Category Archives: Awards

Product Design Graduate Vladimir Almonnord Wins Student Leadership Award

Vladimir Almonnord

Product Design graduate and Student Leadership Award recipient Vladimir Almonnord.

“There’s nothing more pleasant than helping someone in need and watching them achieve success,” said Product Design graduate Vladimir Almonnord, recipient of Art Center’s Student Leadership Award for the Spring 2013 term. “It’s the fuel that keeps me going and that motivates me at times I feel defeated.”

Each term, Art Center presents the Student Leadership Award to a deserving student from the College. The award is a distinguished honor granted to a graduating student who exemplifies leadership qualities and accomplishments that stand out above their peers.

“He has a passion for the process of designing meaningful products, is a superb visual storyteller and produces exceptional results on a grand scale,” said one faculty nominator of Almonnord, a student who forged a unique path that fused product design, illustration, entertainment design and transportation design.

“What surprised me the most about him was how he shares his time and thoughts with almost anyone and everyone that approached him,” said a student nominator.

“He reminds me of what kind of growth is possible, not just in skills, but in character, professionalism and attitude,” added another faculty nominator of Almonnord who, as a team leader for the Designmatters Change on the Streets transdisciplinary studio, helped address two critical issues facing the city of Pasadena: homelessness and panhandling.

“Perhaps his most important leadership achievement while at Art Center is how he willingly nurtured the talents of his peers,” said Dean of Students Jeffrey Hoffman when introducing Almonnord to the stage at last week’s graduation ceremony.

Continue reading →

Art Center Receives NEH Grant to Preserve Industrial Design History

From computers to sports cars to space capsules, America’s infatuation with invention has fueled industrial design. Now a prestigious grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is invigorating Art Center’s efforts to preserve the College’s rich history of industrial design images and materials.

Art Center students in 1937

Students working on an architectural model of a future Art Center campus in a project taught by Kem Weber. Gift of Irene Vermeers (PHOT 1937). Photography by Irene Vermeers.

According to College Archivist Robert Dirig, the grant will support a pilot project to digitize, preserve and make accessible a portion of Art Center’s collection of photographs, film and print materials documenting American industrial design education over an 80-year period.

Continue reading →

Environmental Design Students Take Top Prize in 2013 LAIAC Competition

Connie Bakshi and John Clark propose design ideas for a new space in the tunnel beneath historic Union Station in Los Angeles

Art Center Environmental Design students Connie Bakshi and John Clark emerged victorious in the Los Angeles Interior Architecture Committee (LAIAC) 21st Annual 1:2 Student Competition, winning accolades, a $10,000 scholarship and valuable exposure in their field.

The high-intensity, industry-juried, one-day charette provides an opportunity for undergraduate students, in teams of two selected by their instructors, from 12 Southern California design schools to have their design ideas critiqued by leading industry professionals and compete for a total of $23,000 in scholarship prizes.

Art Center students Connie Bakshi and John Clark at the LAIAC 21st Annual 1:2 Student Competition.

This year students were asked to design the “Linear Gateway.” Their assignment: Imagine a new space for the 600-foot long tunnel that passes underneath the rail lines at historic Union Station in downtown Los Angeles. Transform the existing plain tunnel into a new space that is functional, informative and forward-looking for the city.

Continue reading →

20 Art Center Students Win 2013 ADDY® Awards

Congratulations to the 20 Art Center students and recent alumni who won ADDY® Awards in the 2013 competition! Students received their awards at the ADDY® Gala on March 14 at the Fonda Theatre in Hollywood.

Art Center student winners from the 2013 ADDY Awards

Many of the Gold and Silver ADDY winners produced their projects in Film/Sell, a 14-week class where Film and Advertising majors collaborate on spec ads for their reels. During the class, students go through tons of ideas before landing a concept they can take into production.

“We help them point out what works and what doesn’t, and how their concept plays into the overall brand identity of the product they’re promoting,” said Chris Gehl, who teaches Film/Sell alongside Clio award-winner Nir Bashan. “Our intention with Film/Sell is to create a class that we would have liked when we were students,” said Gehl. “It’s my favorite class to teach, and it is the first time in 20 years that a class like this has existed.”

Sponsored by the American Advertising Federation, the ADDY® Awards recognize excellence in the art of advertising, graphic design, web design, illustration and photography. The AAF Student ADDY® Awards Competition is designed specifically for college students.

Continue reading →

Art Center Students Nominated for 34th Annual College Television Awards

UPDATE: On April 25, 2013 the  34th Annual College Television Awards awarded five College Emmys to Art Center students! Congratulations to everyone on their wins – below is a list of winners:

  • Alternative Category: 3rd Place, Filippo Nesci and Tim Hendrix, KOAN Sound – 80′s Fitness
  • Children’s Program Category: 2nd Place, Carlo Olivares Paganoni and Justin Wells, Cardboard Camera
  • Commercial Category: 1st Place, Kathleen Lorden, Kia Soul “Funeral”; 2nd Place, Lizbeth Chappell and Josue Lopez, Uncomfortable Situations; 3rd Place, Ellen Houlihan, Todd Glass for GLSEN

 

Art Center students have been nominated for the 34th College Television Awards, also known as the Student Emmys. This year marks the first time that six students have been nominated in the same year. The nominees will attend the College Emmys Gala Awards on Thursday, April 25, 2013 at the JW Marriot LA Live in Los Angeles.

Lizbeth Chappell, Tim Hendrix, Ellen Houlihan, Kathleen Lorden, Montana Mann and Carlo Olivares Paganoni were nominated in commercial, children’s and alternative categories. All students were nominated along with their respective production teams.

The College Television Awards is a national competition that recognizes excellence in student-produced video, digital and film work. Members of the Television Academy judged entries online, and will announce the winners at the awards ceremony.

Each student had their own story to tell. Mann’s “Obsession” spec commercial for the Calvin Klein men’s cologne examines the question, “what does it mean to be completely intoxicated by someone?”

Lorden’s spec commercial “Funeral” has already won 2012 CLIO® and ADDY® Awards, while “Uncomfortable Situations,” from Chappell, Jamie Yuen and co-producer Josue Lopez, wanted to create an ad for a difficult product. “It’s wild,” said Chappell. “Eagle suits are everywhere until you go looking for one.”

Hendrix created a music video for the song “80s Fitness” by Bristol musicians KOAN Sound with the commissioned help of OWSLA, the same music label as dubstep musician Skrillex.

Paganoni’s short film “Cardboard Camera,” co-produced with Justin Wells, focuses on creative 10-year-old Cameron. Hoping to enter a kids’ film competition, he uses his imagination and the help of two friends to create a movie.

“It was inspired by my own childhood,” said Paganoni. “I created a flat camera made of paper and start ‘imagining’ that I was shooting a movie with it. Since I couldn’t shoot anything, I started drawing the little frames of the movie like storyboards. This was the basis for our story.”

Even before being nominated, Houlihan’s “Todd Glass for GLSEN” PSA was noticed by The Huffington Post and Perez Hilton. Inspired by standup comedian Todd Glass and his decision to come out of the closet on a 2012 episode of the “WTF with Marc Maron” podcast, Houlihan asked Glass to take on the suicide epidemic in the LGBT teen community.

“I pitched Todd on doing a hard-hitting PSA unlike the typical anti-bullying messages we’ve seen before,” said Houlihan. “We wanted to shake people up and be honest about how serious the suicide epidemic facing LGBT youth is, and to show we’re all responsible for our words and how we affect one another.”

Congratulations to all of our Graduate Film Art Center students!

Alum Jason Hill wins MIT Accelerate Grand Prize for next-gen prosthetic design

Art Center alum Jason Hill, a human factors researcher and industrial designer, is part of a four-person, interdisciplinary team that won the $10,000 Grand Prize in the MIT Accelerate Contest, for a prosthetic socket designed to change its shape throughout a patient’s lifetime.

Hill and his team have formed The BETH Project (Benevolent Technologies for Health), dedicated to developing high-impact, low-cost healthcare solutions for underserved populations. Their February 19 win over seven other teams qualifies The BETH Project for a spot in the series’ final round, the MIT Launch Contest, whose top prize is $100,000. The results of the Launch Contest will be announced May 15, 2013.

Continue reading →

Graphic Design grad wins Student Leadership Award

“Art Center’s legacy rests in its community,” said Graphic Design graduate Adam Lopez, recipient of Art Center’s Student Leadership Award for the Fall 2012 term. “We learn and grow together. And when the time comes for us to move on, our ties to each other grow more important.”

Each term, Art Center presents the Student Leadership Award to a deserving student from the College. The award is a distinguished honor granted to a graduating student who exemplifies leadership qualities and accomplishments that stand out above their peers.

For Lopez, leadership boiled down to helping his peers and working together towards a higher goal. As a member of EcoCouncil, he grew the College’s community by helping bring the Art Center Food Garden to fruition. As founder of the Food Group, he organized fundraisers and cultivated friendships among strangers over shared meals.

Continue reading →

Trustee-produced ‘Red Tails’ wins motion picture prize at NAACP’s Image Awards

The action-adventure World War II film “Red Tails” won the prize for best motion picture at the NAACP’s Image Awards.

The high-flying feature, produced by George Lucas and Art Center Trustee Charles Floyd Johnson, was inspired by the heroics of America’s first all African-American aerial unit.

“Look, I beat Quentin Tarantino,” joked the Star Wars creator upon accepting the award (Tarantino’s “Django Unchained” was also up for the honor).

Lucas choked up while thanking the Tuskeegee Airmen, whose story is chronicled in the film.

The 44th NAACP Image Awards, hosted by talk show host Steve Harvey, were held Friday at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.

Continue reading →

UPDATED: Alum’s prosthetic named Dyson Award runner-up

A prosthetic socket designed to be adjustable, robust and affordable designed by Benevolent Technologies for Health (BETH) was named one of two international runner-ups for the prestigious James Dyson Award.

Product Design alumnus Jason Hill is part of the BETH Project team, which also includes Elizabeth Tsai, an MIT student pursuing her master of science degree, Ramin Abrishamian, an MIT alumnus and businessman, and Asa Hammond, who is earning a degree in physiological science at UCLA.

The BETH Project’s website says its launch product “will bring significant cost savings to the multi-million dollar prosthetic care industry that struggles to meet the needs of low income patients especially in developing countries.”

The team also says that by being made from an infinitely re-moldable material, its mass-producible socket device will cut prosthetic care costs by reducing or eliminating labor intensive procedures like fitting, fabrication, adjustment and re-fabrication.

Continue reading →