From the Dean’s Desk
Dear Colleagues,
I want to begin by expressing my profound gratitude for all your hard work this year. The CVPA and the Schools have taken on several significant projects on top of the usual academic responsibilities. Your dedication and abilities have been demonstrated through your efforts on the Cohort Hire and Strategic Planning process. Working together, discussing and managing differences of opinion in productive ways, and collaborating across schools, disciplines, and points of view have all contributed to these successful outcomes. I am truly inspired by the remarkable achievements that you have accomplished this year, including your outstanding scholarship and creative activity, robust recruitment of the next class of CVPA Dukes, thoughtful engagement with change and new ideas, successful accreditation visits for the School of Music and the School of Art, Design, and Art History, and high-level performances and exhibitions of student and faculty work, among many others.
I am pleased to announce that the Cohort Hire process is almost complete, with just one position still finalizing the process. The positive feedback we have received from those who served on the Omnibus Committee and Position Committees is encouraging. We will soon debrief the process for the committee members and send out a survey to get feedback from those who were not on the committees but participated in the process. Once the final search is complete, we will send a welcome announcement for the entire cohort.
The Strategic Planning process is also almost finished, and we anticipate sharing the finalized plan by mid-May. Thank you for all your feedback in the process, which has greatly helped the Dean’s Advisory Committee and the CVPA Academic Council. I am confident that the input from the CVPA community has driven decision-making and increased understanding of the collective perspectives of our community at every stage.
I want to remind you that the Equity Workload project is underway, and we held an informative workshop on March 31. If you missed it, you can watch the recording by clicking on this LINK. We know this will be a big project for CVPA in the 23-24 academic year, but the positive outcomes from this work will be worth the effort.
With so much going on week-to-week, it can be easy to overlook our successes and efforts. I invite you to join us in celebrating at our upcoming event, the CVPA End-of-Year College meeting on Friday, May 12 from 3-4 pm in the Forbes Center Mainstage followed by a reception in the Forbes Center Grand Lobby from 4-5 pm. You are encouraged to RSVP using this link so we can order food accordingly.
I want to express how proud I am to be your colleague and how impressed I am with your work this year. Thank you again for your commitment to excellence and dedication to our community.
Warmest regards,
RubénCohort Hire Update
CVPA has nearly completed its 11-person Integrative Arts Cohort Hire! Dean Graciani envisioned this project to strategically connect vacant faculty lines in all three schools across a common theme of integrative arts, conceived as combining artistic and/or disciplinary perspectives and/or practices around contemporary issues. This may include—but is not limited to—cross-, inter-, multi-, and trans-disciplinary work. We are excited to be welcoming new colleagues who will collaborate to develop courses, curricula, and research agendas that support these practices and advance CVPA’s commitments to access, diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice, while complementing and expanding our existing strengths in anti-bias/anti-racist pedagogy, artmaking, arts and technology, community engagement, culturally-sustaining practice, design justice, design thinking, educator preparation, entrepreneurial thinking, and design- or arts-based research.
While faculty members from each school served on numerous position committees that helped to facilitate this monumental effort, in this CVPA newsletter, we also wish to recognize our colleagues who served on the cohort hire’s omnibus committee, working across all 11 positions. Before you leave for the summer, please take time to thank: Audrey Barnes (SADAH), Ryan Corriston (STAD), Jon Gibson (SOM), Kyle Hackett (SADAH), Diane Phoenix-Neal (SOM), Rachel Rhoades (STAD), Hannah Sions (SADAH) and Ian Zook (SOM).
Thanks to many colleagues’ hard work, we are excited that these ten individuals will be joining us in Fall 2023 (and hope to announce our eleventh appointment soon!):
• Leah Anderson, Assistant Professor of Acting/Performance (STAD)
• Tara Burns, Assistant Professor of Dance and Technology (STAD)
• Rachel Grimsby, Assistant Professor of Music (Music Education) (SOM)
• Masa Ishiwkawa, Assistant Professor of Music (Jazz Piano) (SOM)
• Dylan Krueger, Assistant Professor of Architectural Design (SADAH)
• Gui Hwan Lee, Assistant Professor of Music (Music Theory) (SOM)
• Kate Lumpkin, Assistant Professor of Musical Theatre (STAD)
• Simon Marland, Assistant Professor of Sound Design (STAD)
• Traci Wile, Assistant Professor of Architectural Design (SADAH)
• Sangjun Yoo, Assistant Professor of Graphic Design (SADAH)
From the Dean’s Office
Exuberance: Dialogues in African American Abstraction exhibition catalogue is now available, co-authored by Susan Zurbrigg, Assistant Dean of CVPA and Professor of Art and Beth Hinderliter, Associate Professor of Art History and Director of the Duke Hall Gallery of Art. “Exuberance celebrates African American painters and challenges commonly held mindsets about abstract art and who makes it. This focused presentation of paintings features a range of works from the 1950s to present day, forging cross-generational dialogues about racial identity, dynamics of color and of pattern, as well as space, rhythm, and movement” (University of Virginia Press). More info here.
New Works from Ingrid De Sanctis
Associate Professor of Theatre, Ingrid De Sanctis, was granted Educational Leave in fall 2022 to focus on completing two new works; the development of a one woman show and the writing of a full-length play as well as engaging in additional work as an actor and playwright. Soon after graduation in May 2022, she was involved in a new play development process in Marfa, Texas working for a play about the life of Dr. Kevorkian, Last Rights, by Mark Charney and Cory Norman. Cast by award-winning theatre director, writer, actor, and acting teacher, James Kerr, she was the only American working with a company of London actors developing Last Rights, which is being considered for production at several theaters after successful workshops in DC, London and Marfa, TX.
During the summer and into fall, she completed her solo play, the things I forgot and went into a rehearsal in January for its premiere at Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) in February 2023. the things I forgot will perform next year at Fire Exit Theatre in Edmonton, Canada, Malone University, The Seat of our Pants theatre company, and in a solo festival at EMU. Her fulllength play, The Three of Us (also titled14 Days) had a first draft reading for students and faculty in STAD in December, then a reading at the Rose Theatre in DC/NOVA in March and will be workshopped/produced in collaboration with Texas Tech University with the support from a development grant from CVPA. The Three of Us is a two person play set in a kitchen and in an effort to engage in a creative process, focused on environmentally responsible practices. The play will be done in a kitchen in Lubbock, Texas.
In addition to her primary projects, identified for her leave, her play, Hands of Clay, was selected to be workshopped with a reading at the Comparative Drama Conference at Rollins College in April. As an actor, she worked as a reader in two plays for the First Draft play readings series and on a podcast, Rose Rhapsody, with the Rose Theatre company in the fall and spring semesters.
After teaching a solo performance class in the fall of 2021, and working with students writing their first solos, she will be producing and directing JMU graduate Aya Nassif’s Solo play developed in that class, Peanut Butter and Just Shut Up premiering in October 2023 at Eastern Mennonite University.
The Madison Art Collection (MAC) is excited to now be accessible through the free Cuseum app! The app allows anyone with a smart phone to access MAC in the palm of their hand. Users will be able to peruse exhibitions, collection objects, and behind-the-scenes multimedia. Student interns assist with writing and uploading content, allowing them to gain skills on industry-specific software.
The digital tool of MAC will expand this fall with the launch of TMS (The Museum System). This collections management software will not only allow interns and staff to catalogue and cross-reference objects, but also to increase the accessibility of the collection. Once online, TMS enables anyone with internet access to see object data and images. Utilized by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the V&A in London, TMS will engage students in the process of digitization and data management.
Have an iPhone? Scan below to download the Cuseum app via the App Store!
MAC recently launched its own line of merchandise, with 10% of all proceeds going towards collection care and management. Start shopping now!
Madison Award for the Public Good
Dr. Anthony Fauci is this year’s recipient of the Madison Award for the Public Good, which acknowledges outstanding community leaders. Each year, a professor in the School of Art, Design, and Art History is commissioned to design an original artwork to be presented to the awardee. This year, Professor Greg Stewart, who specializes in Sculpture, collaborated with his student, Olivia Luke, to reimagine the award.
Professor Stewart reflected on the meaning of the public good, and he concluded that it encompasses someone who is cognizant of the past, involved in the present, and has a vision for the future. With this in mind, he subverted the traditional concept of a trophy and fashioned a small seed library of plants that are indigenous to Virginia. These plants carry genetic material from the past but are cultivated in the present to create future ecosystems. The container is made of red oak, a byproduct from previous sculpture projects.
Click here to see the Madison Vision Series with Jim Acosta and Dr. Anthony Fauci followed by a video on the creation of the award.
Provost Award Winner
Hannah Kim Sions, Ph.D (she/ella), is Assistant Professor of Art Education in James Madison University’s School of Art, Design and Art History. Sions was an elementary art teacher for six years before pursuing her Ph.D. As an itinerant art teacher, she taught at four schools over the course of her six years, teaching in rural, suburban and urban settings. Her experiences helped her recognize the complexities of inequality and inspired her to learn more about how to better serve her student population. Sions’ research foci are equity and justice-centered pedagogy through an intersectional and critical race lens. She has published on these topics in Art Education, Journal of Cultural Research in Art Education, and Journal of Social Theory in Art Education More info here.
Songtuary in the Arboretum, Brought to JMU by OCP
Craig Green and Celo Keller facilitate the Harrisonburg Songtuary, a community singing circle that combines elements of contemplation and play. At the Arboretum in JMU, participants come together and enthusiastically sing songs and chants, promoting the empowerment and growth of their community through music.
For future session or more information, visit https://www.songtuary.org/.
