After years of all-nighters fueled by coffee, critiques, cramming for finals and collaboration, 192 Art Center students will graduate on Saturday. This ceremony includes the very first graduating class for the Graduate Environmental Design and Graduate Transportation Design Programs. In fact, we have a record number, 36, students accepting graduate level degrees on Saturday. Also notable, 25% of this graduating class attended one or more of Art Center’s Public Programs (Art Center at Night or Saturday High).
As the day approaches, we take time to celebrate these creative and talented individuals who are about to take on the world. Here’s the lowdown for the week:
Thursday, April 17: Graduation Show Preview
Industry leaders, employers, corporate partners, donors and alumni get the first look at the Spring term’s graduating artists and designers at the invitation-only Graduation Show Preview.
This is the inaugural dual-campus show, with Fine Art, Graduate Environmental Design and Graduate Media Design Practices all showing at South Campus, from 5–7 p.m. The remainder of the disciplines will be showing at Hillside from 6–9 p.m., with a private reception following.
This event, hosted by Alumni Relations to welcome new graduates into the community, gives our graduating students an opportunity to network with potential employers and fellow alumni. The show features student projects from major fields of study at Art Center, including Advertising, Entertainment Design, Environmental Design, Film, Fine Art, Graphic Design, Illustration, Photography and Imaging, Product Design, Transportation Design, Graduate Environmental Design, Graduate Film, Graduate Industrial Design, Graduate Media Design Practices and Graduate Transportation Design.
Recruiters will also be on campus most of the day Thursday, viewing portfolios and talking to the graduates.
Saturday April 19: Graduation
Join us in the Sculpture Garden at Hillside Campus from 4 to 6 p.m. for the Graduation Ceremony. Students, families and guests will hear from Product Design alumnus Gordon Bruce, who will receive an Alumni Lifetime Achievement Award from the College.
Born in Toronto, designer and author Gordon Bruce graduated from Art Center in 1972 with a BS in Industrial Design. He is principal of Gordon Bruce Design LLC and has been a design consultant for 40 years. His work has been shown at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and his designs are included in the permanent design collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Centre Pompidou, Paris; and The National Museum of American History, Washington, D.C. From 1991 to 1994, he became involved with design education as consulting Vice-President for Art Center’s Kyoto program. He also served as the Chairman of Product Design for the “Innovative Design Lab of Samsung” (IDS) in Seoul, South Korea–a unique internal design school championed by Samsung’s Chairman Lee Kun-Hee. While in Seoul, Bruce and his IDS colleague James Miho, Art Center’s then-chair of Graphic Design, developed a curriculum to reeducate Samsung’s best designers. Later he played a role in helping Porsche Design establish an office in the USA. For many years, he served as head design consultant for Lenovo’s “Innovative Design Center” (IDC Beijing) and for Changhong in China. Recently, he worked with GE Appliances in the United States; presently, he works with Buhler in Switzerland and Huawei in China.
The Student Leadership Award is given out each term to a student who exemplifies stand-out leadership qualities and accomplishments. This term’s award will be given to Kristina Marrero, who crafted an exceptionally full experience at Art Center. She served as the student government’s executive secretary as well as its Product Design representative and she attended Tama Art University as part of the Future Craft Student Exchange as well as multiple sessions of the Pensole Footwear Design Academy in Portland, first as a workshop participant and twice as a teaching assistant. Marrero interned at both Tesla and at Adidas, participated in several Designstorms, served as co-president of Girls of ID, an industrial design club, and helped many a student elevate their design concepts as a lab assistant in the Color, Material and Trends Exploration Lab.
The crowd will also have an opportunity to hear from valedictorian James Tucker-Robbins, who is graduating top of his class with a BFA in Film. Tucker-Robbins’ love for film started at age three, when he would watch videos over and over, studying scenes. He made his first film with friends in sixth grade and by his sophomore year of high school decided to immerse himself in film by attending Interlochen Arts Academy. After graduating from Interlochen he moved to Pasadena to attend Art Center, and the rest is history
Saturday April 19: Graduation Show and MFA Open Studios
After the ceremony, Graduation Show opens to the public from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m., where work by the newest Art Center graduates will be on display.
Also this year, the Graduate Art program is hosting an MFA Open Studios event on Saturday, from 6-9 pm at 950 South Raymond, giving the public an opportunity to view work of 23 rad grad students. The Lime food truck will be there and drinks will also be available.
Congratulations to our Spring 2014 graduates!
