SVA Style - Fall 2019

S STYLE

NIKKI WOODS

This BFA Design major, originally from Miami, is completing her senior year. Before SVA she spent eight years in the U.S. Army, including a deployment to Afghanistan. Nikki hopes to continue studying at SVA and get her master’s in Art Therapy. “I’d love to work in a veteran’s home and help people deal with struggles that I know personally.”

“I have a personal jeweler who wraps crystals and stones. We design them together, so each piece is one of a kind.”

“I have been into headwraps recently. I’ve been getting back into African culture. I love representing.”

“My family owns a vintage store in Miami. My aunt sent me a box of coats, and I love this one. It’s real leather, and burgundy is one of my favorite colors to wear.”

ARTIST ATTIRE OUR VETER ANS

While we love a good uniform, we were more interested in seeing the civilian style of some of our student–veterans. SVA has a proud history as a military-friendly school, which makes sense since World War II veteran Silas Rhodes co-founded the College. Even more, three-quarters of the first class of what was then known as the Cartoonists and Illustrators School were returning veterans taking advantage of the G.I. Bill.

SVA continues to attract talented veterans to its campus. For this issue of Style, we wanted to meet a few of them. We reached out to Nikki Woods (left), the president of SVA’s Veteran Coalition of Arts, and asked her if she could rally up some fellow troops willing to pose for our photographer (Gabriella Lincoln, 2019 BFA Photography and Video graduate), and tell us a bit about themselves and their goals at SVA.

On November 11, be sure to catch the NYC Veteran’s Day Parade, which begins right near campus at Fifth Avenue and 26th Street at noon. Perhaps you’ll be able to find Nikki and her fellow veterans Chris Leoni, Alex Angel and Matthew Yturralde in their military uniforms. In the meantime, check out their unique fashion on these pages.

Think you got style? Or want to nominate a fashionable pal? Send a name (and a pic, if you have one) to style@sva.edu for our next issue.

CHRIS LEONI

BFA Film major Chris spent four years in the U.S. Marines. “Growing up in Florida, it was always hot, so I could only wear shorts and boat shoes. When I got to New York, and it started to get cold, I could experiment more. I like denim and boots. I got used to wearing boots in the military.”

“Some people call my hair the Johnny Bravo look. But I call it the Chris Leoni look.”

“I bought my lion ring at a pawn shop in lower Manhattan. My last name means ‘little lion’ so it’s a symbolic representation of who I am.”

Photography by Gabriella Lincoln (2019 BFA Photography and Video)

“I started dyeing my hair when I moved to New York. I went with neon orange because I use a lot of fluorescents in my work.”

ALEX ANGEL

BFA Design senior Alex was born in California and raised in Hawaii. He spent six years in the U.S. Marines, where he was stationed in California, Virginia, Kuwait and Guinea, among other locations. He wants to pursue a career in motion graphics after graduation.

“I like shirts with intricate and abstract patterns. It reflects my art work.”

“The first shoes I bought when I got to New York were my Timberland boots. They’re influenced by military style, but more stylish and durable. Perfect for NYC winters.”

“My denim jacket has horror patches on it, including ‘Horror is my business’ patch. I get most of them on Etsy. I also wear a lot of horrorrelated T-shirts.”

MATTHEW YTURRALDE

Originally from San Diego, fourth-year BFA Film student Matthew spent six years in the U.S. Army. “I gained an interest in film watching movies to escape from military life. For years, every day after work I’d watch a movie. It was kind of my film school before film school,” he says.

“I pretty much always wear all black. Black pants, shirt and boots. Most flattering look I can have.”

(Turn the page to read about SVA Horror Society, a club Matthew co-founded.)

Ellie Lee, third-year student, BFA Illustration

SVA HORROR SOCIETY

How to Become a ZOMBIE Cover Model

Do you like horror flicks and want to meet some awesome people? Check out the SVA Horror Society. The club, co-founded by BFA Film majors Santiago Saba Salem and Matthew Yturralde, meets weekly to screen and discuss scary movies, often inviting guest speakers such as actor and producer Larry Fessenden (Habit, Wendigo), David Howard Thornton (Art the Clown from Terrifier) and William Lustig (Maniac Cop) to have Q&As post-screening. Ten people came to the first Horror Society meeting in spring 2018, and the club now has over 130 members!

What’s the appeal? “Horror movies are fun to watch as a group,” Matthew opines. Screenings are carefully curated to complement the interests of the club’s members. “We poll everyone about their favorite genres, directors—and how scared they want to be on a scale of 1 to 10,” Matthew says. What’s popular? “Horror-comedy, sci-fi and witch stuff.” Less popular are gore and torture films. “Gore for gore’s sake doesn’t play well.”

Most films are shown at the mini-theater in Room 502 at 209 East 23rd Street, but there are also outings to local theaters. “When the new Halloween movie was coming out, we realized a lot of people hadn’t seen the original. So we scheduled a screening of that, and then we went as a group to Union Square to see the new one right after.”

Another fun road trip was a creepy, comedic tour of Brooklyn with Madame Morbid’s Trolley Tours. The tickets were fully sponsored by the College. “We announced it on SVA Today, and within an hour the tickets were gone, and we had a

wait-list,” The tour company has an SVA connection—its CEO is SVA alumnus Allison Huntington Chase (2010 BFA Film). They had such a great

time, the club wants to keep in touch with the tour company. “I am thinking of doing a screening on the trolley,” Matthew says.

Fittingly, the club partnered with VASA (Visual Arts Student Association) for its popular Halloween party. “We took over the ‘quiet lane’ section at Bowlmor Lanes and decorated it in spiders and roses. We played movies on all the screens.” VASA oversees all clubs at SVA, helping them with budgets, promotion and other matters.

“We get their full support,” says Matthew. The Horror Society even won VASA’s Club of the Year award, earning an extra $100 for its budget.

“I want people to meet each other. Maybe they can partner up and make films together,” Matthew says. The club is open to all majors. “We actually have more non-filmmakers than filmmakers.”

Want to find out about the next meeting? Contact myturralde@sva.edu for more info.

10 Films to Watch This October: A Curated List from SVA Horror Society

1. Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982)

2. Trick ‘r Treat (2007)

3. A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge (1985)

4. Murder Party (2007)

5. Creepshow 2 (1987)

6. REC (2007)

7. The Descent (2005)

8. Tusk (2014)

9. Terrifier (2016)

10. Dead Snow (2009)

“My co-founder Santiago and I went to the release event for Fangoria magazine in October 2018. We got there two hours early and were first in line. The editor-in-chief was there to sign magazines, and we had a chance to talk to him and his team. We told them about our club, and they told us to stay in touch. I sent them pictures of our Q&A with David Howard Thornton. Two months later they asked if we were available for a shoot and if we could be zombies. I told Santiago and (club member) Haley Doyle, and we all showed up. We got to meet (film critic) Joe Bob Briggs and be on the cover of the magazine with him! Showing up is half the battle. You have to show up and meet people.” —Matthew

Yturralde

Madame Morbid’s Trolley Tours offers spooky excursions around Brooklyn. Its CEO is an SVA alumnus.

SKETCHBOOKS

WHERE WE WORK OUT OUR IDEAS

Colleen Preston

BFA Design, fourth-year student

“I always like to have a sketchbook around. I started this one right before I transferred to SVA. It’s a Moleskine. This is the very first spread. I was messing around with markers, colored pencils and patterns. Throughout my sketchbooks, I incorporate lyrics from bands I like. ‘I want to go home’ is from a Smiths’ song. And ‘good times’ is from the Cars.”

“I really like fish and birds as subject matter. There are many of them in my sketchbooks. This one [left] started as a drawing, but I didn’t like how it turned out, so I put some collage over it.”

Á

p “I’ve been using my sketchbook to play around with typography a lot. Here I used pigment liner and colored pencils. Before I came to SVA, I knew I wanted to go into an art-related field. I did a lot of painting at one point, but I slowly shifted more to design. I think there’s a lot you can do in design. You can go into motion or interaction design.”

SIDE GIGS

UNDERGRADS WORKING AT THE

Being a full-time art student is no doubt a hectic lifestyle, as developing a personal creative stance can permeate all of one’s waking hours and even infiltrate the dream world. But some undergrads here at SVA are able to balance their studies and source some surely welcome income via on-campus employment. The main library location at 380 Second Avenue is not only a standout collection of art, illustration, design and new media resources, and a great space to work, study and collaborate, it’s also the largest single employer of undergraduate student workers on campus, hiring more than 20 students each semester. Students help staff the computer lab, circulation desk, the picture collection and the Visual Resources Center.

Two students who worked at the library this summer, seniors Na’Shawn Jackson and Caitlyn Duffy, told us about their experiences.

Na’Shawn worked in the circulation department, where he helped keep the collection in good shape, sweeping books (collecting all the browsed books piled high in teetering stacks on tables onto a cart and back on shelves) and checking out materials for patrons. Shelf reading—checking that items are in order on the shelves—is not a glamorous task but a vital one in the library, as a misfiled book or DVD is as good as lost. It’s actually Na’Shawn’s favorite duty: “I really like to organize things, so this fits with my mind-set. It feels good when you are done.” Beyond his specific tasks, Na’Shawn holds the library in high esteem: “I like how quiet it can be. It’s very peaceful.” As far as the library’s role fitting into student life, he states that “it’s so useful as a work space for students. I think that’s the best part about it.”

not only books : library . sva . edu

Did You Know?

You can peruse through hundreds of magazines and periodicals?

✶

You can download ebooks?

✶

You can stream video through Kanopy?

✶

You can learn French (and dozens of other languages) through Mango Languages?

✶

You can teach yourself coding from Lynda.com?

Caitlyn previously worked in circulation but shifted over to periodicals and the library’s Picture Collection this summer. Before she became a

student worker, Caitlyn visited the library about once a week, using it as a study spot and to look at the extensive holdings of photography books in the collection. A Film and Video major, she mainly focuses on still photography work but has particular interests in zine-making and other publishing projects. Caitlyn’s main tasks include checking in and shelving new periodical issues, along with adding to the vast Picture Collection [1] by cutting out pictures from spare donations [2] and gluing them onto paper backing [3, 4]. These analog images number in the thousands and are arranged by subject; they can even be checked out for home usage. Caitlyn’s favorite feature of the library is the patron request policy, where students “can ask for any book they want and, within reason, it will be ordered.” She does feel that some students are not fully aware of all that the library offers, as she feels “maybe not a lot of the kids know how amazing it is.” When asked about the satellite library space on the west side, Caitlyn mentions that she has used it for both solo and collaborative study and also for printing out assignments. Her work duties have extended over there as well, where she has filmed many of the public events hosted in the west side library for digital archiving.

CAMPUS SPOTLIGHT: SVA LIBRARY

SVA LIBRARY BY DAVID SHUFORD

FOLLOW @SVALIBRARY ON INSTAGRAM, TWITTER AND FACEBOOK FOR ANNOUNCEMENTS, THE LATEST INFO AND SOME COOL STUFF.

Caitliyn Duffy (left) works at the SVA Library at 380 Second Avenue (above).

ZEN AND THE ART OF ANALOG PHOTOGRAPHY D

espite the advances of digital photography, film is not dead. In fact, it’s experiencing a resurgence, as we found out from some of our BFA Photography and Video students. “A lot of people are shooting film now,” says third-year student Abbey Gilbert. “My teacher told me a lot of students are working with film because they’re trying to have a sense of nostalgia they never had as digital natives.”

Abbey got her first analog camera—a Rolleiflex 120mm—as a gift when she was 14. “It was my grandfather’s. It got passed down to my dad, and then he gave it to me.” Since then, Abbey has gotten a Leica 35mm and a medium-format Mamiya 7.

Third-year student Carlos Becerra never touched an analog camera until he got to SVA. “Now I have many—Fuji GX680, Bronica ETR-Si, Mamiya d220— it’s become a bit of an obsession.”

With film, you are limited by the number of exposures per roll. But our students see positivity in this limitation.

“It definitely taught me a lot of patience,” Abbey says. “When you have 36 shots, you have to make those count. It costs money. It makes you really think about the composition and the moment.”

“It’s a lot more zen,” Carlos says. “You have to be more in tune with your gear and

with your vision. You need to know what it is that you want to take an image that has an impact.”

Abby adds, “It’s taught me when to wait for the right moment and not just click away. Even when I use a digital camera now, I don’t take nearly as many shots as I would have before.”

Abbey had been shooting with color slide film (Fuji Velvia) but admits the medium is tricky. “You can easily mess it up. But if you get it right, it’s so beautiful. A more forgiving film would be Kodak Portra 160.” Carlos also uses slide film (Kodak Ektachrome): “It’s pretty expensive, like $13 a roll, but the colors are really great. There’s something about seeing the final image on the film itself—it just has a certain effect on me.”

FAMOUS FOOTSTEPS

Many of the analog cameras favored by our students were used when they were cutting-edge technology by the world’s most important photographers. See who used what on the right.

While the film may be pricey, you can mitigate the cost by getting good deals on old cameras. “Some of the cameras are a lot cheaper than the top-of-the-line digital camera,” says Carlos. “And you get tremendous quality from the images.”

Where do they suggest buying cameras? “I buy them mostly off of eBay,” Carlos says. “I spent a lot of time searching through listings trying to find the best bang for my buck.” Abbey suggests eBay as well, but cautions: “Make sure the buyer credentials are good. Otherwise, you could end up with a broken camera.” She adds, “B&H has a good refurbished section. And ask your family if they have old cameras.”

You can see more of our students’ work at abbeygilbert.com and on Instagram: @carlos.takespictures.

@CAR

LEICA 35 mm Camera

Ansel Adams

Helmut Newton

Robert Capa

Diane Arbus

Vivian Maier

Henri-Cartier-Bresson

Photo by Abbey Gilbert

Photo by Abbey Gilbert

Photo by Carlos Becerra

SVA CRIBS

IRVING PLACE PICKS

NEARBY THE GRAMERCY RESIDENCE is Irving Place, one of the city’s prettiest streets, which runs six blocks from East 14th Street to Gramercy Park South. “It’s a quiet, leafy neighborhood that feels really secluded, but you’re no more than a couple of blocks away from Manhattan’s bustle,” says Tara. Treat yourself to a stroll down this street, and here are a few suggestions for a stop.

FRIEND OF A FARMER

Ydistributed only to the buildings on the park’s periphery. So, if you live in Gramercy Women’s Residence, you can get access. “I visited the park in the spring to see the flowers,” resident and BFA Illustration student Tara Anand tells us.

GORGEOUS VIEWS AND ACCESS TO THE PARK

Another great perk for Gramercy residents is the view from its rooftop. Tara’s suitemate, Ellie Lee, says, “I’m up there all the time. I hang out, listen to music, do homework. The view is amazing, especially at night.” Tara agrees: “It is definitely the biggest plus in this building. At the beginning of the fall the staff host a barbecue up there, which is really lovely.”

If you don’t live at this residence but yearn to go for a stroll inside Gramercy Park or get a bird’s-eye view of it from the rooftop, you could try to buddy up to one of the residents.“We can have up to two guests at a time,” Ellie says. “And whoever has keys to the park can bring anyone with them.” Maybe stop by Irving Place (see sidebar) to bribe some residents with some pastries or cheese.

Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and charming inside and out.

IRVING FARM

Offering coffee and light bites, this no-WiFi zone encourages you to unplug.

BEDFORD CHEESE SHOP

“They have the best grilled cheese sandwiches,” Tara says.

Ludlow Residence

My

ART

“I find a lot of inspiration on the Lower East Side. There is just so much to do and explore around here. It makes you open up to things you didn’t know about and haven’t experienced before.”

Check out the video of Sahar’s crib and others at sva.edu/video/cribs

“I love the view from the rooftop. You look down into Gramercy Park, and all around are skyscrapers that light up at night.”

Ellie Lee, third-year Illustration student

The 15th-floor room affords great views and a wide windowsill provides a perfect perch to look out from.

Sahar decorates her space with plants and her favorite possessions: books.

Sahar uses colorful throw pillows to make her space more comforting.

Ludlow Residence and the neighborhood as imagined by 2019 BFA Illustration graduate Patrick Edell.

Downtown Home SAHAR KHRAIBANI

WRITING STUDENT ON LES LIVING

©2019 VISUAL ARTS PRESS, LTD.

Anthony P. Rhodes, executive creative director

Gail Anderson, creative director

Brian E. Smith, design director

Sheilah Ledwidge, editor, writer

Designers: Marco Accardo, José Antonio Contreras, Mo Hinojosa, Shantanu Sharma

Photography: Marco Accardo, Shantanu

Sharma, Diana Egnatz, Sam Morgan, Steven Birnbaum

sva.edu

Jan Morales, BFA Photography and Video

Shantanu Sharma, BFA Design

Nicole Kupferman, BFA Design

Giulia Aguiar, BFA Film

Will Colpoys, BFA Animation