn Center for the Performing Arts in Burlington, VT.
Tony Thompson 61 PT Last December Tony exhibited his Alfombras Multiusos (multipurpose rugs) at Carrie Haddad Gallery in Hudson, NY, the town where he lives. His Alfombra Multiuso III (2009, rug and acrylic poured paint, 27 x 48”) is shown below.
1964 Elissa Della-Piana IL runs Gallery Della-Piana in Wenham, MA, the town where she lives. She exhibits both fine art and illustrations, and has shown the works of many RISD alumni, including Sas Colby 61 PT*, Holly Meade
1961 Sara Juarez IL (Albuquerque, NM) sent in these thoughts: “I taught middle school art (and sometimes social studies) for over 22 years. I drew on my RISD classes every day I taught. The RISD experience imprinted my life—all to the good!” Marilyn Woodworth IL (Warren, MA) has been working in fiber and is having shows with her daughter, who’s also a fiber artist. She’s a member of the Concord [MA] Art Association, and for the third year running she has participated in Art in the Park in Charlestown, MA.
Merrill (Bud) Budlong BArch 60 “Have had a happy life and career,” writes Bud (above left with his husband). “Albany, NY, 9 yrs; St. Vincent, WI, 3 yrs, San Francisco, 33 yrs. Retired to State College, PA in 05. Married Don Smith, the best sweetheart anyone could have. Together 34 years last February. Forever grateful for RISD years. No regrets. Would do it all again.”
Edward Rozzo 70 PH Last October Edward (Milano, Italy) spoke as an expert on visual culture at the third annual National Museum Conference in Middelburg, the Netherlands. One of his recent photos is shown below.
Courtney McGlynn IL (Chestnut Hill, MA) sent in this update: “Always grateful to RISD for my formative years as an artist and designer. I’m in my 32nd year of teaching at Bunker Hill Community College in historic Charlestown, MA and am also freelancing as a graphic designer.”
Earlier this spring Brenda Atwood Pinardi PT* (Hyde
Park, MA) exhibited a collaboration with Candace Walters BGD 92 (Antioch, IL) called Beyond The Triangle at HallSpace in Dorchester, MA. Mary Curtis Ratcliff AE
of Berkeley, CA has started a new Etsy shop (www.etsy.com/shop/ ratcliffstudio) to sell prints of her artwork.
1968 W. Bruce Tillinghast GD
recently expanded his successful restaurant, New Rivers in Providence, and has been nominated as Best Chef in the Northeast by the James Beard Foundation.
1969 A book review and a Tanka poetry series by Edward Baranosky PT (Toronto, Canada) were included in the February edition of LYNX: A Journal for Linking Poets.
1965
45th reunion | October 8–10 Mary Shaffer IL (Marfa, TX) is one of 50 accomplished artists nationwide to win a 2009 United States Artists (USA) Fellowship, which comes with a $50,000 grant. Mary pioneered the art of slumped glass—a process she appropriated from the auto industry and made her own since falling in love with the medium at RISD in the late 1960s. Rick Shnitzler AR (Philadelphia, PA) did the data-collecting for a recent Philadelphia Inquirer article about cell-phone and text-driving hazards that was picked up by USAToday.com and Businessweek.com. He is excited for his daughter, Julia, who is a senior at Germantown Friends School and is looking forward to studying bio-science in college.
1966
A poster series by George
Last December Karen (Canner) Moss PT (Brookline, MA) exhibited a drawing in the Boston Drawing Project’s 10th Anniversary Exhibition at Carroll and Sons in Boston.
Delany GD (Rehoboth, MA) won a Gold Medal in the 2009 Graphis Poster Annual. In December the same series was accepted into the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress.
An exhibition of recent works by Bruce Helander IL/MFA 72 PT
(West Palm Beach, FL) was shown at Miami Art Space in conjunction with Art Basel Miami, the annual international art fair held in early December. An article in the December 2009 issue of Traditional Building Magazine focused on the work Howard Newman ID (newmansltd.com) and his wife Mary did on the restoration of The Trinity, a complex sculpture by Richard Lippolds that includes 20,000 feet of gold and bronze wire. Their painstaking work was a crucial component of the restoration of the Church of St. Gregory the Great at Portsmouth [RI] Abbey School. As part of a cultural exchange, an exhibition of work by Rosalyn Richards PT (Lewisburg, PA) was on view last winter at the Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts Museum in Tianjin, China. The exhibition is now traveling and will end up at Bucknell University in spring 2011.
1967 In March Benjamin Larrabee PH (Darien, CT) debuted new architectural prints at the Architectural Digest Home Design Show in NYC. He also won 1st Place for Black & White Photography in the recent Rowayton [CT] Art Center Show. Paintings and Drawings from the Figurative Period, a solo show of work by George Lloyd PT* (Portland, ME), was on view from January to March at Acme Fine Art in Boston.
Amalie R. Rothschild 67 GD Amalie’s photo Miles Davis multi, Tanglewood, August 18, 1970 is included in We Want Miles, an exhibition about Miles Davis that opened at the Musée de la Musique in Paris earlier this year and is now showing at the Musée des Beaux Arts in Montreal through August 30. Amalie and Angeo Pontecorboli got married on December 19, 2009 in Baltimore, MD and now live in Florence, Italy, where Amalie has had several residencies.
Jennifer Davies 68 IL Jennifer’s collage textiles— made from drawing, monotyping and dyeing linen paper—is included in Fiberart International 2010, which continues through August 22 at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts and the Society of Contemporary Craft in Pittsburgh. The show will then travel to San Francisco in September. Jennifer lives in Branford, CT.
1970
40th reunion | October 8–10 Work by Tim Casey PT* (NYC) was included in Paper Works, a large winter exhibition at Janet Kurnatowski Gallery in Brooklyn. In March Connie Coleman TX/ MAT 74 (Pipersville, PA) showed highlights from the last 25 years of her graphic design and printmaking work at the Sol Mednick Gallery at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, where she teaches as a professor of Media Arts. Three years ago, Ruth (Silverman) Joray AE* became head of school at The Quaker School at Horsham [PA],a small school for students with language-based learning disabilities. A dynamic creative program complements the rigorous remedial work at the school. In November Andrew Stevovich PT (Northborough, MA) participated in the Boston International Fine Art Show held at the Boston Center for the Arts at The Cyclorama.
Help organize your reunion! Contact crobinso@risd.edu
43
WHERE WE ARE
undergraduate class notes
1974 Earlier this spring Luis Alonso IL (NYC), a long-time Foundation Studies faculty member at RISD, exhibited at The Chazan Gallery at Wheeler in Providence. In February Jappie King Black TX (Brockport, NY) and Laura Reinhard 98 PH (Princeton Junction, NJ) showed in Elongating the Thread, a fiber arts exhibition at Syracuse University, where they both also went to school. In March Jamie Dalglish FAV (NYC) participated in the High Line Open Studios Chelsea.
Annie Polatsek 72 PH One of the exquisitely made paper vessels Annie exhibited recently in PAPERTAINERS: Art on the Move, a solo show at Bishaud Bangla in Chittagong, Bangladesh. She lives in Stari Grad, Croatia.
1972 Bob Barancik AR (Bryn Mawr,
PA) had a great turnout for the March 14 opening of Art Not Hate, a show of prints, drawings, videos and handmade books at the Florida Holocaust Museum in St. Petersburg, FL. The show looked at tragedies from the Holocaust to 9/11. Based in Barcelona, Spain, Jonathan Daifuku AR* (www. daifukudesigns.com) is designing urban furniture for Colomer and recently updated his website, adding a new module called Publications.
Nancy (Clark) McIntyre AE (Alexandria, VA), who is represented by the Jane Haslem Gallery in Washington, DC, had a recent show at the Arts Club of Washington. “I’ve enjoyed teaching silkscreen printing for 12 years now at the Art League School in Alexandria, VA,” she writes, “still drawing on what I learned from Art Wood at RISD in 1971, but using safer water-based materials.”
1973 Last fall Lynne Kortenhaus PR /MFA 75 PR exhibited recent works on paper at D SCALE in Boston, where she lives.
Charles Corda BARCH 75 Fruit Smoothies, Miami–1979, Look-Out Point and Two Palms are among the 11 photographs by Charles (Coconut Grove, FL) nominated for awards in the Third Annual International Color Awards Competition. As a result, they were published in the January 2010 inaugural issue of PHOTO PAPER Magazine.
44
Spring 2010
Mark Sfirri ID/MFA 78 FD (New Hope, PA) has been recognized with a national teaching award: the Distinguished Educator Award from the Renwick Alliance. American Woodturner ran a feature in the February 2010 issue focused on him and his teaching accomplishments.
1975
35th reunion | October 8–10
Work by Barbara Bernstein PR (who teaches in RISD’s Sculpture Department) has been featured in two recent solo shows: Things are not what they seem, nor are they otherwise, a site-specific exhibition at the Wilson Museum in Roanoke, VA and Patterns of Love and Beauty, exhibited at the Riverviews Arts Space in Lynchburg, VA. Sharon Siegel IL* (Albany, NY) will be retiring from her arts coordination job at Capital Region Boces this year. She recently completed a 20 x 24-foot studio addition to her house that will enable her to concentrate on her artwork and teach private classes.
Last fall David H. Wells PT (Manchester, NH) showed with Deborah Bright, a professor and interim dean of Fine Arts at RISD, in a two-person exhibition at The Chazan Gallery at Wheeler in Providence.
1976 Last summer Sarah Derby Haskell TX (York, ME) received the Sarah Farmer Peace Award from the Baháí of the Greater Seacoast NH/ME area. She was honored for Woven Voices: Messages from the Heart, an interactive global art project inspired by Tibetan prayer flags, Shinto paper prayers and the Buddhist concept of impermanence. Last fall Nat Hesse SC (Santa Fe), a RISD trustee and president of the Alumni Association, took top prize for his sculpture Slouching Hero at the Sculpture on Main Outdoor Art Exhibit in Marble Falls, TX. Diane Schmidt PH (Corrales,
NM) runs The Albuquerque Judaism Examiner website and has been writing articles recently on issues relating to the block-
buster Avatar. In March she also wrote an article that was picked up by Gallup Independent Newspaper called Passover: In Every Age a New Slavery. Jane Kleinman Schub IL (Garrison, NY) has garnered a lot of press recently by entering the cosmetic world with STRANGEBEAUTIFUL, which presents nail color as more than an accessory for the hand. Geoffrey Warner PH* (Stonington, ME) has launched a new seating design—the Owl stool, which is affordable, available in three heights and made of either cherry or walnut.
1977 Too Busy Marco (Atheneum), a new children’s book by New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast PT (Ridgefield, CT), is due out in August. In December Deborah Gavel IL (Albuquerque, NM) showed recent paintings and sacred art at Heart of the Lotus in Santa Fe. Michelle Hill TX (see page 31)
Chandini Bachman 76 AP Chandini (second row center) works with the Capitol Guide Service as a tour guide at the United States Capitol building in Washington, DC, the city where she lives.
Stephen Talasnik 76 PT Earlier this spring Stephen (NYC) exhibited recent paintings like this one, Multiple Words (2009, acrylic and a collage on panel, 36 x 60") in Thought Pattern, a solo show at Marlborough Gallery in Chelsea.
1978 Earlier this year Robin (Pitterman) du Plessis TX
(Sag Harbor, NY) exhibited in a show called REAL(ists) at Ringling College of Art’s Selby Gallery in Sarasota, FL. This spring Valerie Hird PT (Burlington, VT) took part in Sacred and Profane: Eye of the Beholder, a group exhibition at the Portsmouth [NH] Museum of Fine Art. In January she participated in the first show at the Lucky Street Gallery in Key West, FL. Zon, a hearing aid designed by Stuart Karten ID Design in Marina Del Rey, CA, was selected for inclusion in the recent Inaugural Exhibition at the Design Museum Holon in Israel.
Salley Mavor IL, Mary Jane Begin 85 IL, Cheryl Kirk Noll
77 IL, Alison Paul 05 IL and Rebecca Walsh 00 IL contributed work to Imagination! The World of Children’s Book Illustrators, a show held last fall at URI in Providence. A portion of As the World Turns Then and Now, a post-9/11 painting series by Rhonda (Schneider) Wall PT (Easton, PA), was on view from January to April at Princeton [NJ] University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.
1979 In January Kathleen (Hodge) DeVault PT* (East Providence) showed recent work in Kathy Hodge 2010: Shoemaker Series at Bert Gallery in Providence. Last fall Nancy Reyner IL (Santa Fe) had a solo show at The Sylvia Plotkin Judaica Museum in Scottsdale, AZ called The Biblical Sea: Water & Energy Field Paintings. Work by Susan Weinreich SC* (Mount Kisco, NY) is on view this spring in Intuitive Abstractions at Bean Runner Café in Peekskill, NY.
Kristin Jones 79 SC Mime, this stainless steel sculpture by Kristin (NYC) and Andrew Ginzel, was commissioned by the St. Louis Metro Arts in Transit program and installed last fall in Richmond Heights, MO.
The RISD Museum helped open the world of art and design to you when you were a student. It’s still here for you. 2010–11 exhibition highlights Odyssey: The Photographs of Linda Connor* Lynda Benglis Changing Poses: The Artist’s Model 2011 Faculty Biennial Cocktail Culture
www.risdmuseum.org 20% of your Alumni Membership is directed to the Phil Seibert [BFA ’67 IA] Alumni Acquisition Fund, which supports the purchase of works of art by RISD alumni. Join today! Call 401.454.6322 or join online at www.risdmuseum.org/join. BFAPH ’67 PH * BFA* ’67
00
WHERE WE ARE
undergraduate class notes
1984
Alex O’Neal 79 IL As a resident Fellow at Camargo Foundation in Cassis, France from January through May 2009, Alex (Brooklyn) created drawings and paintings like this one, Delta Jail Scene with Lightning (2009–10, oil pastel on paper, 32 x 42").
Last fall Claudia Flynn SC (Wakefield, RI) had a solo exhibition, MYTHOS + PATHOS, at the Knight Campus Art Gallery in Warwick, RI. Charles Mueller BArch (Chester,
CT), a principal at Centerbrook Architects & Planners, has been commissioned to design a major expansion to the Mary Cheney Library in Manchester, CT. A house on the Connecticut River designed by Charles has garnered an award from AIA Connecticut and a Builder’s Choice award. The project has also been featured in Connecticut Magazine, The New Old House Journal and Builder Magazine.
1980
30th reunion | October 8–10
Kirsten Andreason AP (Safety Harbor, FL) won 3rd place for a watercolor she showed in the recent Paint-Out in Paradise invitational held at the Venice [FL] Art Center.
In January new work by T. Barny SC (Healdsburg, CA) was featured at DISTRICT Gallery in Park City, UT. Madeline Sorel IL (Brooklyn) curated Looking Out, Looking In: Portraits By Twenty-Five Women Artists at Kingsborough Community College, where she teaches illustration. Held in March, the show included work by fellow RISD grads Anna Rich 78 IL and Ann Lundquist 81 CR/ MFA 85 PT.
1981 Earlier this spring work by Trine Bumiller PR (Denver, CO) was on view in Liminal: New Paintings, a solo show at Zg Gallery in Chicago. T, the New York Times style magazine (10.4.09), featured the new design Michael Gabellini BArch (Brooklyn) did for the Jil Sander headquarters in Hamburg, Germany.
1982 Andrea Bisordi-McLaughlin
AP (Wilton, CT) currently owns Tahiti Street, a women’s swim and resort-wear store in Greenwich, CT, where she has been in business for 20 years. She’s also married and has three sons. 46
Bestiarium At Hamburger Bahnhof, a solo show of work by Walton Ford FAV (Southfield, MA), continues through May 24 at Paul Kasmin Gallery in NYC.
Last Winter Fotini Vurgaropulou SC participated in a group show at The Loading Dock in Brooklyn, where she lives.
1983 Geoff Adams FAV (Newton, MA) has created live action segments for the PBS children’s show Martha Speaks. His Who’s That Dog videos are portraits of working dogs. Geoff shoots, edits, and creates all the graphics and music for these segments. This year he is also delivering more live action segments for continuing seasons of Arthur, Curious George and Peep and the Big Wide World. Stephen Dynia BArch (Jackson, WY) runs the architectural firm that built the Jackson Hole Performing Arts Pavilion spotlighted in the online publication of Architype Review in winter 2009. Erminio Pinque IL and his Providence-based Big Nazo Puppet Studio took part in the 2010 Winter Olympics, leading a boisterous street parade every night to kick off festivities in Place de la Francophonie, a French quarter and arts district in Vancouver.
Fred Lisaius 81 IL Fred’s Tropical North (2009, acrylic on wood panel, 30 x 30") is among the work featured in two solo shows last winter, Flourish at Bellevue [WA] College and Terra Incognita at the Linda Hodges Gallery in Seattle. He lives in Bellevue.
Spring 2010
Karla Knight 80 PT Right: Earlier this spring, Karla’s work was on view in Life In Space: Charcoal Drawings, a solo exhibition at Artspace New Haven [CT]. She lives in Redding, CT.
1985
25th reunion | October 8–10
Meg (Kelleher) Aubrey IL (Alpharetta, GA) recently completed her MFA in Painting at Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta, GA. She is now teaching in SCAD’s foundation studies department. Lisa Baechtle IL moved to northwestern Tennessee in October 2008, where she has been winning awards in shows around the area and is teaching afterschool art to kids in McKenzie, TN. Huma Bhabha PR (see pages
26–29)
Tracy Farricker Kopp IL (Cos Cob, CT) is currently teaching English as a Second Language to elementary school students in Stamford, CT. She also just earned her second master’s degree and is now a reading specialist. Elizabeth Giordano Kiely IL (Mansfield, MA) is a freelance muralist and faux-finisher/painter as well as an assistant librarian. She and her husband, Brian, have four children.
Last summer Kristina (MacKay) Lavoie PH (Cranston, RI) received her Master of Social Work degree and is now a Licensed Clinical Social Worker working for Gateway Healthcare in Providence.
Rana (Segal) Rochat 83 PR
KEY
Untitled W209 (encaustic on panel, 54 x 48") was among the recent works by Rana (Atlanta, GA) on view in Encaustic Painting, a winter solo show at the Winston Watch Gallery in Seattle.
Michael Maltzan BArch
(see page 7) “I love what I do,” says Dave Miller ID. “I am surrounded by talented, creative people and we make stuff. What could be better?” Dave has worked as an industrial designer, assistant storyboard director for animated children’s series, a syndicated cartoonist and a senior designer at Hasbro Toys. He now owns his own design firm, Back40 Design Group, in Oklahoma City. Jackie Saccoccio PT(West
Cornwall, CT) has been a visiting critic in the RISD Painting Department since 2003. She is now focused on organizing an immersive collaborative exhibition of 15 artists that will run at the RISD Museum from this November through March 2011. Christina (Scholly) Speed
GD is the marketing director for Patagonia, an outdoor clothing company and leader in corporate environmentalism. Based in Ventura, CA, Patagonia is a recent recipient of the AIGA Corporate Design Leadership Award.
Elisa Drumm Van Auken TX, owner of E. Drumm Designs in Littleton, MA, produces a line of whimsical, painted wood sculpture, which is represented in about 50 galleries across the US. She lives with her husband, Jeff, and her 18-year-old twins, who will be heading off to college this fall.
current majors
former majors
master’s degrees
AP
AD
Advertising Design
MA
Art Education
Arch Architecture
AE
Art + Design Education
(formerly MAE)
CR
Ceramics
LA
Landscape Architecture
MArch Architecture
DM
Digital + Media
MD
Machine Design
MAT Teaching
FAV
Film/Animation/Video
TC
Textile Chemistry
MFA
Fine Arts
FD
Furniture Design
TE
Textile Engineering
MID
Industrial Design
GD
Graphic Design
MIA
Interior Architecture
GL
Glass
Apparel Design
IA
Interior Architecture
FIfth-year bachelor’s degrees
ID
Industrial Design
BArch Architecture
IL
Illustration
BGD
Graphic Design
OTHER
JM
Jewelry +
BID
Industrial Design
CEC
Continuing Education
Metalsmithing
BIA
Interior Architecture
Certificate
PH
Photography
BLA
Landscape Architecture
FS
enrolled for Foundation
PT
Painting
Studies only
PR
Printmaking
*
attended RISD, but no
SC
Sculpture
TX
Textiles
MLA Landscape Architecture
degree awarded
Jeff Waring PT is participating
Madeline (Pydych) Hopkins 82 IL
in the May 22nd Trenton Ave Arts Festival in Philadelphia, near where he lives in Middletown, PA. Last winter he exhibited in Sights and Sounds: outdoor abstractions and acoustic drawings, a solo show at the Freyberger Gallery on Penn State’s Berks County Campus.
Last fall Madeline (Moody, ME) exhibited paintings like this one, Ogunquit River Autumn (oil, 25 x 13"), in a solo show at Cygnet Gallery in Portland, ME.
1986 Lee Dimeo IL, Paula Martiesian 76 PT, Ken Speiser 68 SC, Robert Thornton 52 PT and Carmel Vitullo 47 PT are all
showing in Bert Gallery’s pocket exhibit Among the Living: Favorite Contemporary Artists, which runs through June 18 at the Providence gallery.
Ronit Eisenbach BArch (Tacoma Park, MD) recently co-authored Installations by Architects: Experiments in Building and Design (Princeton Architectural Press) with Sarah Bonnemaison. Ellen (Tave) Glassman GD (Closter, NJ) has spent the last two years transforming the Kenmore brand so that this year each major
Kenmore appliance has been redesigned and is getting a new logo, user interface, packaging, website and marketing communications. Ellen also led the brand identity and packaging efforts for Craftsman Evolv tools and DieHard batteries. Hallmark recently selected a greeting card designed by Patrick Hamilton GD for production through its Birthday His Way Card Contest. Patrick is also completing several residential interior design projects in and around Manhattan, where he lives.
Michael Oatman PT (Troy, NY) is working on a permanent commission for MASS MoCA entitled All Utopias Fell. The piece is slated to be unveiled in July.
Green Infrastructure for Blue Urban Watersheds, an essay by Mary Rickel-Pelletier BArch (Hartford, CT), was published recently by the American Planning Association Planners Press, which is affiliated with the National Building Museum. Earlier this year, Hanna von Goeler IL (Montclair, NJ) exhibited work in The Currency of an Altered State at the Hunterdon Art Museum in Clinton, NJ.
Mary Jane Begin 85 IL Mary Jane has been teaching at RISD for the past 19 years and is now an assistant professor of Illustration. She’s also working on a new book series Willow Buds (recently optioned for television animation), a project for Hasbro and Revolution, a new book for Sleeping Bear Press about a young girl who worked in New England’s textile mills. Mary Jane is also among several children’s book luminaries (including fellow RISD artists Grace Lin 96 IL, Brian Selznick 88 IL and Chris Van Allsburg MFA 75 SC) who will be featured in The Library of the Early Mind, a new documentary on children’s books. A solo show of her works closes on May 21 at the Providence Art Club. Help organize your reunion! Contact crobinso@risd.edu
47
Create a lasting legacy
When Frank and Joan Hooper decided to work on their estate plan, they didn’t hesitate when it came to RISD. Not because they are alumni (they’re not). And not because their son Will attended RISD (he didn’t). Rather, it was because Frank’s Aunt Edna graduated from RISD in 1920, and then worked and taught at the college for 37 years—Aunt Edna being the founding director of the Edna W. Lawrence Nature Lab, RISD’s beloved natural history collection, which has been a jewel of the campus and provided students with a shared experienced for more than 70 years.
Extending Edna Lawrence’s legacy was the motivation behind the Hoopers leaving a generous bequest for the Edna W. Lawrence Memorial Scholarship Fund. “Because Aunt Edna loved RISD and we loved Aunt Edna, we grew close to the school. And that’s why we made this bequest—to honor Aunt Edna and to continue her wonderful legacy by helping generations of future RISD students fulfill their creative dreams. I know Aunt Edna would be very proud of that.”
“Aunt Edna was such a special person in our family,” says Frank with a smile. “As a child, I found her visits to be simply magical—she made amazing drawings and told wonderful stories. As I grew older, I discovered just how special she was through her work at RISD. She influenced the lives of so many artists and designers.”
To find out how estate planning can help you create a legacy at RISD, contact Molly Garrison in the Office of Leadership Giving at (401) 454-6425 or giftplanning@risd.edu.
www.risd.edu/giftplanning give to risd
Allison Massari IL (Tiburon,
CA) was the keynote speaker at Stop Revolving! Start Evolving!, a self-help workshop held in March in Mill Valley, CA. Clovia Ng IL* (White Plains, NY) of CNGraphics Art & Design runs a successful business specializing in restaurant graphics. She is also the exclusive graphic designer for Lerebours Antiques, a new antiques shop in NYC.
Last fall John Ruggieri PT* (Boston, MA) exhibited in THE GRID, a group show at Milepost 5 Project Space in Portland, OR. Potter Adam Silverman BArch (Los Angeles) and architect
William Hudders 86 PT Brooklyn Morning (oil on canvas, 38 x 52”) appears in a therapist’s office scene in the soon-to-be released movie It’s Kind of a Funny Story from Focus Features. Another of Bill’s paintings made a “guest appearance” in Bewitched, starring Nicole Kidman and Will Ferell. Bill lives in Macungie, PA.
Earlier this spring work by Peter Zelle GL (Saint Paul, MN) was featured at Preston Contemporary Art Center in Mesilla, NM.
1988 1987 Stephen Burt IL (Portland, ME)
is an associate professor and chair of Creative and Fine Arts at the University of New England in Portland and Biddeford, ME. Waiting for Google, an exhibition of new work by Brian Kane PT (Cambridge, MA), was on view this spring at Murphy and Dine Gallery in NYC.
Farsad Labbauf ID (Jersey City,
NJ) exhibited in four shows in February and March—in Iran, Italy and New York. The exhibition in Iran was a survey of his work from the last seven years entitled Manifestation of Unity. In January Tim Trelease IL (Deerfield, MA) and Keith Hollingworth 59 CR exhibited at A3 Gallery in Amherst, MA (the town where Keith lives).
Tracy Glover GL (tracyglover-
studio.com) is handcrafting and marketing a line of sconces and table and floor lamps using beautiful blown glass spheres. Last winter Wendy Gonick GD took part in the Arlington Open Studios, exhibiting some of her most recent work at the Arlington [MA] Center for the Arts.
Jim DiMarcantonio 86 PT The owner of Hope Bindery in Providence, Jim has produced several special edition books this spring for and about luminaries in rock and roll. The 50-lb, goat-skin-covered Acid Age of San Francisco Rock features 41 large-format signed silver prints by Herb Greene of classic rockers such as Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, Led Zeppelin and many more. Jim’s bindery also recently completed a book on the Grateful Dead, and Bruce Springsteen commissioned him to make two custom books.
Nader Tehrani BArch 86 (Boston) are exhibiting Boolean Valley, an installation exploring the intersection between architectural precision and handmade craft, through June 6 at the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas, TX.
1989 Earlier this spring Karen Gelardi PT (South Portland, ME) exhibited in New Paintings + New Factories, a two-person show at Coleman Burke Gallery in NYC. More than one Perspective, a beautifully crafted blanket made by California-based artist Hiroko Kurihara TX (www.hirokokurihara. com), was featured in the Home Section of The New York Times (2.4.10). “Now, more than ever, I’m inspired to continue bringing
people good design and good connections,” she notes on her site, which explains her business’ approach to “sustainable sewing” and donating a scarf or blanket to a homeless person for each one sold.
Harold Shurtleff 57 MD of Bourne, MA on February 10, 2010.
Steven Lerner BArch 67 of Providence, RI on November 29, 2009.
Walter Grallert 60 AR of
Welles Lamonte 70 TX of Westport, MA on February 9, 2010.
DEATHS
Bethany (Gleason) Kallgren
Rosemary Buehler Bayles
Marshall 44 AP of Fort Collins,
Fraser 51 PT of Bloomington, IN
Hester (Miles) Eaton 37 AP of Portland, OR on February 11, 2010.
CO on May 9, 2010.
on June 16, 2009.
James D. Wilmot 47 PT of
Roger Powell 52 IL of Jupiter,
Boothbay Harbor, ME on January 29, 2010.
FL on May 30, 2009.
Westford, MA and Cherryfield, ME on November 27, 2009.
Albert Adams 53 GD* of Shrews-
Donald James Quell 61 AR
of Hamden, CT (husband of
Kenneth McKenzie 48 TC of
bury, MA on September 11, 2009.
of Philadelphia, PA on October 13, 2009.
Mary Erby Kordak 73 PT) on
October 4, 2009.
Kelley 54 TX of Seattle, WA on March 13, 2010.
Isobel (Taple) Stander 61 IL
Hugh Roberts 74 SC of
of Elk River, MN on July 25, 2009.
Brattleboro, VT on January 4, 2010.
Frances (Church) Flynn 37
GD of Chesapeake, VA on August 9, 2009. Virginia (Ziegler) Toelken
Union, SC on September 28, 2008.
39* of Waterford, CT on August 6, 2008.
Audrey L. (Schofield)
John W. Reisert, Jr. 39 MD of
on January 21, 2010.
Narraganset, RI on January 9, 2010. H. Maxwell Mays 41 JM* of
Coventry, RI on November 16, 2009.
Loudfoot 49 AP of Riverside, RI
Cornelia (Chamberlin)
John Raymond Kordak 71 ID
John A. DiStefano 54 IL of
Harold Persons 62 IL of Marble-
Janet Carolyn Wilkins 82 IL of
Robert H. Hugman, Jr. 50 GD
Cranston, RI on January 15, 2010.
head, MA on September 26, 2009.
Deerfield, VA on August 24, 2009.
of Irving, TX on November 12, 2009.
Alan Loud 56 IA of Bristol, RI on
Paul Langmuir 65 GD of
Alexander McKean Coogan
January 17, 2010.
Providence, RI on April 30, 2010.
James C. Baldwin 57 GD of Brewster, MA on October 21, 2009.
Alfred DeCredico 66 PT of Providence, RI on December 6, 2009 (see also pages 36 + 38).
BArch 85 of Manchester-by-theSea, MA on January 15, 2010.
Victor Magiera 50 TC of White
Albert Golin 42 GD of West
Plains, NY on November 1, 2009.
Palm Beach, FL on October 31, 2009.
B. Samuel Dunlap 51 IA of
Maryville, TN on January 31, 2009.
Sylvia (Klanian) Forti 57 AP
of Pawtucket, RI on May 16, 2009.
S. Patrick Donovan III 88 IL of New York, NY and Cincinnati, OH on April 12, 2010.
49
WHERE WE ARE
undergraduate class notes
Peter McCleery AR (Fremont, CA) wrote in to report that he is now married to Stephanie McCleery. Thomas Michna BArch (Los Angeles) and his partner Rick Simner have three-year-old twins, Linus and Daisy, who were born on December 19, 2006. Thomas also has a new website for his studio: www.thomasmichna.com.
Gary Bernard 90 IL
Jeannie Pettigrew Whelan
Odyssey Books recently released Ollie and Tugg (April 2010), written and illustrated by Gary (Philadelphia). It follows the success of Pemba Sherpa, his popular first book, which was a Junior Library Guild Selection for fall 2009. Gary’s third children’s book, The Moth and the Sun, will be published later this year.
PT participated in Impromptu: Winter Exhibition at Mina Dresden in San Francisco, where she lives. Abigail Balz Samaha IL and
her husband Adam welcomed their son, Oscar Atlas Samaha, on November 3, 2009. The family lives in Chicago.
1991 On May 1 Providence-based artist Carolina Arentsen IL ran an
1990
20th reunion | October 8–10
The Asian Art Museum of San Francisco recently acquired Egg Woman II, a painting by SoHyun Bae PT/SC (NYC), for its permanent collection. Norman Clayton GD and his wife, Aurelia del Roario Ureno, have a new son, Diego Raphael Clayton, who will turn 1 on June 8. The family lives in Berkeley, CA.
event at RISD to support Chilean earthquake relief efforts. There was music, traditional food, a silent auction and a slide show of images of Chilean landscapes from before and after the earthquake. Photographer Tom Birtwistle PH (Harmony, ME) has been named one of Maine’s 60 Most Collectible Artists by Maine Home & Design magazine.
Patrick Keesey PT/GL (Marfa, TX) and his company, Patrick Keesey Furniture and Design, is happy to introduce the PKFD Bocce Set available at Partners and Spade. The bocce carrying case is made of eco-friendly 100% post-production black walnut.
Karen LaMonte 90 GL Reclining Dress Impression with Drapery (2007, cast glass, 18 ½ x 61 x 23”) has been added to the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC. Karen lives in Prague, Czech Republic.
50
Spring 2010
Ingrid Design, the graphic design company Ingrid (Hernandez) Bolton BGD runs in Louisville, KY, is celebrating eight years in business thanks to clients like Yum! Brands and Kellogg’s, which contracts her to work on the annual marketing campaign for Girl Scout cookies. Last fall work by Rebecca Chamberlain AP (Brooklyn) was featured in a solo show at Judi Rotenberg Gallery in Boston. Fence Embroidery with Embellishment, a 600-foot public art installation by NYC-based artist Katie Daniels PT, is currently on view along a South Street construction fence in lower Manhattan (near the Wall Street intersection). Part of re:Construction, an effort by the Downtown Alliance to use construction sites as canvasses for innovative public art and architecture, Katherine’s project suggests a geometric flowering vine made from colorful circles and green and white “stems” woven into the wire fence. Edmond Kim IL and his wife, Vanessa Quinn, welcomed their daughter, Ella Grace Kim, on December 5, 2009 in New York.
Arpie Gennetian Najarian BGD 92 Daily Parking (2008, collage with thread, 36 x 48”) is among the recent work featured in a winter exhibition at Muriel Guepin Gallery in Brooklyn. “Making art has always been my way of creating order and capturing the beauty of the lines and forms of objects that I encounter every day,” says Arpie, who lives in Woodcliff Lake, NJ.
Mark Taber 94 SC Polo Triptych (gouache on paper, 9 x 12” each) is among the work Mark showed in Daydream, a fall group exhibition at Lana Santorelli Gallery in NYC, where he lives.
Amber (Wood) O’Harrow TX
(Davenport, IA) just joined crafthaus (crafthaus.ning.com), the contemporary art, design and fine craft connection. Earlier this year, Melissa Prest PT exhibited work in TRANS: form| color, an international group show featuring abstract painters, at Meridian Gallery in San Francisco, where she lives. Michael Riley GD (see page 9)
1992 This spring Sandy Steen Bartholomew IL (Warren, NH) published Totally Tangled (Design Originals, April 2010), a book about the method of meditation known as Zentangle, which uses repetitive pattern drawing to help focus the mind and boost creative confidence. Last December Arnor Bieltvedt PT (Pasadena, CA) exhibited paintings at the international art fair Lineart in Gent, Belgium. The work he showed is based on his childhood memories of Icelandic landscapes, along with his blossoming interest in the lush flora and color of his new home in southern California.
Shortly after the earthquake in Haiti, Shepard Fairey IL (Los Angeles) began selling new t-shirts he designed to raise funds for UNICEF’s Haiti relief efforts. His work is on view through May 29 in May Day, a solo show at Deitch Projects in NYC. In March Bo Joseph: A Persistent Absence, a solo exhibition of recent paintings by Bo Joseph PT, was featured at Sears-Peyton Gallery in NYC, where he lives. Denyse Schmidt GD, who runs
DS Quilts in Bridgeport, CT, has created a new, exclusive series of one-of-a-kind quilts for Ralph Pucci International in New York.
1993 Last fall Shawn Kenney IL (East Providence, RI) participated in Impressions of Light, a group exhibition at the Providence Art Club’s Maxwell Mays Gallery. Brett Kincaid ID is now
working as director of design for Steelcase, North America, based in Ada, MI. Last November NEVERandagain, the latest project by Elissa Levy GL, opened at the International Studio & Curatorial Program gallery in Brooklyn, where she lives.
Lois Weinthal BArch and her husband Jeffrey Siegel are enjoying their one-year-old daughter, Sophie Henne Siegel, born on April 15, 2009. The family lives in Austin, TX.
1994 An article on the design process Alice Kennedy PT (Maplewood, NJ) uses in creating incredible quilts will be featured in the August issue of American Patchwork & Quilting magazine. Peter Mann ID (Jersey City, NJ)
showed new work and old favorites at the recent Architectural Digest Home Design Show in NYC.
In May Sarah Greene Reed PH exhibited a new body of work entitled On the Dot at D Berman Gallery in Austin, TX, where she lives. The show will travel to Moody Gallery in Houston in December. Hurricane Story, a solo show of photographs by Jennifer Shaw PH, was featured earlier this year at Guthrie Contemporary in New Orleans, where she lives. Christina Toy BArch and her husband Sheldon Lim welcomed their new daughter, Casiel A. Toy-Lim, on October 1, 2009. The family lives in San Francisco.
Approaching Art with the Intensity of an Athlete, an article focused on the art and work of painter Sonya Sklaroff PT (NYC), was featured in the April 2010 issue of American Artist magazine. In March Sonya and Sarah Snow IL (New Paltz, NY) exhibited recent paintings in a three-person show called In the Mix at Maison de la Culture in Neuilly, France. A solo show of new paintings by William Swanson PT (Emeryville, CA) is on view through July 3 at Walter Maciel Gallery in Los Angeles.
risd:store Bill Killen 93 FAV Daniele as Ophelia (oil, 25 x 11¼”) was among Bill’s oil paintings and silver point drawings that were on view in a winter solo show at Providence’s AS220 gallery.
risdstore.com
overnight shipments available on request 30 North Main Street | Providence, Rhode Island Questions? Contact risdstore@risd.edu or 401 454-6464
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WHERE WE ARE
undergraduate class notes
Barry Beach 95 SC Last fall Barry (San Rafael, CA) showed work like this, Basin and Range (2009, wood & metal), in two exhibitions in San Francisco: Wonderland, a large multi-sited arts project downtown and Raw, an exhibition of new sculpture and installations by Bay-area artists held at Root Division.
Kristin Varner 95 IL Kristin (www.kristinvarner.com) is excited to have published her first picture book, Big Feelings (Parenting Counts Press, 2010), written to help kids better understand their own emotions. The freelance illustrator lives in Berlin, Germany.
1995
1996
Daniele Boglivi Fiori IL
Marc Cavello FAV (Locust Valley, NY) would love some feedback on his newly updated website: www.marccavello.com.
15th reunion | October 8–10
(Weehawken, NJ) and Tamara Bodor Dilworth PH (South Salem, NY) each won a 2009 Daytime Emmy for their set design and art direction of The Martha Stewart Show. Peter Conlon FAV and his NYC-based studio WUT IT IS designed the new main television title screens for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths.
Work by Josh Pulver BArch, principal of A+C (apluscny.com) in NYC, was featured in the October 2009 issue of dwell magazine and in a December 2009 episode of HGTV’s Top Ten. He is currently developing a series of prefab homes expected to hit the market this summer. In March the meet the greens kitchen products designed by Chris Raia ID were featured on NBC’s Today Show in a segment about hot new household items. He and Andrea Zatarain 96 JM also have a new son, Stefan Thomas Raia, who will be a year old on July 23. Stefan’s older brother Mateo is three and the family lives in Newton, MA.
52
Scott Clark IL (see page 8) Kimberly (Nolen) Getker IL and her husband Karl Getker 95 IL welcomed their first child, Madeline Domey Getker, on December 23, 2009. The family lives in Attleboro, MA.
In April a multimedia installation by Catherine Grisez JM was featured at Traver Gallery in Seattle, where she lives. Called LICK, the show of sculpture, photography and writing focused on wounds and the beauty of the healing process. Grace (Mercer) Lin IL (see
page 10) Anna (Kessler) Rulnick AP
and her husband Jason welcomed their second child, Hailey Mira Rulnick, on November 7, 2009. Hailey’s older brother, Maxim, will be three in June. The family lives in NYC.
1997 Eric Gordon IL (Bethesda, MD) is the co-creator and co-facilitator of Studio In-Sight, a group that serves artists living with disabilities at St. Luke’s House in Maryland.
Spring 2010
This spring he mounted the first show of work by the group, which runs through the end of May at the University of Maryland’s Graduate School of Social Work. Patrick Hwang BArch and Belinda Law were married on January 3, 2010 in Los Angeles. Patrick has been appointed an assistant professor at the University of Arizona, School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture in Tucson. Karelle Levy TX (Miami), who
runs KREL, has been promoting the fall line of KREL Black Label at shows in NYC. Just before the December holidays, Caleb Siemon GL (Santa Ana, CA) was thrilled to receive a call from Washington, DC—from the office of Michelle Obama, who commissioned Caleb to make glass vessels for the Obamas to give to heads of state during their first official tour to Europe. He also produced special-edition jars to hold honey produced by White House bees.
1998 Kyla Coburn IL recently bought and renovated the 9,000-sf Arnold Mill in Central Falls, RI as the new headquarters for her company Kyla Coburn Designs LLC. The building now houses a design studio, office and wood shop, as well as five live/work lofts occupied by local artists. In addition to all this, Kyla recently gave birth to her second child, Alya.
In December Stephanie Diamond PR (NYC) presented Snap Sharing/Photo Reader: Intuitive Readings on Your Photographs at the SCOPE Art Fair in Miami.
Addie Langford AR (Detroit,
MI) earned her MFA in Ceramics in 2006 from Cranbrook and won a Fulbright Fellowship to study in Madrid the following year, where she focused on Renaissance tapestry as a harbinger of contemporary collage. Since 2007 Addie has headed the Art School at
Flint [MI] Institute of Arts and has taught as a lecturer at the University of Michigan/Ann Arbor School of Art + Design. Clara Lieu IL (Newton, MA), a Foundation Studies faculty member at RISD and director of Wellesley’s Jewett Art Gallery, curated a spring exhibition at the gallery featuring the work of fellow RISD professors Ken Horii, Tony Janello and Thomas Mills.
Pattie Lee Becker 97 PH Based in Boulder, Pattie Lee exhibited sculpture and pencil drawings like these (11 x 14") in a spring show called Ropes, which ran through May 23 at the Boulder [CO] Museum of Contemporary Art. The show explored the beauty and complexity of this seemingly mundane object.
Last fall work by Anna Schuleit PT (Dublin, NH) was on view in Two People Ago, a solo show at Coleman Burke Gallery in NYC. Rhett Turner PH (see page 31) Stephanie Ward AP (see
page 7)
1999 Last winter Brooklyn-based artists John Gauld PT, Marc Handelman 98 PT, Sara Greenberger Rafferty 00 PH and Jordan Wolfson 03 SC participated in the Kings County Biennial at Kidd Yellin in Brooklyn. Paw for a little love, a show of fabric collage photos by Laura Evonne Steinman SC
(Somerville, MA), was on view earlier this year at The Cambridge [MA] Homes.
Jayda Uras IA (Beyoglu, Turkey)
Brian Martin 98 IL
and her aroma therapy line, Vie en Rose, were referenced in a recent Wall Street Journal article about the rejuvenation of Istanbul’s spa culture.
Phase 1, (oil on board, 9 x 12") is among the work Brian (Seekonk, MA) contributed to Between Realities, a winter exhibition he co-curated at Principale Gallery in Alexandria, VA.
2000
10th reunion | October 8–10 In the past year, Megan Biddle Price Latimer Agah GD, a
private art dealer, consultant and independent curator in LA, serves on the board of the Santa Monica Museum of Art and as vice president of the board of MoCA Contemporaries. Eric Baere IL (NYC) made a guest appearance on The Martha Stewart Show on December 28, 2009 demonstrating the techniques he uses to create incredible murals for residential clients. Erin Bazos GD and Erich Schoenenberger were married in Ravello, Italy on July 11, 2009. Erich is an architect and the couple now lives in Brooklyn.
GL (Croton-on-Hudson, NY) has been an artist in residence at the Macdowell Colony, Jentel, the Creative Glass Center of America, Sculpture Space and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. One of her pieces was recently acquired for the permanent collection of the US Embassy in Riga, Latvia. Aaron Bruckerhoff BArch
and his wife Melissa recently celebrated the first birthday of their son, Thomas Bryan Bruckerhoff who was born on April 16, 2009. They also have a daughter, Ava Louise, and live in Boston.
TECH TOYS INSPIRE SWEATER PLAY In January T, the New York Times’ style magazine, ran an interview with Miami-based artist Jim Drain just as he released 29 limited-edition sweaters at Opening Ceremony, a fun retail gallery in Manhattan. Excerpts from Deborah Shapiro’s interview with Jim follow.
How did you get into knitting and textiles at RISD? At the time, all my roommates at Fort Thunder had special talents—drawing comics, music, printing—but no one was knitting. I think I was interested because it was untapped territory and Providence itself had this ghost of an industry still around. I’m attracted to the things that people throw away—the shadow goods, in Jungian terms. As soon as I became slightly interested, out of nowhere all these resources appeared nearby: mills full of dead stock, fabric stores with ancient fabric. Plus, I was inspired by how dedicated people were in RISD’s Textiles Department. From there, it was like falling down the rabbit hole.
Jim Drain 98 SC
How did this sweater project come about? When I gave a talk at RISD about a year and a half ago, a professor asked me if wanted to see this machine they had just gotten. It’s like the Lamborghini of industrial knitting machines. And I was like, ‘How can I use this machine?!’ A technician found a spot for me last summer and my gallery stepped up to fund the project, buying the yarn and the time on the machine. I was working with this grad student Joe Segal MFA 09 TX , who was able to translate my sculptural ideas into workable, wearable garments. Do you see this project as an extension of your sculptural work? In some ways it’s a departure. The best thing was being able to make work that I was invested in and really excited about and that exists outside of a white-wall situation. [Fortunately, the sweaters offer the same] transformative experience I’m looking for in my sculptural work. It is a transformation through direct experience. A visceral euphoria. So often our culture will improve upon a technology to the point of near blissful perfection, but really, the experience is hollow and lonely and isolating. The technology may have moved ahead, but we have gone Neanderthal. Sorry, cavemen!
For the full interview go to
tmagazine.blogs.gs.nytimes.com/2010/01/27
53
WHERE WE ARE
Victoria Jamieson 00 IL Olympig!, Victoria’s second children’s book (www. victoriajamieson.com), will be published this year by Dial Books for Young Readers. Her first, Bea Rocks the Flock (Bloomsbury), came out last year.
undergraduate class notes
Elizabeth Eddins GD has been running eddinsdesign, a Providence-based studio, since 2006. She helped finalize this first issue of RISD XYZ, and in addition to RISD, some of her other clients include the RI Economic Development Corporation, Wellspring Academy, the Business Innovation Factory and Roger Williams University. Peter Edwards SC (Troy, NY)
runs casperelectronics, a company he founded to design experimental electronic musical instruments. Tim Finn FAV teaches animation,
animation history and drawing at the Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University. He’ll also begin teaching a new comic book storytelling course he suggested for this fall. Last December Tim’s new film CYMoKay screened at the Cormack Cook Colossal Cinema Collection in Brookline, MA.
2000 continued
10th reunion | October 8–10
Victoria (Lin) Casselman AP
and Chad Casselman BArch 00 recently got married after seven+ years of dating. They live in NYC, where she works as director of design development for Kiki de Montparnesse. Her lingerie designs have been featured on the cover of WWD and in Cosmopolitan, InStyle, Self and Marie Claire. They’re sold at Anthropologie, Bloomingdale’s, Henri Bendel, Neiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman and Barney’s.
Roxana Ghani ID and Matthew John Dietrich were married on October 13, 2009. The couple lives in San Francisco.
Last fall Kate Gilman GD joined representatives from Google, LinkedIn and IDEO as a panelist at the Coroflot Creative Employment Confab in San Francisco, where she lives.
Christy Cullen IL left
International Greetings last spring and now works for Anna Griffin, Inc. in Atlanta, GA, where she illustrates and designs quilt fabrics, scrapbooking items and party invitations. An upcoming issue of Martha Stewart Living will feature Anna Griffin among their top 10 picks for up-and-coming designers.
Jason Bregman BLA 02 Jason was the lead environmental designer and project manager for the West Palm Beach Waterfront Park. Some 80,000 people attended the grand opening in January. Jason lives in nearby Delray Beach.
54
Spring 2010
Teresia Hendrosoebono GD
and Frankie Muliadi got married on December 26, 2009 and moved to Auckland, New Zealand the following month. Lela Keen Jaacks SC sent in this update: “After graduation, I continued working for glass artist Daniel Clayman 86 GL in Rumford, RI. I married my amazing husband David Jaacks BArch 93 in 2001 and since 2002 have been a full-time mother, now with three beautiful children, Falcon (8), Thatcher (6) and Carson (4). We moved to Vermont in 2006 and recently moved to a new home where we are happily setting up a fantastic studio for me to get back to my work as an artist. I am grateful to have time now to refocus on my creative work.”
“I am currently working as a graphic designer,” John Jay Kelsey SC wrote from Rocky Hill, NJ. “But most of my time is spent caring for our son Jack, who was born in October 2008. He is my ‘work in progress’ and will hopefully be a RISD graduate as well.”
Katherine Lampert IL, who works as a rug and textlies designer at Holly Hunt Enterprises in Chicago, is continuing to pursue an independent painting practice and was in a recent group show at Rowland Contemporary in Chicago. Jennifer Leipham PH and
Composer and producer Roger Paul Mason IL (Brooklyn) just returned from Brazil, where he produced a record for the rock band Holger.
Last fall Carter Mull PT participated in New Photography 2009, a group show at the Museum of Modern Art in NYC.
Colin Kluck BGD welcomed a
new son, Leonardo (Leo) Kluck, on January 4, 2010. The family lives in San Jose, CA.
Kristen (Stout) Lovelock 02 PT Concrete Allotment Projects, a not-for-profit curatorial collaboration between Kristen and Jo Wilmot, recently organized DETOX (www.detoxme.org.uk), a “pop-up” exhibition exploring the phenomena of detoxification. The winter show presented photos, paintings and drawings at 16 Hoxton Square in London, the city she calls home.
“Thought I would share how proud I am to be a RISD alum,” Michelle (Skemp) Sheppard FD (San Francisco) recently
Chandler O’Leary 03 IL Earlier this spring, work by Chandler was on view in Mnemonic Sampler at The Tempest in Tacoma, WA, where he lives. In November he’ll have another solo show, called Local Conditions, at the University of Puget Sound’s Collins Memorial Library in Tacoma.
Alta Price PR (Long Island City,
NY) is co-organizing a June tour of Italy’s Veneto and EmiliaRomagna regions called Legacy of Letters 2010. Matt Sundstrom IL launched
In September Robin Nanney SC
Andrew Seles IL and Loretto
will graduate with her Master of Architecture degree from Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles.
Saquing BArch are engaged, the
Having spent the last 10 years “wandering around the world of graphic design,” Jen OwensLocke IL is currently the creative director for Marlo Marketing/ Communications in Boston and is married to Private Alan Locke of the Massachusetts Army National Guard. Last year Kristina Paabus IL received her MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She’s currently living in Tallinn, Estonia, where she’s a Fulbright Fellow and visiting artist at the Estonian Academy of Arts. Kristina has exhibited in Chicago, Minneapolis, Boston, Berlin and Tallinn, and has had artists’ residencies in Michigan, Estonia and Romania. Amie Louise Plante JM
(Cranston, RI) earned her MFA from UMass Dartmouth in 2003. She started her own business creating custom, one-of-a-kind and limited production art jewelry and also designs jewelry, giftware and table-top products for several well-known retail brands in the US and Europe. Laura Tempest Schmidt PR (Providence) is a trend/fashion jewelry designer for Crimzon Rose International. She’s also a worldclass bellydancer.
proud parents of four cats and happily living in Los Angeles. Adam Swaab FAV, a freelance
designer, animator and visual effects director in LA, recently worked as an animation supervisor on Julie Taymor’s upcoming film adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Hedieh Wojgani BArch is working on development and urban regeneration for a nonprofit in Kabul, Afghanistan. Katherine Grace Wright PR
married John Buckley on August 29, 2009 in Sharon Springs, NY.
2001 In February Pablo Alvarez IL/ MAT 03 and Kristian Rangel GD showed in The Art of Latin Heritage, an exhibition at smoke in Providence presented by the Providence Phoenix and Art Mingling. Tyler Hatch IL and his wife Beth
celebrated the first birthday of their son Lucas on March 21. He was born in 2009 in Chagrin Falls, OH. Dan Messier ID recently bought 60,000 bees to start his new venture, urban beekeeping! This spring he plans to start with a single hive and see how it goes at his home in North Providence.
the website www.driveintothesun. com to show 68 of his landscape drawings from a recent crosscountry trip from New Hampshire to Oregon, where he lives.
wrote. “I have started a luxury bedding company called Sefte (pronounced seft) and know that the education and all the work put in at RISD got me where I am today. Every Sefte product is handcrafted by global artisans using luxurious textiles that are both socially and environmentally sound.” Andrea Summerton ID, Frank Cresencia 10 FD, Jeremy Liechman 02 FD, James Lear 08 FD, Hyejung Park 10 FD, Debra Folz 10 FD and Jennifer Tran 09 FD were celebrated at the late-winter A Toast To Local Designers Fresh from RISD at VOOS in Brooklyn.
In late 2009 Peter Yoon PT (Providence) accepted a Coming Up Taller Award from First Lady Michelle Obama at the White House. An initiative of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities, the award is the nation’s highest honor recognizing people who run community and after-school programs in the arts and humanities.
2003
2002
Last fall print and silkscreen works by Philadelphia-based artist Alex Lukas PR (www.alexlukas.com) were featured in The Eventuality of Daybreak, a solo show at the Glowlab gallery in NYC.
Andy Kennedy IL (see page 8)
Last winter Erik Koeppel IL (Jersey City, NJ) exhibited in The American Landscape, a solo show at Wally Findlay Gallery, the Manhattan gallery that represents him. He also spoke at the Institute of Classical Architecture & Classical America at New York’s Grand Central Academy of Art. Katherine Kuo ID plans to
marry Scott Arnetti on September 18, 2010. Katherine runs her own NYC-based design company and recently became a head designer at Bed, Bath, & Beyond, where she oversees their tabletop home décor, boxed lighting, frames and wall art division.
In March Jessica Hess IL (Boston, MA) participated in Temporal Surfaces, a two-person exhibition at White Walls in San Francisco. Jane Kim PR (Seaside, CA)
designed a Waterbox steel water bottle called Kelp that can be found at REI.
Four new children’s books illustrated by Christina Rodriguez IL (Stillwater, MN) were published in 2009: My Dad’s Deployment, Baseball on Mars/ Beisbol En Marte, Triangle Top: The Tale of a Troubled Tribe and The Antarctic Express. Her work was also included in the Children’s Book Illustrators Guild of Minnesota’s group exhibition Minnesota Made, held earlier this year at the St. Paul [MN] campus of the University of St. Thomas. Katherine Sawyer IL runs her own interior design business in Breckenridge, CO. She is doing freelance illustration work and teaching private snowboarding lessons as well.
Earlier this year, David Benjamin Sherry PH, Paul Loeback 02 ID and Huma Bhabha 85 PR were highlighted in The Nifty 50, a list of top up-and-coming talent in America published by T, the New York Times style magazine. Orthostatic Tolerance: It Might Not Be Such a Bad Idea if I Never Went Home, a solo show of work by NY-based artist Tavares Strachan GL, continues through July 7 at MIT’s List Visual Arts Center in Boston. Last fall Vogue Girl Korea ran an article on the work of Sara Vanderbeek 03 PR, who works out of her studio in Austin, TX.
Allison Maletz 03 PH An audio installation by Allison (represented by this image, which appears in the catalogue) is featured in this summer’s Moscow International Biennale for Young Art at the Moscow [Russia] Museum of Fine Art (July 1-30). The 8:46-minute loop “is of many people fornicating,” but plays as ambient noise from several hidden speakers. “The first 4 minutes are fairly quiet,” Allison explains, “but the second half becomes rather intense, noticeable, humorous and sometimes uncomfortable for the audience.”
Earlier this year, Dan O’Neill PT (Providence) showed recent work in Rome as Studio, an exhibition held at Temple University’s art gallery in Rome, Italy.
55
WHERE WE ARE
2004 Alex Barton IL (NYC) is pleased
to announce two new websites: www.devilsrainbow.com for his company and www.alexanderbarton.com for his personal painting. In March Christian Breed PT (Rome, Italy) exhibited new paintings at Lincoln Center’s SCOPE New York. Since the beginning of the year Anthony Dihle GD has been busy designing posters for multiple exhibitions in Washington, DC (where he lives), teaching a silkscreen workshop and helping to organize the AIGA DC art auction to benefit ArtSpace DC. He also curated Paper Cuts: The Art and Science of Rock Posters, a group show held earlier this spring at the Athenaeum in Alexandria, VA. Earlier this year Michael Neff PH (Brooklyn) participated in New Prints Winter/2010, a group show at the International Print Center New York. Work by Brad Ewing MFA 04 PR was also included in the show.
undergraduate class notes
Pauline Zee AP and Dean Lee Yasharian were married on October 3, 2009 in New York City.
This spring Whitney Claflin PT had a solo show at Real Fine Arts in Brooklyn, where she lives.
2005 5th reunion| October 8–10 Diana Eng 05 AP (see page 6) Becky Fong GD recently moved from NYC to Atlanta, where she now works as a design consultant for donor recognition programs and environmental design at Robin E. Williams Incorporated. Joe Gebbia ID (San Francisco)
delivered the keynote address at the IIDA and ASID annual Student Day 2010 in Portland, OR. His talk was titled The Modern Designtrepreneur. Last fall Matt Grigsby ID (Providence) served as a panelist for a RISD|CE symposium called Design, Industry + Careers in the Age of Sustainability.
Work by Matt Mignanelli IL (NYC) was featured in The Paradigm, a solo show held in April at Recoat Gallery in Glasgow, Scotland. Alison Paul IL (Providence)
has been busy with readings and signings for Sunday Love (Houghton Mifflin, January 2010), her new picture book. Her first book, The Crow (A Not So Scary Story), was published in 2007.
2006 Albert Alvarez FAV (San Antonio) is showing his paintings in Psychedelic: Optical and Visionary Art since the 1960s, a group show that runs through August 1 at the San Antonio [TX] Museum of Art.
Last fall Janet Bruesselbach IL and Allison Moore 07 IL (Newhall, CA) showed work in Nothing For Itself: Pluralist Paintings Born in the Middle of Salad, a group show at A Gathering of the Tribes in NYC, near where Janet lives. In April Rob Rey IL (Providence) participated in Four Painters & A Sculptor at the Bristol [RI] Art Museum.
Thomas Sheridan BARCH 08
Jessamee Sanders AP (East
Last summer Thomas was part of a team working for the National Park Service’s Historical American Building Survey. His team assessed and documented several vacant buildings/corridors on Ellis Island in NYC and the drawings he produced for the project are now being sent to the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. Thomas splits his time between Seattle and Brooklyn.
Meredith, NY) has created a website for her new company, Tamlin & The Fall (tamlinandthe fall.com).
Sam Burley 09 IL Dadu Shin 10 IL Sam’s Ancient Threshold (above) earned him the $1,000 Gold Award in the 2010 Illustration West 48 competition sponsored by the Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles. Dadu took Silver and earned the Elin Waite/Dick Oden Scholarship for his submission, Runner (top). Both of these works (and a second one by Sam, called Vietnam War) were shown in the SOI’s early spring Illustration West 48 exhibition and online gallery.
Jessica Soininen-Eddis PT (Brooklyn) is pursuing her MFA in painting at Pratt and married Timothy Eddis on October 7, 2007 at Hotel Viking in Newport, RI.
2007 Mary Alexis ID and Karl Heiselman 87 ID are now
married and recently relocated from London to Brooklyn, where Mary works as a self-employed designer. Xephyr Zanzabar IL and Dave
Inkpen were married last summer and live in Pascoag, RI.
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Spring 2010
Earlier this spring Damian VanCamp PH and Jamie Allen
05 IL (Geen Pond, NJ) exhibited in Reawakening, a group show at Lana Santorelli Gallery in NYC, where Damian lives.
2008 Harrison Love IL (Stonington, CT) and Michael Green MFA 09 FD (Providence) showed in New Life: The Vernal Equinox, an exhibition held this spring at The Spot on Thayer Street, a gallery in Providence.
Animator Hayley Morris FAV is working as a director and animator at Curious Pictures in NYC and lives in Katonah, NY.
2009 Jonathan Arena GD (see page 6) Korakrit Arunanondchai PR
has a new fashion label with Pamela Lee 06* called Korakrit*Pamelalee. They are exhibiting a new line called THRS (fashion for Thursday night art openings) at Tompkins Projects in Brooklyn, near where they live. Eve Essex SC has wrapped
up her residency at the Berwick Institute in Boston, staging a reenactment of Cardew’s Scratch Orchestra. She is now an artist in residence at ArtFarm in Nebraska. Jennifer Hom IL is working
at Google and last fall was pleased to see her first doodle (of Mahatma Ghandi) make the Google homepage. Grace Jun GD (see page 6)
Last fall James Lavine IL (North Berwick, ME) exhibited in Human Mechanics: Considering the Link between Hand and Tool, a solo show at LAUNCH at the Gail Cahalan Gallery in Providence. In April Julie Mauskop PT (Israel) exhibited Survivors, a series of paintings focused on her Holocaust-survivor grandparents, at the Columbia/Barnard Hillel in New York. Last fall work by Hilary Merzbacher IL (Wyndmoor, PA) was featured in Built World: Exploring Forms Neither Permanent nor Unique at LAUNCH at the Gail Cahalan Gallery in Providence.
In the wake of the quake in Haiti, Aaron Perry-Zucker GD
(Cambridge, MA) started a web forum called Design for Haiti (www.designforhaiti.com) to encourage fellow designers to create posters supporting relief efforts, along with information graphics that help explain the plight of the Haitian people. Earlier this year Amanda Dandeneau PH, Sebastian Cassetta PH, Thomas S. Prado PH and Jeff BarnettWinsby MFA 06 PH showed together in RISD: Random Individuals Seeking a Dealer at Jane Kim/Thrust Projects in NYC. In January Meatwaffle, the animated film Leah Shore FAV (Brooklyn) made as her senior project, was shown at the prestigious 2010 Sundance Film Festival in Utah. Leah was the only female animator and the youngest participant competing in this year’s festival.
Scintillating start
Less than a year after collecting her diploma, Katie Gallagher is attracting the kind of attention every young fashion designer needs. Interview and Vogue Italia have already run stories on her work, Daphne Guinness and Nicola Formichetti, Lady Gaga’s stylist, asked to borrow showpieces from her debut collection, and in February, when she showed her Fall 2010 collection at New York’s Fashion Week, the buzz just kept building. T, the New York Times’ style magazine, selected her as one of its “magnificent 7,” New York Magazine proclaimed her one of the top half dozen new designers to watch and the global fashion site Refinery 29 crowned her “Coolest Freshman/ Best New Designer.” Katie is “the new quirky cool darling of the fashion world,” R29 proclaimed. “With her latest collection, the young designer has skyrocketed from indie darling to a bona fide fashion force. Her spring/summer 2010 collection is darkly futuris-
2010 Alyson Ainsworth TX, Amie Cheong MFA TX, Ilene Godofsky 09 TX, Eun Jung Lee MFA TX, Alexa Newman TX, Ji Hae Park MFA TX, Chelsea Plumb TX, Wendy Wood TX and Hailey Koh Eun Yoon TX all took part in the late winter Imagine That! show at the Slater Mill Gallery in Pawtucket, RI.
Judges for the Illustration West 48 competition sponsored by the Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles selected works by Lisa Butler IL, Fabiola Garza 09 IL, Jean Kim IL, Nick Nadeau IL and Victo Ngai IL for inclusion in their early spring exhibition and online gallery. “Art directors, editors, designers and media folks who need artists go to the online gallery looking for young talent, so it’s a great launch,” notes their RISD professor, Susan Doyle
Earlier this spring, work by Trish Elwood O’Day CEC Digital Photography was featured in Icons and Archetypes, a solo show at the Pleiades Gallery in NYC. Caleb Wood FAV won first place in the animation category of the New York chapter of the Society of Illustrators’ 2010 student scholarship competition.
2011 Judges for the most recent New York Society of Illustrators competition selected illustrations by Ole Tillman IL, JooHee Yoon IL and Lisa Butler 10 IL for inclusion in the 2010 exhibition and catalogue.
81 IL/MFA 98 PT/PR.
Katie Gallagher 09 AP
tic, sleek and, as ever, unique. Kind of like the designer herself.” Katie says that when she opted to do her entire RISD thesis collection in black everyone told her “that it’s really scary to do that because people always want to see color, but I didn’t really care.” Following her own instincts may be key to her early success, which she’s building piece by piece in her small Chinatown studio. For fall 2010 (see above) she has presented an edgy, sculptural line inspired by an abstract painting she made—“a winter scene with trees and pastels, washedout colors, very drippy.” This gets translated into a silk, wool and leather line in shades of gray with hints of purple and pink, creams and a touch of forest green. “I don’t believe that fashion is the end goal,” Katie says on her website. “Stories, personalities, moods, ideals and attitudes are. Fashion, when executed successfully, communicates these attributes quickly and eloquently.” For more of Katie Gallagher’s work go to
katiegallagher.com
57
EHP turns fifty this year.
RISD celebrates a half century of Roman revelry with a special tribute at RISD by Design 2010, October 8–10 Fifty years ago this fall, the first class of RISD European Honors Program students sailed to Italy for a year-long adventure in Rome. Every year since, scores more RISD students have been making incredible creative discoveries in a city teaming with culture and housing some of the most ancient art and architectural treasures of the Western world.
If you’ll never forget your experience at the Palazzetto Cenci or your first visits to the Pantheon, the Coliseum, Venice, Florence, Assisi and more, come share your memories at the EHP’s 50th anniversary celebration this fall. p.s. Let us know if you recognize any of the happy campers in these photos. Email pbrown@risd.edu.
Send us your xyz info! Tell us what you’re up to and we’ll share your news with the RISD community.
Here are some of the ways you can contribute to your magazine:
upcoming deadlines:
1/ submit updates (professional and personal) to class notes email risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: class notes)
September 1 for Fall 2010 (due out in mid-October)
2/ send us your responses to the content of each issue email risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: feedback) 3/ send in story ideas for articles or subject matter you’d like us to cover email risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: story suggestions)
December 1 for Winter 2011 (due out in mid-January) To submit information via post, write to: RISD XYZ, Two College Street, Providence, RI 02903 To speak to the editor, call Liisa at 401 454-6349
Graduate Class Notes
1972
1979
1983
A Drop in the Bucket, a new film by Lauren Shaw MFA PH (Belmont, MA) about providing safe water for the people of Cambodia, has been winning awards throughout the film festival circuit.
Earlier this spring Dennis Delomba MFA SC (Providence) had an exhibit of his recent landscape and nature pictures, drawings and prints at the Audubon Society’s Bristol [RI] Education Center.
Ceramic artist and sculptor Allison Newsome MFA CR (Warren, RI) spoke at the RISD Museum in February, addressing issues of the environment and human interaction. Her work is included in The Figure: Contemporary Works from the Collection, which continues at the RISD Museum through February 2011.
1973 Carol Kreeger Davidson
MFA SC recently exhibited paper works, small sculptures, drawings and photography of outdoor installations in her hometown of Bloomfield, CT.
1974 Christy Rupp MAT
(see page 11)
1976 Donald Kouba MFA PH (Oak Forest, IL) sent in this: “I am completing 30 years of teaching and coordinating the Photographic Studies program at Prairie State College (south of Chicago). I will officially retire in July 2010 and hope to pursue several creative endeavors, including publishing a book of photographs entitled In Approachable Light. Many thanks to RISD for getting my career started back in 1976.”
1977 This spring the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art in Gateshead, England presented the first retrospective of work by Jenny Holzer MFA PT (Hoosick Falls, NY) shown in Britain.
Anne Sherwood Pundyk MFA 82 PT
1978
Sharp Shooter (2009, oil and acrylic on linen, 63 x 60”) and Vanity Fair (2009, oil and acrylic on linen, 65 x 63”) are among the paintings Anne (www.annepundyk.com) exhibited in two recent shows: A Semblance, a two-person exhibition at Susan Eley Fine Art in NYC and With or Without Permission: Appropriation, Assemblage, and Collage, a group show at the Philoctetes Center in NYC (that also included work by Brooklyn-based alum Mac Premo 95 IL).
Last fall Rebecca Kamen MFA SC (www.rebeccakamen.com) exhibited Diving Nature: An Elemental Garden, a solo show at Greater Reston Arts Center in Reston, VA, near where she lives.
A photo collage by Paul Mindell MAE (Norwalk, CT), one of the winners in the 2009 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition sponsored by the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, continues to be on view at the Washington, DC gallery through August. Last fall Laurence Young MFA PR (Provincetown, MA) exhibited in Ephemeral Light, a solo show at The Banks Gallery in Portsmouth, NH, and participated in The Constructed Landscape, a small group show at Powers Gallery in Acton, MA.
1980
30th reunion | October 8–10 There and Not There: Rust Portraits by Esther Solondz, a solo show of photography by Esther Solondz MFA PH (Providence), continues through June 6 at the Newport [RI] Art Museum. Deborah Tharp MAE
(Montgomery Village, MD) teaches art at St. Albans School in Washington, DC along with Stephen Ruecker 75 SC, the school’s sculpture teacher. Also, she and her father, Robert Tharp MAE 81 recently celebrated his 88th birthday. The two studied together at RISD in the 1970s.
1982 Brad Buckley MFA SC (Sydney, Australia) co-edited the new book Rethinking the Contemporary Art School: The Artist, the PhD, and the Academy.
1984 Work by Todd Moore MFA PT (Tiverton, RI), a Foundation Studies professor at RISD, was included in a late winter group show at The Chazan Gallery at Wheeler in Providence.
1991 Judy Gelles MFA PH (Philadelphia, PA) recently directed a project with inner city 7th graders who were encouraged to take photos of themselves, their families and their neighborhoods. Through Their Eyes, a public art installation of the resulting photographs, was on view in late winter and early spring as part of Philagrafika 2010 Independent Projects. Judy’s own work has been shown recently at Pentimenti Gallery in Philadelphia and is in A Complex Weave: Women and Identity in Contemporary Art, which opened at Towson [MD] University’s Center for Arts Gallery earlier this spring and is now touring nationally through December 2012.
Earlier this spring Matthew Monk MFA GD and Wendy Seller 75 AE, who both teach at RISD as assistant professors of Foundation Studies, had a joint exhibition at Lenore Gray Gallery in Providence.
Submit your news for class notes to
risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: class notes)
59
WHERE WE ARE
1992 Harry Gray MAE (Le Mars, IA) is
finishing his 30th year of teaching high school art at South Sioux City [IA] Senior High and is focusing on plein aire painting in pastels when creating his own work. Last fall Emi Ozawa MFA FD (Albuquerque, NM) participated in Boxes and Their Makers, a group show at the Center for Furniture Craftmanship’s Messler Gallery in Rockport, ME. The exhibition included work by fellow Furniture Design grads Andy Buck MFA 93 FD and Jenna Goldberg MFA 94 FD.
1993 Michael Hough MFA CR is
currently an associate professor of Ceramics + Sculpture at Bridgewater [VA] College, where he also directs the Miller Art Gallery on campus.
1995
15th reunion | October 8–10 Robbie Heidinger MFA CR (Easthampton, MA) was awarded a Massachusetts Cultural Council Artist Fellowship in Crafts in 2009.
graduate class notes
New work by NYC-based artist Shahzia Sikander MFA PT/PR (www.shahziasikander.com) was featured last fall in I am also not my own enemy, a solo show at Pilar Corrias Gallery in London.
1996 Art Craft and Hand-Mind Coordination, an article by John P. McCormack MFA FD on teaching design and making at the high school level, appeared in the Winter 2010 issue of Our Schools/Our Selves. The San Francisco-based furniture designer also recently became a master member of the Baulines Craft Guild and paddled his one-man kayak from Bellingham, WA to Prince Rupert, BC.
1997 In February Ben Snead MFA PT/ PR (Brooklyn) exhibited at Feature Inc in NYC. Earlier this spring The New Yorker (3.29.10) ran a great, eight-page feature on Julie Mehretu MFA PT/PR, who had just visited RISD for a public conversation with fellow artist Pat Steir (the focus of the Museum’s spring show Pat Steir: Drawing Out of Line). Written by Calvin Tomkins, the New Yorker
piece focused on Julie’s massive Mural (80’ long x 23’ high) for the lobby of Goldman Sachs’ new office building in lower Manhattan. Her work is also currently on view in a solo show at the Guggenheim, which continues through October 6.
1999 Having won a 2010–11 Fulbright fellowship for study abroad, Kathryn Hagy MFA PT/PR will be leaving her home in Cedar Rapids, IA to teach and do research in Kathmandu, Nepal for a year. Her work was featured in a recent solo show at Krause Gallery in Providence and in Elements of Water, a group show at the Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, CO. Kana Tanaka MFA GL (NYC/ www.kanatanaka.com) completed two major public art projects last fall, Optical Streams Part 1 & 2 at the Lafayette [CA] Library and Learning Center and Spirit of Camelback at the Scottsdale [AZ] Center for the Performing Arts. He also had an early spring solo show called KAGAMI, which just wrapped up at Chandra Cerrito Contemporary Gallery in Oakland, CA.
Noam Elyashiv MFA 94 JM Noam’s House with Chimney and Two Sheep are among her jewelry pieces on view in Drawings from Ireland, an April solo show at Gallery Loupe in Montclair, NJ. Noam teaches in the Jewelry + Metalsmithing Department at RISD.
Wendy Wahl MAE 85 Using pages of the Encyclopedia Brittanica, Wendy created Arboreal Anatomy (9 x 6 x 11’), an installation commissioned for this spring’s SOFA(Sculpture Objects & Functional Art) Fair in New York. “I love the materiality of books, and this piece is a tribute of sorts to a medium in transition,” says the RI-based artist. “I wanted the SOFA audience to think about how they get their knowledge and to question their relationships to the natural world.”
60
Spring 2010
2000
10th reunion | October 8–10 Two pieces by Alex Roskin MFA FD (Hudson, NY) were selected for inclusion in the recent NOW exhibition and sale at Phillips De Pury in Chelsea. D Wood MFA FD is currently a
PhD candidate in Design Studies at the University of Otago in New Zealand. This spring D is attending an international seminar on
design anthropology at two European universities and in July will be presenting a paper at the Oral History Society Conference at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. Susan Working MFA FD is
excited to be living in Brittany, where she is academic director of the Pont-Aven School of Contemporary Art in Pont-Aven, France. Last spring she also had a solo show at the Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Snowmass Village, CO.
2001
2002
Amy Devers MFA FD* (see
Earlier this year Robert Ladislas Derr MFA PH (Columbus, OH) presented The World Isn’t Always Round, a three-channel video and photography installation at the Moreau Art Galleries at Saint Mary’s College in Notre Dame, IN.
page 9) Photographs by Cynthia Farnell MFA PH (Conway, SC) were included in Transitive Geographies: Contemporary Visions of an Evolving South, a show that just finished its spring run at Georgia College and State University Museum in Milledgeville, GA. The exhibition featured works from her series Presence, which poetically combines local archival photos with her own contemporary images.
The Massachusetts Art Education Association has named Michelle Grohe MAE (Jamaica Plain, MA) the 2010 Massachusetts Museum Art Educator of the Year. Michelle works at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum as director of School and Teacher Programs.
Last fall Yuki Murata MID took part in Santa Fe’s Design Week, speaking as a local designer about her rug collection and its roots in her Asian heritage, her love of the natural world and her passion for authentic, joyful living. Christopher Taylor MFA PH,
who teaches in RISD’s Glass Department, earned the 2009 Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Biennial Award. This year he will teach glassblowing workshops in Turkey, Spain, and Kenya.
May Yao MFA 01 SC Swallow’s Nest (2006, hair, wood, leather, fabric, steel, light boxes, plastic, hardware, 84 x 108 x 36") and other works by May (Providence) were included in Passengers, a recent group show at the Chazan Gallery at Wheeler School in Providence. She showed with two other RISD alums, James Reynolds 84 GL and Steven Easton 84 GL*.
GREEN GOALS
When he got a call from the Clinton Foundation earlier this spring, Boback Firoozbakht didn’t have to think twice about the invitation to interview former President Bill Clinton for a special Earth Day Edition of Digg Dialogg. Following the Digg model for its interviews, his role was to ask Clinton the top six questions about climate change submitted by the Digg community. Their half-hour discussion then aired on digg.com, the Clinton Foundation site and YouTube. As a three-time participant in the annual Clinton Global Initiative University (a conference of selected students from around the world), Boback had already met the president a half a dozen times—most recently at this spring’s CGIU event in Miami. But sitting down with this extraordinary man face-to-face was a special honor: “Looking into his eyes—which are tired, but knowing—I was reminded of just how much he does for so many people around the world.” Boback believes he was invited to do the interview because people at the
Boback Firoozbakht MIA 11
Clinton Foundation “know my personality and my role in making a course in sustainability a requirement for all non-science majors at Texas University in Arlington,” he explains. After graduating from TUA with a BS in Architecture, he landed at RISD because he wanted to pursue a master’s in Interior Architecture at “the best art school in the country.” His particular interest in sustainable, adaptive reuse of existing structures is based on his goal of becoming a green developer. Underscoring that goal, Boback recently represented RISD at the 2010 Design Indaba conference held in Cape Town, South Africa, where students from the world’s leading design schools get together to discuss new ideas in sustainable design. Back in Providence after his whirlwind travels this spring, he says, “Nothing beats being in the RISD environment. For me, it’s all about the students and the high quality of work that’s produced here.” —Martina Windels MFA 88 JM 61
WHERE WE ARE
graduate class notes
2003 Seema Goel MFA SC (Maynooth
KE, Ireland) is one of five artists selected for Lovely Weather, a groundbreaking, year-long residency in Donegal, Ireland aimed at examining climate change. Seema is attempting to make the science of global warming more accessible through her carbon capture sweaters project, which uses the iconic Donegal sweater as a method of questioning local responses to climate change. Jessalyn Jarest MLA and Joseph James MLA are pleased to announce the birth of their first child, Nathan Roger James, on December 21, 2009. The family lives in Cambridge, MA.
In February Dan Price MFA SC had a solo show titled Group Theory at the Urban Institute of Contemporary Art in Grand Rapids, MI. He’s now working as an assistant professor of Sculpture at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
In March Mark Pack MFA PT participated in a three-man show called Intersections at ARTBOX in Indianapolis, IN (the city where he lives).
2005
5th reunion | October 8–10 Melissa Borrell MFA JM spoke
at the recent Society of North American Goldsmiths conference in Houston (where she lives) about the challenges of pricing work as an artist. Alice Fisk MacKenzie MFA GD
(NYC) took part in Stories from Cuba, a recent show at the Center for Latino Arts and Culture at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ. The exhibition focused on rural life, urban portraits, public art and dance in Cuba from 1970–2000.
2006 Andrew Gunnar Norquist
MFA SC is showing recent work through May 29 at AS220’s Project Space in Providence, where he lives. Eduardo Terranova MArch
(NYC) has had three solo shows since the beginning of the year: at Tinney Contemporary in Nashville, TN, Elga Wimmer Gallery in NYC and the Providence Art Club. Lindsey Meyer MArch (Mercer Island, WA) has been awarded a 2010 Fulbright fellowship for study abroad. She will travel to Fez, Morocco to research architectural building elements and artisans’ techniques as a means of promoting a sustainable economy while preserving the country’s architectural heritage.
Last December a photo/graphic poster Don Tarallo MFA GD (Bridgewater, MA) designed for Samsung was selected for inclusion in an international graphic design exhibition at Shanghai Normal University. Don also recently lectured on type and image at the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, one of China’s leading art and design schools.
Joshua Enck MFA 03 FD Crinoline (steel + patina, 48 x 27 x 36") and Septuplet Lath (reclaimed pipe, fir lath, poplar, plaster, copper, 30 x 30 x 33") are among the works Joshua exhibited in a recent solo show at AS220 in Providence and in the 2010 RISCA Fellowship Exhibition in Warren, RI. He teaches at RISD in the Foundation Studies and Furniture Design departments.
Work by Adrienne Werge MFA PH (Southbend, IN) was on view last summer in Works of Wonder at the Krasel Art Center in Saint Joseph, MI. In the fall, she installed For Such a Time As This: Remembering Vietnam at the Old Federal Building in Grand Rapids, MI and was awarded a fellowship from the Ragdale Foundation for a fall residency.
2004 Work by Louise Kohrman MFA PR was included in 10 Zea Mays Printmaking, a 10th anniversary portfolio exhibition at Zea Mays Printmaking in Florence, MA, near where she lives. Last fall Alissia MelkaTeichroew MID (Brooklyn)
co-curated Bits n’ Pieces at Material Connexion in New York. 62
Spring 2010
Thad Russell MFA 06 PH Jo Sittenfield MFA 00 PH Thad and Jo got married on December 31, 2009 and held a great reception in RISD’s atmospheric new Fleet Library. They live in Providence.
Annie Langan MFA 08 PH Earlier this year, Annie showed photographs like this in Art from the Heartland at the Indianapolis [IN] Art Center. She lives in Providence.
2007 The Ghana Think Tank, a joint project between John Ewing MFA DM, Christopher Robbins MFA DM, Matey Odonkor MFA DM and Carmen Montoya MFA DM, has been short-listed for the Frieze Foundation Cartier Award 2010, one of the world’s leading awards for emerging artists. Chris, John and Carmen are also working to bring back the WPA (the Depression-era Work Projects Administration) this summer. They plan to open branch offices in Wassaic, NY, Jamaica, Queens and hopefully, Cambridge, MA, where they’ll help each local community to identify creative
public works projects and pay people to work on the recovery of their own neighborhood. For more information and to support the WPA 2010, go to: kck.st/9jYmy8 The graduate admissions viewbook Isaac Gertman MFA GD (Brooklyn) designed for RISD was included in AIGA’s 365 exhibition in NYC recognizing the best new work in Communication Design for 2009. Peter Segerstrom MFA DM
(Brooklyn) designed the sound for Brody Condon’s recent installation Case at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in NYC. Breanne Trammell MFA 08 PR (Brooklyn) designed and printed sculptural props for the same installation.
2008
and Naomi Kaly MFA 07 DM was
Fred Besancon MLA (San
Diego, CA) and his wife Jenn had their first child, Jeffrey Besancon, on September 29, 2009. Fred’s proposal for a Berlin Wall Memorial, created when he was a student at RISD, also won a recent Award of Excellence from the American Society of Landscape Architects. Frank Chen MArch works at
Bernard Tschumi Architects in New York, where he lives. Last fall he won the Unbuilt Architecture Award from the Boston Society of Architects. Earlier this year, recent work by Heather McPherson MFA PT, Yuka Otani MFA GL, Maria del Carmen Montoya MFA 07 DM
included in FULL DISCLOSURE, a group show at Tompkins Projects in Brooklyn, where they live.
2009 Wallpaper Magazine recently cited the work of Peter Oyler MFA FD (Brooklyn) as “playful, fresh and thoughtful.” The comments referred to his body of work FOREVER YOUNG, which features irreverently joyful designs—from hammered-out cardboard seating to colorful giant rubber bands that function as wall shelves. Gigi Gatewood MFA PH
(Providence) has been awarded a 2010 Fulbright fellowship for study abroad. While living in Trinidad, she plans to explore the complexities and changes that
have taken place in recent years in the Orisha religion, and ultimately, publish a book that communicates the rich religious diversity of Trinidad.
2010 Having won a 2010 Fulbright fellowship to study in Australia, Matthew Perez MFA GL will research, test and analyze annealing factors of “shape induced stress”—a common problem in complex glass sculptures. He hopes to publish his findings and use them as departure point to create a new body of work.
ACCUMULATIONS of OPAQUE EXPERIMENTS
RHODE ISLAND SCHOOL of DESIGN
AN N UAL GRAD UATE TH ESIS EXH I B IT IO N OPENING RECEPTION MAY 20, 6–8 GradExhibition2010.risd.edu
MAY 21 – JUNE 5 2010 open daily 12 – 5 RHODE ISLAND CONVENTION CENTER Exhibition Hall A 1 Sabin St. Providence, R I
ARCHITECTURE,
CERAMICS,
D I G I TA L + M E D I A ,
FURNITURE DESIGN
GLASS, GRAPHIC DESIGN, INDUSTRIAL DESIGN, INTERIOR ARCHITECTURE J E W E L RY & M E TA L S M I T H I N G , PHOTOGRAPHY,
LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE,
PA I N T I N G
PRINTMAKING, SCULPTURE, TEXTILES
63
image by
John Maeda RISD President 64
America needs to rethink its recipe for innovation, which depends on more than a mastery of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) subject areas. Spring 2010
Adding a healthy dose of Art to the mix will create the STEAM we need to get the country going again.
Please submit your own visual commentary about what’s on your mind. Our favorite will appear in the fall issue. For details email:
risdxyz@risd.edu (subject line: drawing board)
Much of the type you’ve been reading in the new RISDXYZ is set in Antenna and Receiver.
Many RISD alumni have contributed their talents to expanding Font Bureau’s extraordinary type library over the years.
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a senior designer at
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Jesse Ragan 01 GD Font Bureau contributing type designer Dyana Weissman 02 GD Font Bureau staff type designer Benton Modern Display Kelly Ehrgott-Milligan 93 GD Belucian, Empire Tobias Frere-Jones 92 GD Armada, Asphalt, Benton Modern, Benton Sans, Cafeteria, Citadel, Eldorado, Epitaph, Garage Gothic, Grand Central, Griffith Gothic, Hightower, Interstate, Niagara, Nobel, Pilsner, Poynter Gothic Text, Poynter Oldstyle Text, Poynter Oldstyle Display, Reactor FB, Reiner Script, Stereo Elizabeth Holzman 93 GD Brok, Constructa Brian Lucid 95 GD/01 MFA Barcode, Narcissus Laurie Rosenwald 77 PT Loupot Denyse Schmidt 92 GD Scamp
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Non-Profit Org. U.S. Postage PAID
Rhode Island School of Design Two College Street Providence, RI 02903 USA
Burlington, VT 05401 Permit No. 19
october 8–10, 2010
alumni reunion + parents’ weekend risd by design 10 connect relax recharge
Return to RISD from Friday, October 8 - Sunday, October 10 for a weekend full of people you want to see, artwork and other great visual stimuli and fun things to do, like celebrating the 50th anniversary of RISD’s European Honors Program. travel + lodging suggestions: www.risd.edu/rbd more program info: rbd.risd.edu questions? contact claire at: crobinso@risd.edu | 401 454-6379
Illustration by Aaron Meshon ’95 IL (www.aaronmeshon.com)