Division of the Arts News by Date
February 2025
02-04-2025
At the 68th annual Obie Awards, the American Theatre Wing presented Assistant Dean of Students Corey Sullivan ’03 and other members of his arts collective, Theater Mitu, the Ross Wetzsteon Award for sustained innovation in the field. Theater Mitu was originally formed through Sullivan’s collaborations as an undergraduate at Bard.
In 2001, then an undergraduate, Sullivan began collaborating with visiting artists on a production for Bard’s Theater and Performance Program. Their work together continued beyond the show’s run, and soon after, Sullivan joined the group in forming an interdisciplinary arts collective called Theater Mitu. Since then they have worked together to push the boundaries of theater through innovative productions, global research and education initiatives, programs supporting emerging artists, and the creation of their Brooklyn-based performance and technology center, MITU580.
Theater Mitu will be in residence at the Boston Museum of Science and Arts Emerson in spring 2025 to present Utopian Hotline, a project developed in partnership with the SETI Institute and Arizona State University’s Interplanetary Initiative. Part telephone hotline, part vinyl record, and part live performance, Utopian Hotline uses real voicemails left on a public hotline to create a moment of community—inviting audience members to re-imagine our shared future. Inspired by the 1977 NASA Voyager mission, which launched a vinyl-style recording of sounds found on Earth into space, as well as the uncertainty surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic, this immersive performance begs the question: “If we were to send another message into the distant future, what message would we send?”
Last summer, Theater Mitu premiered (HOLY) BLOOD! at their Brooklyn space, MITU580. Part live-scored silent film, part irreverent midnight movie, the piece created an original live soundscape merged with manipulated fragments of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s cult-classic film Santa Sangre. Projected across a shattered landscape of screens and sculpture, accompanied by explosive blood choreography enclosed in glass booths, the work remapped a story of circuses, blood cults, madness, and forgiveness.
For more information on the company’s work, visit www.theatermitu.org
In 2001, then an undergraduate, Sullivan began collaborating with visiting artists on a production for Bard’s Theater and Performance Program. Their work together continued beyond the show’s run, and soon after, Sullivan joined the group in forming an interdisciplinary arts collective called Theater Mitu. Since then they have worked together to push the boundaries of theater through innovative productions, global research and education initiatives, programs supporting emerging artists, and the creation of their Brooklyn-based performance and technology center, MITU580.
Theater Mitu will be in residence at the Boston Museum of Science and Arts Emerson in spring 2025 to present Utopian Hotline, a project developed in partnership with the SETI Institute and Arizona State University’s Interplanetary Initiative. Part telephone hotline, part vinyl record, and part live performance, Utopian Hotline uses real voicemails left on a public hotline to create a moment of community—inviting audience members to re-imagine our shared future. Inspired by the 1977 NASA Voyager mission, which launched a vinyl-style recording of sounds found on Earth into space, as well as the uncertainty surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic, this immersive performance begs the question: “If we were to send another message into the distant future, what message would we send?”
Last summer, Theater Mitu premiered (HOLY) BLOOD! at their Brooklyn space, MITU580. Part live-scored silent film, part irreverent midnight movie, the piece created an original live soundscape merged with manipulated fragments of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s cult-classic film Santa Sangre. Projected across a shattered landscape of screens and sculpture, accompanied by explosive blood choreography enclosed in glass booths, the work remapped a story of circuses, blood cults, madness, and forgiveness.
For more information on the company’s work, visit www.theatermitu.org
Photo: Assistant Dean of Students Corey Sullivan ’03.
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Staff | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Dean of Student Affairs,Dean of Student Affairs,Division of the Arts,Theater and Performance Program,Theater Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Staff | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Dean of Student Affairs,Dean of Student Affairs,Division of the Arts,Theater and Performance Program,Theater Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
02-03-2025
Ephraim Asili MFA ’11, associate professor and director of film and electronic arts, has been selected as one of 50 artists to receive a 2025 United States Artists (USA) Fellowship. Each year, individual artists and collaboratives are anonymously nominated to apply by a geographically diverse and rotating group of artists, scholars, critics, producers, curators, and other arts professionals. USA Fellowships are annual $50,000 unrestricted awards recognizing the most compelling artists working and living in the United States, in all disciplines, at every stage of their career.
“My approach to filmmaking is both hybrid and experimental. My films often alternate between essayistic or observational documentary form, narrative fiction, and self-reflexive gestures which foreground how the film medium itself, and the filmmaker using it, frame lived experience,” says Asili.
Ephraim Asili is an African American artist and educator whose work focuses on the African diaspora as a cultural force. Often inspired by his quotidian wanderings, Asili creates art that situates itself as a series of meditations on the everyday. He received his BA in Film and Media Arts from Temple University and his MFA in Film and Interdisciplinary Art at Bard College. Asili’s films have screened in festivals and venues all over the world, including the New York Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, The Berlinale, and the International Film Festival Rotterdam. Asili’s 2020 feature debut The Inheritance premiered at the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival and was recently the focus of an exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art where it is a part of their permanent collection. In 2021 Asili was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. During the summer of 2022 Asili directed a short film Strange Math along with the 2023 Men’s Spring/Summer fashion show for Louis Vuitton. In 2023, Asili was the recipient of a Harvard Radcliffe Fellowship, and in 2024 Asili was awarded a grant from Creative Capital.
Sancia Miala Shiba Nash '19 and Drew K. Broderick MA ’19 of kekahi wahi also won a 2025 United States Artists fellowship. kekahi wahi was instigated in 2020 by filmmaker Sancia Miala Shiba Nash and artist Drew K. Broderick. The grassroots film initiative is committed to documenting transformations across the Hawaiian archipelago and sharing stories of the greater Pacific through time-based media.
“My approach to filmmaking is both hybrid and experimental. My films often alternate between essayistic or observational documentary form, narrative fiction, and self-reflexive gestures which foreground how the film medium itself, and the filmmaker using it, frame lived experience,” says Asili.
Ephraim Asili is an African American artist and educator whose work focuses on the African diaspora as a cultural force. Often inspired by his quotidian wanderings, Asili creates art that situates itself as a series of meditations on the everyday. He received his BA in Film and Media Arts from Temple University and his MFA in Film and Interdisciplinary Art at Bard College. Asili’s films have screened in festivals and venues all over the world, including the New York Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, The Berlinale, and the International Film Festival Rotterdam. Asili’s 2020 feature debut The Inheritance premiered at the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival and was recently the focus of an exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art where it is a part of their permanent collection. In 2021 Asili was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. During the summer of 2022 Asili directed a short film Strange Math along with the 2023 Men’s Spring/Summer fashion show for Louis Vuitton. In 2023, Asili was the recipient of a Harvard Radcliffe Fellowship, and in 2024 Asili was awarded a grant from Creative Capital.
Sancia Miala Shiba Nash '19 and Drew K. Broderick MA ’19 of kekahi wahi also won a 2025 United States Artists fellowship. kekahi wahi was instigated in 2020 by filmmaker Sancia Miala Shiba Nash and artist Drew K. Broderick. The grassroots film initiative is committed to documenting transformations across the Hawaiian archipelago and sharing stories of the greater Pacific through time-based media.
Photo: Ephraim Asili MFA ’11, associate professor of film and electronic arts and director of the Film and Electronic Arts Program. Photo by Lou Jones
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Faculty | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Film,Film and Electronic Arts Program,Master of Fine Arts (Bard MFA) | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,MFA |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Faculty | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Film,Film and Electronic Arts Program,Master of Fine Arts (Bard MFA) | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,MFA |
January 2025
01-21-2025
Dark Star and Grey Wolf, two new series of photographs by An-My Lê, Charles Franklin Kellogg and Grace E. Ramsey Kellogg Professor in the Arts at Bard College, are now on view at Marian Goodman Gallery in New York, writes Musée Magazine. Each series begins with opposite perspectives, with Dark Star presenting starscapes taken in Mesa Verde in Colorado as it might have been observed 1,400 years ago, and Grey Wolf revealing political landscapes in aerial photos of Montana land used for large-scale agriculture and military facilities. “With her more oblique depictions of conflict and geopolitical subjects, Lê presents images with layered, instead of explicit, meaning—allowing space for the viewer to construct their own ideas and draw their own conclusions,” writes Rae Quinn for Musée Magazine.
Photo: An-My Lê, Charles Franklin Kellogg and Grace E. Ramsey Kellogg Professor in the Arts.
Meta: Type(s): Article,Faculty,Staff | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Photography Program |
Meta: Type(s): Article,Faculty,Staff | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Photography Program |
01-07-2025
Five Bard College students have been awarded highly competitive Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarships by the US Department of State. Gilman Scholars receive up to $5,000, or up to $8,000 if also a recipient of the Gilman Critical Need Language Award, to apply toward their study abroad or internship program costs. This cohort of Gilman scholars, who will study or intern in over 90 countries, represents more than 500 US colleges and universities.
Bard College Mathematics and Italian Studies double major Ezra Calderon ’25, from Harlem, New York, has been awarded a Gilman Scholarship to study at the University of Trento in Italy via exchange, for the spring semester 2025. “This scholarship provides an exciting opportunity to improve my language skills and conduct research while abroad for my Senior Project in Italian Studies,” says Calderon.
Bard College Studio Art major Adelaide Driver ’26, from Taos, New Mexico, has been awarded a $4000 Gilman Scholarship to study at Kyoto Seika University in Japan, for the spring semester 2025. “Receiving this scholarship means the world to me. I have always wanted to study abroad, but money was a concern. This scholarship provides the opportunity to study what I love in an incredible place. I am so grateful,” says Driver. She serves as a peer counselor at Bard and will be studying illustration at Kyoto Seika.
Bard College junior Dashely Julia ’26, who is jointly majoring in Architecture and Art History with a concentration in Latin American and Iberian studies, has been awarded a $3000 Gilman Scholarship to study at Bard College Berlin in Germany, for the spring semester 2025. “Winning the Gilman Scholarship holds profound significance for me. It represents the opportunity to engage with diverse cultures and gain new perspectives that will enrich my understanding of art history and architecture. As someone deeply passionate about exploring how cultural and historical contexts shape artistic and architectural practices, studying abroad is more than an academic pursuit—it is a lifelong dream come true,” says Julia, who is a Posse Puerto Rico Scholar and lead peer mentor for the Office of Equity and Inclusion at Bard.
Bard College Computer Science major Nyla Lawrence ’26, from Atlanta, Georgia, has been awarded a $5,000 Gilman scholarship to study at National Sun Yat-sen University in Taiwan via exchange, for the spring semester 2025. “My grandmother told me this quote from Derek Bok: ‘If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.’ There is always something to be ignorant about but, I am happy the Gilman Scholarship provides others and myself the ability to learn more about the world while also studying. Studying abroad not only allows for broader education opportunities, but also life lessons and responsibility before exiting college, which I am really excited for,” says Lawrence, who will be learning Mandarin, her third language after English and German, to better communicate and traverse the land. Lawrence is currently one of three captains of the Bard women’s volleyball team and the Katherine Lynne Mester Memorial Scholar in Humanities for the 2024–2025 academic year at Bard.
Bard College Psychology major Brenda Lopez ’26, from Bronx, New York, has been awarded a $3,000 Gilman scholarship to study at Kyung Hee University in Seoul via exchange, for the spring semester 2025. “I couldn’t be more grateful, and I can’t wait to see how this scholarship helps me when spending my time in Korea,” says Lopez. At Bard, Lopez is part of the Trustee Leader Scholar Project Nicaragua Education Initiative and a clubhead for the K-DIARY club on campus.
The Department of State awarded the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship to approximately 1,600 American undergraduate students from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, in this fall 2024 cycle. All scholarship recipients are US undergraduate students with established high financial need as federal Pell Grant recipients. On average, 65 percent of Gilman recipients are from rural areas and small towns across the United States, and half are first-generation college or university students.
Since the program’s inception in 2001, more than 44,000 Gilman scholars have studied or interned in more than 170 countries around the globe. Supported by the US Congress, the Gilman Scholarship is an initiative of the US Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and is aided in its implementation by the Institute of International Education. To learn more about the Gilman Scholarship and its recipients, including this newest cohort, visit gilmanscholarship.org.
Bard College Mathematics and Italian Studies double major Ezra Calderon ’25, from Harlem, New York, has been awarded a Gilman Scholarship to study at the University of Trento in Italy via exchange, for the spring semester 2025. “This scholarship provides an exciting opportunity to improve my language skills and conduct research while abroad for my Senior Project in Italian Studies,” says Calderon.
Bard College Studio Art major Adelaide Driver ’26, from Taos, New Mexico, has been awarded a $4000 Gilman Scholarship to study at Kyoto Seika University in Japan, for the spring semester 2025. “Receiving this scholarship means the world to me. I have always wanted to study abroad, but money was a concern. This scholarship provides the opportunity to study what I love in an incredible place. I am so grateful,” says Driver. She serves as a peer counselor at Bard and will be studying illustration at Kyoto Seika.
Bard College junior Dashely Julia ’26, who is jointly majoring in Architecture and Art History with a concentration in Latin American and Iberian studies, has been awarded a $3000 Gilman Scholarship to study at Bard College Berlin in Germany, for the spring semester 2025. “Winning the Gilman Scholarship holds profound significance for me. It represents the opportunity to engage with diverse cultures and gain new perspectives that will enrich my understanding of art history and architecture. As someone deeply passionate about exploring how cultural and historical contexts shape artistic and architectural practices, studying abroad is more than an academic pursuit—it is a lifelong dream come true,” says Julia, who is a Posse Puerto Rico Scholar and lead peer mentor for the Office of Equity and Inclusion at Bard.
Bard College Computer Science major Nyla Lawrence ’26, from Atlanta, Georgia, has been awarded a $5,000 Gilman scholarship to study at National Sun Yat-sen University in Taiwan via exchange, for the spring semester 2025. “My grandmother told me this quote from Derek Bok: ‘If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.’ There is always something to be ignorant about but, I am happy the Gilman Scholarship provides others and myself the ability to learn more about the world while also studying. Studying abroad not only allows for broader education opportunities, but also life lessons and responsibility before exiting college, which I am really excited for,” says Lawrence, who will be learning Mandarin, her third language after English and German, to better communicate and traverse the land. Lawrence is currently one of three captains of the Bard women’s volleyball team and the Katherine Lynne Mester Memorial Scholar in Humanities for the 2024–2025 academic year at Bard.
Bard College Psychology major Brenda Lopez ’26, from Bronx, New York, has been awarded a $3,000 Gilman scholarship to study at Kyung Hee University in Seoul via exchange, for the spring semester 2025. “I couldn’t be more grateful, and I can’t wait to see how this scholarship helps me when spending my time in Korea,” says Lopez. At Bard, Lopez is part of the Trustee Leader Scholar Project Nicaragua Education Initiative and a clubhead for the K-DIARY club on campus.
The Department of State awarded the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship to approximately 1,600 American undergraduate students from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, in this fall 2024 cycle. All scholarship recipients are US undergraduate students with established high financial need as federal Pell Grant recipients. On average, 65 percent of Gilman recipients are from rural areas and small towns across the United States, and half are first-generation college or university students.
Since the program’s inception in 2001, more than 44,000 Gilman scholars have studied or interned in more than 170 countries around the globe. Supported by the US Congress, the Gilman Scholarship is an initiative of the US Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and is aided in its implementation by the Institute of International Education. To learn more about the Gilman Scholarship and its recipients, including this newest cohort, visit gilmanscholarship.org.
Photo: Clockwise from top left: Bard College Gilman Scholars Brenda Lopez ’26, Dashely Julia ’26, Adelaide Driver ’26, Nyla Lawrence ’26, Ezra Calderon ’25.
Meta: Type(s): Student | Subject(s): Architecture Program,Art History and Visual Culture,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Computer Science,Division of Languages and Literature,Division of Science, Math, and Computing,Division of Social Studies,Division of the Arts,Inclusive Excellence,Interdivisional Studies,Italian Studies,Mathematics Program,Psychology,Psychology Program,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Student | Subject(s): Architecture Program,Art History and Visual Culture,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Computer Science,Division of Languages and Literature,Division of Science, Math, and Computing,Division of Social Studies,Division of the Arts,Inclusive Excellence,Interdivisional Studies,Italian Studies,Mathematics Program,Psychology,Psychology Program,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
01-07-2025
Jeffrey Gibson, artist in residence at Bard College, reflects on 2024—a year that started with Gibson being honored as the first Indigenous and openly queer artist to have a solo representation of the US Pavilion in Venice Biennale and continued with MASS MoCA’s commissioning of Power Full Because We’re Different, the largest single museum installation in his career—in an interview with Artnet. Gibson notes the opening events of the Venice Biennale as a personal highlight of 2024 “because of the sheer joy felt by myself and many other Native and Indigenous people who traveled to Venice to celebrate together and bring life to the installation through music, dance, poetry and performance. To see how the images ricocheted through Indian Country in the US was thrilling.” He also mentions Indian Theater: Native Performance, Art, and Self Determination since 1969, organized by Fellow in Indigenous Art History and Curatorial Studies at Bard Candice Hopkins CCS ’03, at the Hessel Museum of Art, as one of the best exhibitions that he saw in 2024. “It is the kind of exhibition that I have been waiting for and it established a fresh starting point for many when considering the history of Native American Art,” says Gibson.
Further reading:
Center for Indigenous Studies’ Three-Day Convening at the Venice Biennale Featured in Hyperallergic
Further reading:
Center for Indigenous Studies’ Three-Day Convening at the Venice Biennale Featured in Hyperallergic
Photo: Jeffrey Gibson. Photo by Brian Barlow
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): American and Indigenous Studies Program,Bard Graduate Programs,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Center for Curatorial Studies (CCS Bard),Center for Indigenous Studies,Division of the Arts,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Center for Curatorial Studies |
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): American and Indigenous Studies Program,Bard Graduate Programs,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Center for Curatorial Studies (CCS Bard),Center for Indigenous Studies,Division of the Arts,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Center for Curatorial Studies |
01-07-2025
Bard Distinguished Artist in Residence and Assistant Professor of American and Indigenous Studies Kite MFA ’18 was profiled in the multimedia hub I Care If You Listen. The piece focuses on Kite’s two-day residency at the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center at Rensselaer (EMPAC) where she led seven students through a workshop on dreaming, then let them create and perform their own visual scores based on their dreams. “It’s great to get to work with the students here,” Kite said. “Wrangling crazy ideas, organizing them into something sensible, being sensitive to your audience’s needs, and being careful with time, being self aware—those are all skills I can share.”
Kite joined Bard in 2023 and has worked in the field of machine learning since 2017. She develops wearable technology and full-body software systems to interrogate past, present, and future Lakȟóta philosophies. She is also the director of the Wihanble S’a Center for Indigenous AI at Bard. I Care If You Listen describes her work as “[uniting] scientific and artistic disciplines through custom worn electronic instruments, research, visual scores, and more… rooted in Lakota ways of making knowledge, in which body and mind are always intimately intertwined.”
Kite joined Bard in 2023 and has worked in the field of machine learning since 2017. She develops wearable technology and full-body software systems to interrogate past, present, and future Lakȟóta philosophies. She is also the director of the Wihanble S’a Center for Indigenous AI at Bard. I Care If You Listen describes her work as “[uniting] scientific and artistic disciplines through custom worn electronic instruments, research, visual scores, and more… rooted in Lakota ways of making knowledge, in which body and mind are always intimately intertwined.”
Photo: Kite.
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Faculty | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,American and Indigenous Studies Program,Artificial Intelligence,Bard Graduate Programs,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Center for Indigenous Studies,Division of the Arts,Interdivisional Studies,Master of Fine Arts (Bard MFA),Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,MFA |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Faculty | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,American and Indigenous Studies Program,Artificial Intelligence,Bard Graduate Programs,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Center for Indigenous Studies,Division of the Arts,Interdivisional Studies,Master of Fine Arts (Bard MFA),Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,MFA |
December 2024
12-10-2024
Six Bard College faculty members have been named as recipients of grants from the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) for 2025. NYSCA Support for Organizations grants were awarded to Erika Switzer, assistant professor of music and director of the Postgraduate Collaborative Piano Fellowship at Bard, Lucy Fitz Gibbon, visiting faculty in vocal arts at the Bard College Conservatory of Music, Sarah Hennies, visiting assistant professor of music, and Suzanne Kite, distinguished artist in residence, assistant professor of American and Indigenous Studies and director of the Wihanble S’a Center for Indigenous AI at Bard. Additionally, Bard College received a Support for Organizations Award for 2025 in the amount of $40,000. NYSCA Support for Artist grants were awarded to DN Bashir, assistant professor of theater and performance at Bard, and Ann Lauterbach, professor of languages and literature.The NYSCA grants are intended to increase access to arts funding and recognize the substantial economic and social impact of New York state’s arts and culture sector.
Erika Switzer and Lucy Fitz Gibbon will receive a grant in support of operational expenses and projects at Sparks & Wiry Cries, an organization, cofounded by Switzer and where Fitz Gibbon serves as managing editor, that curates opportunities for art song creators, performers, and scholars with innovative initiatives. These projects will include the upcoming Brooklyn premieres of Meltdown, a dramatic work for mezzo and piano trio which engages the layered stories and science of climate change through the lens of a female glaciologist, and Skymother, which weaves together the family history of composer Timothy Long (Choctaw, Muscogee Creek) with the Haudenosaunee creation story, Sky Woman.
Sarah Hennies, along with her duo partner, Tristan Kasten-Krause, a bassist and composer, will receive the grant for their new work Saccades for double bass and percussion at the Wassaic Project, an artist-run nonprofit contemporary art gallery, artist residency, and art education center. The piece is to be performed in total darkness with a single candle flame.
Suzanne Kite will receive a grant for the proposed project, Owáǧo Uŋkíhaŋblapi (We Dream a Score), her first full orchestral work for her organizational partner, the American Composers Orchestra (ACO). The piece continues Kite’s exploration of individual, collective, and societal dreaming practices, using an Indigenous AI framework. NYSCA funding supports the development of an AI app in collaboration with the Brooklyn-based design firm School. Members of the ACO and the public will submit their dreams to the app, which transforms language into Lakȟóta Visual Language symbols.
DN Bashir’s Hollow House, sponsored by JACK Arts Incorporated, follows a group of New York residents meeting at a farm-to-table restaurant in an old house in the Hudson Valley. Inspired by Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, it explores unspoken power dynamics and “the systems that hold us captive.”
Ann Lauterbach will be awarded a grant in support of her project called “The Meanwhile: Linear Ruptures and Simultaneous Narratives,” which will have a performance and possible exhibition at the Flowchart Foundation.
Erika Switzer and Lucy Fitz Gibbon will receive a grant in support of operational expenses and projects at Sparks & Wiry Cries, an organization, cofounded by Switzer and where Fitz Gibbon serves as managing editor, that curates opportunities for art song creators, performers, and scholars with innovative initiatives. These projects will include the upcoming Brooklyn premieres of Meltdown, a dramatic work for mezzo and piano trio which engages the layered stories and science of climate change through the lens of a female glaciologist, and Skymother, which weaves together the family history of composer Timothy Long (Choctaw, Muscogee Creek) with the Haudenosaunee creation story, Sky Woman.
Sarah Hennies, along with her duo partner, Tristan Kasten-Krause, a bassist and composer, will receive the grant for their new work Saccades for double bass and percussion at the Wassaic Project, an artist-run nonprofit contemporary art gallery, artist residency, and art education center. The piece is to be performed in total darkness with a single candle flame.
Suzanne Kite will receive a grant for the proposed project, Owáǧo Uŋkíhaŋblapi (We Dream a Score), her first full orchestral work for her organizational partner, the American Composers Orchestra (ACO). The piece continues Kite’s exploration of individual, collective, and societal dreaming practices, using an Indigenous AI framework. NYSCA funding supports the development of an AI app in collaboration with the Brooklyn-based design firm School. Members of the ACO and the public will submit their dreams to the app, which transforms language into Lakȟóta Visual Language symbols.
DN Bashir’s Hollow House, sponsored by JACK Arts Incorporated, follows a group of New York residents meeting at a farm-to-table restaurant in an old house in the Hudson Valley. Inspired by Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, it explores unspoken power dynamics and “the systems that hold us captive.”
Ann Lauterbach will be awarded a grant in support of her project called “The Meanwhile: Linear Ruptures and Simultaneous Narratives,” which will have a performance and possible exhibition at the Flowchart Foundation.
Photo: Clockwise from top left: Erika Switzer, Suzanne Kite, Lucy Fitz Gibbon, DN Bashir, Sarah Hennies, and Ann Lauterbach.
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): Awards,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of Languages and Literature,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Literature Program,Music,Theater and Performance Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): Awards,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of Languages and Literature,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Literature Program,Music,Theater and Performance Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
12-10-2024
Artist and Bard alumnus Eddie Rodolfo Aparicio ’12 has been recognized by ARTnews as a 2024 Emerging Artist of the Year. For his first solo museum presentation, which took place earlier this year, Aparicio was selected by the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles to take over part of its sprawling Geffen Contemporary location for the relaunch of its “MOCA Focus” exhibition series, which featured works he made between 2016 and 2023 alongside three site-specific commissions. “In Aparicio’s work there is a commitment to experimentation and to pushing materials to their limits, only to show us new ways of seeing and thinking,” ARTnews wrote of the exhibition. “This is the beginning of an incredibly promising career.” His work explores the visual and conceptual possibilities of globally ubiquitous raw materials and products of Indigenous knowledge of Latin America. In recent years, Aparicio has produced large scale rubber casts that document the social and economic relationships between Latin America and the United States through specific use of material, multiplicity of site and metaphorical gestures.
Photo: Eddie Rodolfo Aparicio, La ceiba me salvó / The Ceiba Saved Me, 2020, cast rubber with ficus tree surface residues on found cloth; glazed stoneware; twine; and wooden support, approx. 122 × 86 × 5 3/4 in. (309.9 × 218.4 × 14.6 cm). Collection of Michael Sherman and Carrie Tivador. © Eddie Rodolfo Aparicio, image courtesy of the artist and Commonwealth and Council, Los Angeles and Mexico City. Photo by Ruben Diaz
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
November 2024
11-15-2024
Bard College faculty, staff, and students gathered at Blithewood Manor for this year's Annual Scholarship Reception on Monday, November 11. This annual event honors students who have excelled in their studies and contributed to academic and campus life. The evening’s awardees, who were nominated by faculty from across the four divisions of the College, represent excellence in the arts; social studies; languages and literature; and science, mathematics, and computing.
“We are pleased to recognize this year’s Bard Scholars, who represent the very best of what we are and what we do,” said Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Studies David Shein. “These students, who were selected by their faculty and deans in recognition of their contributions in the classroom and to the campus community, have demonstrated not only excellence in their work but deep care and commitment to that work and to the life of the College. We are proud of them and look forward to seeing what they will do next.”
Many of the named scholarships are made possible by generous contributions from Bard donors. Thank you to all supporters for believing in the value of a college education, and for investing in the future of Bard students.
Further reading:
Learn More about Postgraduate Scholarships and Fellowships through Bard's Dean of Studies Office
Learn More about Scholarships, Prizes, and Awards at Bard
“We are pleased to recognize this year’s Bard Scholars, who represent the very best of what we are and what we do,” said Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Studies David Shein. “These students, who were selected by their faculty and deans in recognition of their contributions in the classroom and to the campus community, have demonstrated not only excellence in their work but deep care and commitment to that work and to the life of the College. We are proud of them and look forward to seeing what they will do next.”
Many of the named scholarships are made possible by generous contributions from Bard donors. Thank you to all supporters for believing in the value of a college education, and for investing in the future of Bard students.
Further reading:
Learn More about Postgraduate Scholarships and Fellowships through Bard's Dean of Studies Office
Learn More about Scholarships, Prizes, and Awards at Bard
Photo: 2024 Annual Scholarship Reception. Photo by Karl Rabe
Meta: Type(s): Student | Subject(s): Academics,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Dean of Studies,Division of Languages and Literature,Division of Science, Math, and Computing,Division of Social Studies,Division of the Arts,Giving | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Student | Subject(s): Academics,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Dean of Studies,Division of Languages and Literature,Division of Science, Math, and Computing,Division of Social Studies,Division of the Arts,Giving | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
11-13-2024
An-My Lê, Charles Franklin Kellogg and Grace E. Ramsey Kellogg Professor in the Arts, was interviewed for a feature on Louisiana Channel, the YouTube channel of the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark with weekly videos on art and design. Lê spoke about her project Silent General and also about her experiences photographing military technology and the aftermath of war. In her conflict photography, Lê values subtlety and presenting a picture without telling the viewer how to think. “A good picture is one that is surprising,” she said. “It may be something that is familiar to me, but it's described in a way I've never seen before, [so that] it’s making me understand the situation in a new way.”
Lê spoke about understanding her childhood after she evacuated from Vietnam to the US through her work as an artist. When she took her first photography class in college, she discovered her skills in visual expression and was encouraged by a professor to become a photographer. She eventually traveled back to Vietnam and photographed the country in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. “Dealing with the unknown is a big part of being a photographer,” she says. “It requires one to be courageous, to go to places you don’t normally go to, or you may fail; it’s about realizing something that you don’t know.”
Lê spoke about understanding her childhood after she evacuated from Vietnam to the US through her work as an artist. When she took her first photography class in college, she discovered her skills in visual expression and was encouraged by a professor to become a photographer. She eventually traveled back to Vietnam and photographed the country in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. “Dealing with the unknown is a big part of being a photographer,” she says. “It requires one to be courageous, to go to places you don’t normally go to, or you may fail; it’s about realizing something that you don’t know.”
Photo: An-My Lê, Charles Franklin Kellogg and Grace E. Ramsey Kellogg Professor in the Arts.
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Photography Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Photography Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
11-12-2024
A New Day, a cello concerto released in 2021 by Joan Tower, Asher B. Edelman Professor in the Arts at Bard College, was featured in Times Union. The work, which began as a commission by the Colorado Music Festival, Cleveland Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, and National Symphony Orchestra, was written while Jeff Litfin, her late husband of 50 years, was dying. “I was in real bad shape,” Tower said. “So I decided to write. In fact, all the music I've been writing since then is about him.” The concerto, which will be performed by Albany Symphony in Troy on November 16 and 17, contains four movements: “Daybreak,” “Working Out,” “Mostly Alone” and “Into the Night.” The titles are intentionally simple, allowing for many interpretations of a single day, she told Times Union.
Photo: Joan Tower.
Meta: Type(s): Article,Event,Faculty,Staff | Subject(s): Bard Graduate Programs,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Conservatory,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Music,Music Program | Institutes(s): Bard Conservatory of Music,Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Article,Event,Faculty,Staff | Subject(s): Bard Graduate Programs,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Conservatory,Division of the Arts,Faculty,Music,Music Program | Institutes(s): Bard Conservatory of Music,Bard Undergraduate Programs |
11-12-2024
Daniel Terna ’09 ICP ’15 was profiled in Artsy Artist’s “Artists On Our Radar,” an editorial series featuring five artists who made an impact in the past month through exhibitions, gallery openings, and other events. Terna’s latest exhibit The Terrain is on view at the Jack Barrett Gallery in Tribeca until December 14. The Terrain features Terna’s photographs of political events from 2017 to the present, including the Women’s March and the Global Climate Strike, along with day-to-day photographs from his own life. The Terrain was also reviewed by the New York Times, which writes that Terna's photography contains “narrative restraint... [it] keeps admitting how hard it is to really know another human being.”
Terna has exhibited at the BRIC Arts Media Biennial, MoMA PS1’s film program, and the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, among others, and will exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum’s National Portrait Gallery in May 2025. His photography is focused on intergenerational relationships, combining personal narratives with his outside perspective on current events. Of Terna’s 2023 photo Monastery, taken near the Dachau concentration camp where his father was imprisoned, Artsy writes, “The peaceful scene is transformed by its context, invoking the weight of memory and survival.”
Terna has exhibited at the BRIC Arts Media Biennial, MoMA PS1’s film program, and the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, among others, and will exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum’s National Portrait Gallery in May 2025. His photography is focused on intergenerational relationships, combining personal narratives with his outside perspective on current events. Of Terna’s 2023 photo Monastery, taken near the Dachau concentration camp where his father was imprisoned, Artsy writes, “The peaceful scene is transformed by its context, invoking the weight of memory and survival.”
Photo: Monastery, 2023-4. Photo courtesy Daniel Terna and Jack Barrett Gallery, New York
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Photography Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Photography Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
11-12-2024
The Fund for Visual Learning (FVL) recently held their annual sale in the Fisher Studio Art Building Galleries and online, generating $8,650 to support studio arts students at Bard. Faculty, students, and staff all contributed work to the 2024 FVL art sale. The exhibition was hung by Roman Hrab and organized by Paige Mead and Erin Dougherty, with the help of students Heidi Lind ’26, Praagya Khand ’25, and Calum Tinker ’25. FVL began in 2014 to improve access to the Studio Arts Program for students experiencing financial challenges, and to enrich classroom and campus experiences for all. Since its founding, FVL has provided grants for an ambitious range of diverse student art projects.
Photo: 2024 Fund for Visual Learning Art Sale. Photo by Queenie Si ’25
Meta: Type(s): Event | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Event | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Studio Arts Program | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
October 2024
10-22-2024
The 2024 Dance Magazine Awards honor Bard alumna Joanna Haigood ’79, alongside George Faison, Liz Lerman, Mavis Staines, Shen Wei, and Mikhail Baryshnikov, whose work with Baryshnikov Arts earned him the Chairman’s Award. From its first year in 1954, the Dance Magazine Awards have been given annually in appreciation of the artistry, integrity, and resilience that dance artists have demonstrated over the course of their careers. The theme for this year’s awards is “the stage and beyond”—the dancers, choreographers, and educators recognized are invested in work that often transcends the proscenium.
“Since 1980 Joanna Haigood has been creating work that uses natural, architectural, and cultural environments as points of departure for movement exploration and narrative,” says the Dance Magazine Awards statement. “Her stages have included grain terminals, a clock tower, the pope’s palace, military forts, and a mile of neighborhood streets in the South Bronx. Her work has been commissioned by many arts institutions, including Dancing in the Streets, Jacob’s Pillow, the Walker Art Center, the National Black Arts Festival, and Festival d’Avignon. Haigood has had the privilege to mentor many extraordinary young artists at the École Nationale des Arts du Cirque, the Trinity Laban Conservatoire, Spelman College, Stanford University, the San Francisco Circus Center, and Zaccho Studio.”
“Since 1980 Joanna Haigood has been creating work that uses natural, architectural, and cultural environments as points of departure for movement exploration and narrative,” says the Dance Magazine Awards statement. “Her stages have included grain terminals, a clock tower, the pope’s palace, military forts, and a mile of neighborhood streets in the South Bronx. Her work has been commissioned by many arts institutions, including Dancing in the Streets, Jacob’s Pillow, the Walker Art Center, the National Black Arts Festival, and Festival d’Avignon. Haigood has had the privilege to mentor many extraordinary young artists at the École Nationale des Arts du Cirque, the Trinity Laban Conservatoire, Spelman College, Stanford University, the San Francisco Circus Center, and Zaccho Studio.”
Photo: Joanna Haigood ’79. Photo by Charlie Formenty
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Dance,Dance Program,Division of the Arts | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Bard Undergraduate Programs,Dance,Dance Program,Division of the Arts | Institutes(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs |
10-15-2024
Professor An-My Lê’s photographs are featured in the New York Times Opinion piece “The Price,” which is part of the Times series “On the Brink” about the modern threat of nuclear weapons. “The Price” covers the United States’ $1.7 trillion overhaul of its nuclear arsenal and its impact on American communities. Lê’s photographs show the infrastructure of the US military, including the inside of nuclear facilities and the people working inside them. They illustrate the tension that writer W. J. Hennigan describes: “Congress decided that America needed new weapons… but it’s clear, after I visited these places, that the American people have not.”
Lê is a professor of photography whose work has covered war’s impact on culture and the environment for over 30 years. Her past projects have been exhibited in solo shows at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among many others.
Lê is a professor of photography whose work has covered war’s impact on culture and the environment for over 30 years. Her past projects have been exhibited in solo shows at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among many others.
Photo: An-My Lê, Charles Franklin Kellogg and Grace E. Ramsey Kellogg Professor in the Arts.
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Photography Program |
Meta: Type(s): Faculty | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Photography Program |
10-15-2024
The Sunday Times profiled Bard alumna Gia Coppola ’09, whose feature film The Last Showgirl premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September. The film, which stars Pamela Anderson, follows a showgirl who has to reconsider her life when her show closes. Coppola told the Times that the film came together like a “divine intervention,” particularly Anderson’s casting, of whom Coppola said “no one else could be this character.”
Coppola studied photography at Bard and got her start shooting films for fashion brands. She moved on to assist the costume departments in family films before eventually making her first movie, Palo Alto, in 2013. She also recently shot short film-ads for jewelry company Mejuri. Throughout many of her projects, especially her newest film, she is interested in “how society confines women in all different generations.”
Coppola studied photography at Bard and got her start shooting films for fashion brands. She moved on to assist the costume departments in family films before eventually making her first movie, Palo Alto, in 2013. She also recently shot short film-ads for jewelry company Mejuri. Throughout many of her projects, especially her newest film, she is interested in “how society confines women in all different generations.”
Photo: Pamela Anderson in The Last Showgirl. Courtesy Utopia
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Film |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni | Subject(s): Bard Undergraduate Programs,Division of the Arts,Film |
10-08-2024
Brandon Blackwood ’13, Bard alumnus and designer, has been named in TIME magazine’s TIME100 Next list for 2024, which highlights influential figures who are shaping the future of business, entertainment, sports, politics, science, health, and other fields. “As one of few preeminent Black designers, Blackwood represents changemakers who lead by example with fearlessness, innovation, and a steadfast embrace of inclusivity,” writes Elaine Welteroth for TIME. “His influence extends beyond the runway, inspiring a new generation of designers to merge style with substance. The B on his bags not only honors their namesake—it also reflects his brilliance across every design, collection, and work of art he offers to this world.”
Photo: Brandon Blackwood ’13. Courtesy of Brandon Blackwood NYC
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Article | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Division of the Arts,Inclusive Excellence |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Article | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Division of the Arts,Inclusive Excellence |
10-07-2024
Bard alumni/ae Rosa Polin ’16 and Ryan Rusiecki ’20, graduates of the photography program, have been featured in Cultured magazine’s Young Photographers 2024, a list highlighting the next generation of image makers who have dedicated themselves to photography as an art form. “I try to use photography the same way I try to live the rest of my life,” said Polin ’16, who blends realism and the uncanny in intimate imagery. “I am trying to find my voice. It’s all a big mixture of shame, curiosity, fear, playfulness, boredom, irony, sadness, lust, humor, and empathy.” For his environmental photography, Rusiecki ’20 has revisited the same subject each year, watching its transformation under imminent threat. “The subject of my practice — the Hudson River estuary — is a globally rare habitat that is under threat by rising sea levels and climate change,” he said. “I have only been able to photograph the estuary after having spent four years of repeated return, and multidisciplinary research, to understand its nuances and visual fragility. I consider the estuary a friend.”
Photo: L–R: Rosa Polin ’16 and Ryan Rusiecki ’20.
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Article | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Division of the Arts,Photography Program |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Article | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Division of the Arts,Photography Program |
10-02-2024
Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College artist and collaborator Justin Vivian Bond is named a recipient of a 2024 MacArthur Fellowship. One of this year’s 22 recipients of the prestigious “genius grant” awarded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Justin Vivian Bond, an artist and performer, has a long relationship with the Fisher Center and Bard College. They curated and hosted the Spiegeltent season for five years (2014–2018), and continue to return as a performer each summer to sold-out audiences. They have taught in Bard’s undergraduate Theater and Performance Program, and have received developmental support from Fisher Center LAB on multiple projects. MacArthur Fellows receive $800,000 stipends that are bestowed with no conditions; recipients may use the money as they see fit.
In a statement about their work, the MacArthur Foundation says, “Justin Vivian Bond (Viv) is an artist and performer working in the cabaret tradition weaving history, cultural critique, and an ethic of care into performances and artworks animated by wit, whimsy, and calls to action. Bond uses cabaret to explore the political and cultural ethos of the moment and tie it back to history to address contemporary challenges, in particular those facing queer communities. Bond’s decades-long journey across the landscape of gender has both informed their artistic practices and played a significant role in ongoing conversations around gender identity and LGBTQ+ rights.”
Justin Vivian Bond studied theater at Adelphi University (1981–1985) and received an MA (2005) from Central Saint Martins College, London. They have taught performance at New York University and Bard College and held a long-term residency at Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater (New York). Bond has appeared on stage at such venues as Carnegie Hall, the Sydney Opera House, and the Vienna Staatsoper, among others. They are the author of a memoir, Tango: My Childhood, Backwards and in High Heels (2011), and their art has been exhibited at The New Museum, VITRINE (London), and Participant, Inc. (New York).
In a statement about their work, the MacArthur Foundation says, “Justin Vivian Bond (Viv) is an artist and performer working in the cabaret tradition weaving history, cultural critique, and an ethic of care into performances and artworks animated by wit, whimsy, and calls to action. Bond uses cabaret to explore the political and cultural ethos of the moment and tie it back to history to address contemporary challenges, in particular those facing queer communities. Bond’s decades-long journey across the landscape of gender has both informed their artistic practices and played a significant role in ongoing conversations around gender identity and LGBTQ+ rights.”
Justin Vivian Bond studied theater at Adelphi University (1981–1985) and received an MA (2005) from Central Saint Martins College, London. They have taught performance at New York University and Bard College and held a long-term residency at Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater (New York). Bond has appeared on stage at such venues as Carnegie Hall, the Sydney Opera House, and the Vienna Staatsoper, among others. They are the author of a memoir, Tango: My Childhood, Backwards and in High Heels (2011), and their art has been exhibited at The New Museum, VITRINE (London), and Participant, Inc. (New York).
Photo: Justin Vivian Bond. Photo courtesy of John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
Meta: Type(s): General | Subject(s): Division of the Arts,Fisher Center,Fisher Center LAB,Spiegeltent,Theater and Performance Program,Theater Program | Institutes(s): Fisher Center |
Meta: Type(s): General | Subject(s): Division of the Arts,Fisher Center,Fisher Center LAB,Spiegeltent,Theater and Performance Program,Theater Program | Institutes(s): Fisher Center |
September 2024
09-27-2024
A new photo book by Bard alumna Virginia Hanusik ’14, Into the Quiet and the Light: Water, Life, and Land Loss in South Louisiana, which documents a decade spent in the coastal region of the state, has been reviewed in Aperture. “Photographs appear alongside an anthology of essays and poetry commissioned for the book,” writes Michael Adno for Aperture. “For Hanusik, architecture is also a clear sign of time passing; buildings, like hands on the face of a clock, float along a canal one year and disappear the next, while others are raised twenty feet up in the air to escape the coming flood.” Hanusik’s photographs and written contributions explore the cultural legacy of weather and storms in coastal areas, the physical and psychological marks left behind by hurricanes, and the privileges afforded to certain communities over others in responses to flood damage. “At the core of the project,” Hanusik writes, “is an effort to encourage thinking of this region—and coastal communities around the country—as an interconnected system rather than as separate and expendable landscapes.”
Photo: Virginia Hanusik ’14.
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Article | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Book Reviews,Division of the Arts,Photography Program |
Meta: Type(s): Alumni,Article | Subject(s): Alumni/ae,Book Reviews,Division of the Arts,Photography Program |