Student profile: Christina Yang’s Art Center coming of age story

Self portrait by Christina Yang

Drawing of Christina Yang at work by Madeline Ocampo

Christina Yang began attending Art Center when she was 12 years old. But hold off on calling her the Doogie Howser of the design world. She simply followed her passion for visual arts through every phase of the College’s curriculum, from its public programing for underage artists to full-fledged matriculation.

She began her journey with Art Center for Kids courses. She then continued her studies in the College’s Saturday High program while attending Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA) before being recently accepted as a full-time student in the degree program. She starts Fall 2013 as an Entertainment Design major.

Dotted Line: Why did you choose Art Center?

Christina Yang: My father went to Art Center, so attending the Kids program felt natural. But I also kept returning chiefly because of the high quality instruction I received. While other children’s programs were rather loose and directionless, Art Center instructors taught me core skills with a great deal of structure balanced with encouragement. My age never mattered. The teachers were never condescending. We had the privilege of being exposed to Art Center’s disciplined, focused, rich learning environment, which helped us begin to take ourselves seriously as artists.

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Dyson Foundation Grant: Less Time Paying Bills, More Time in the Studio

The Dyson Foundation was particularly impressed by this prosthetic socket, designed for BETH by Industrial Design alum, Jason Hill,

When James Dyson Foundation was looking for ways to inspire the next generation of design engineers, Art Center Industrial Design students kept appearing on the Foundation’s radar.

“We’ve consistently received strong entries to the James Dyson Award from Art Center,” says Erin Webb, Foundation manager, referring to the Foundation’s annual international design competition. “It was clear to us that the College has a very iterative approach to the design process and that Art Center students are challenged not just to come up with ideas but also to create prototypes.”

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Remembering Art Center Europe director, Uwe Bahnsen

Art Center Europe director, Uwe Bahnsen

Art Center Europe director, Uwe Bahnsen

It is with much sadness that I write to inform you of the passing of Uwe Bahnsen, a beloved director and leader of Art Center Europe from 1986 to 1995.

Recognized as one of the most influential European automotive designers of the 20th Century, Uwe was an inspiration and role model for our students and faculty during those exciting years in Europe. He was a former Vice President of Design for Ford of Europe, as well as the President of the International Council of Societies of Industrial Designers from 1995 to 1997. He was born in Hamburg, Germany, studied at the College of Fine Arts in Hamburg, was an accomplished painter and sculptor, and was truly one of the most revered and admired leaders of the Art Center campus in Vevey, Switzerland.

Geoff Wardle, currently heading our graduate program in Transportation Design and former chair of the Trans department at Art Center Europe, knew Uwe Bahnsen well and wrote movingly about his admiration and respect for this giant of automobile design:

I have always acknowledged Uwe Bahnsen along with Patrick LeQuement, his protégé, as the two automotive designers who most effectively invested their considerable intellect and energy to elevating the importance of design within the car industry and to the outside world. They did this in a way that has helped all of us who followed in their path. Not only that, both men added gravitas to the profession by truly understanding the full scope of design – as opposed to just styling – and how to fully leverage the contribution of the design process and philosophy into manufacturing industry.

Provost Fred Fehlau, remembering Uwe with great fondness, added the following:

I worked with Uwe when I was teaching one summer in the late ‘80s. He liked fast cars, good food and especially enjoyed working with students. He always had a smile on his face, as if he was getting more from them than they were getting from him. But he never let on.

Art Center has been distinguished throughout its history by many fine and impressive attributes, but nothing is more important or celebrated than the great people who have given so much and who have graced our community with their talent and skill. In Uwe, we have lost a great teacher, a true leader, and a wonderful friend.

Our condolences and warm wishes go to his family at this difficult time.

Dr. Lorne M. Buchman is the president of Art Center College of Design.

 

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Plumbing the depths of innovation: Mazda unveils student-created concept car, Deep Orange 3

It’s innovative engineering inside and out. And it’s all the work of students.

A next-generation Mazda concept vehicle, designed by Art Center College of Design student Fredrick Naaman and engineered by a team of Clemson University International Center for Automotive Research (CU-ICAR) automotive engineering students, was revealed in Traverse City, Mich., today during the Center for Automotive Research Management Briefing Seminars.

The official unveiling marks the completion of the Deep Orange 3 Mazda-sponsored vehicle, the third-generation Deep Orange vehicle prototype, which is a completely new vehicle, inside and out.

Derek Jenkins, design director for Mazda North American Operations, said that to be part of a college program of this caliber that focuses not just on one aspect of a vehicle, but the vehicle as a whole, is really an automaker’s dream come true.

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Conscious Commuter mobilizes an e-bike revolution at The Design Accelerator

Gabriel Wartofsky with his electric bike at the Environmental Media Awards

Gabriel Wartofsky with his electric bike at the Environmental Media Awards.

When entrepreneurial inspiration strikes, it’s often described as the convergence of creative and commercial instincts. An innovator perceives a void in the marketplace and conceives a product or experience to fill that space and drive demand for more. But for Gabriel Wartofsky and Bob Vander Woude, that well-worn path into the startup trenches has been less clear-cut.

The partners have spent the past two years developing Conscious Commuter, a company built around an electric bicycle with a sleek design and long-range battery. However the whole enterprise is driven by nothing short of a mission to revolutionize transportation.“We’re solution providers,” declares Vander Woude, an entrepreneur and CEO of a seed-stage investment fund, who was looking to fund an electric bike company when he happened upon a web demo of Wartofsky’s senior thesis project, now the basis for their partnership, which aims to implement e-bike sharing systems in cities around the world. “We’re multi-modal. That’s the secret sauce. Other electric bike companies are not coming from the background of solving a social problem. They’re just motivated to get to a retailer and make money.”

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Trayvon Martin protest: Photography student Kit Sinclair embeds himself on the front lines of the battle for justice

We first glimpsed the images above by chance, as Photography instructor Tony Di Zinno and student Kit Sinclair were reviewing the project in the cafeteria at South Campus. We were immediately struck by the bold and viscerally affecting quality of the shots Sinclair captured while attending a protest the night the Trayvon Martin verdict was rendered. Sinclair had been working closely with Di Zinno, a renowned sports photographer, in a class entitled, Project Photo: Sport, which focuses on navigating the intersection of sports, politics and art. “The culture of sport relates to conflict in many ways,” explains Di Zinno. “The Olympics are a thing of beauty – but also form of surrogate warfare. In this class we reflect on how examples of how sport acts as a mirror in reflecting ourselves as societies. We examine seminal figures like Mohammed Ali whose iconic LIFE magazine image by civil rights photographer Flip Schulke is featured on the profile of our Art Center-Sports class facebook page. Kit’s protest coverage was squarely in the tradition of the concerned photographer. We see in his images moments reminiscent of Sixties symbols of protest – which led in turn to class discussions of  visual literacy and image as art reference in terms of a so-called ‘black power’ salute by Tommy Smith and John Carlos on the 200m medal stand in the ’68 Olympic games.” 

“The larger point to me as an educator is to support these emerging artists,” continues Di Zinno, who co-teaches the class with Andy Bernstein, who shoots for the NBA and NHL. We are reminded by Kit’s work not to be too isolated in our silos of higher learning. But to realize that we are all indeed citizens and participants… and to learn to apply critical thinking. To dare and go see for ourselves. To take time to consider and deliberate in how to apply what we learned. Perhaps,most importantly – to share what we did learn with others.”

In the above gallery and blog post below, Sinclair incorporates each of these strands into a series of arresting photographs, that simultaneously call out for our attention and compassion.

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Rockin’ the foundation: Alumnus Simon Davey on how Art Center at Night influenced his work

Simon Davey's Spiteful Table.

Simon Davey’s Spiteful Table.

Many successful Art Center students get their first taste of the College through Art Center at Night (ACN), the College’s continuing studies program. Take for example recent Product Design alumnus Simon Davey, whose student rebranding project for Dulce Mexico was recently highlighted on Adobe’s packaging form Designer Showcase.

I chatted recently with Simon Davey on how ACN influenced both his career at Art Center and his entire design process. Here are a few excerpts.

On the playful quality of his work:
I’ve heard people describe my work as playful or whimsical, and I don’t really shy away from that. At the heart of my design philosophy is an attempt to truly understand the context in which a problem exists. In other words, I like questioning how and why people are using their stuff. And that means sometimes the work I create borders on the ridiculous, like my Spiteful Table, a side table/rocking chair hybrid.

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Most Wanted: Young Guns of Illustration: Pioneering panelists shoot from the hip

Brendan Monroe, Demetrius May and Ronald Kurniawan

Brendan Monroe, Demetrius May and Ronald Kurniawan

Of all the role models one might expect an ambitious young illustrator to tap for inspiration, Jay-Z hardly qualifies as one of the usual suspects.  But unpredictability, in all its forms, has always been imperative to the outlaw mentality embraced by each of the panelists at “Most Wanted: Young Guns of Illustration,” this month’s lively discussion, featuring Illustration alums Ronald Kurniawan, Demetrius May, and Brendan Monroe. The three young mavericks enthralled the crowded Ahmanson Auditorium discussing the work in multiple sub-markets and the various facets of the industry. And, yes, the hip-hop mogul’s name was invoked, when May cited his sage advice to young entrepreneurs — “I’m not a business man, I’m a business, man…all of you are your own business.” – as a useful mindset vital to anyone determined to stand out in today’s crowded creative marketplace.

The panelists also stressed the importance of joining the ‘maker’ revolution. “I consider [Illustrators] as picture makers. You have to be a designer. You have to be able to create everything and anything out of your head. You have to be flexible,” said Kurniawan, an Art Center graduate (with honors), currently working at Dreamworks, whose work has been inspired by ideograms, letterforms and syllables. Kurniawan has a wide array of experience in feature and television animation, visual development, character design, advertising, and book illustration – both in-house and freelance. With extraordinarily realistic lighting and interplay of color, Kurniawan’s work is a feast for the senses. Kurniawan’s clients include Sony Pictures, LACMA, LA Weekly, Mattel, Inc. and Disney Consumer Products to name a few. His work has been recognized in several publications including Communication Arts, American Illustration and Society of Illustrators.

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Transform, Transcend, Transmedia: The Changing Face of Graphic Design

Paul Hoppe’s installation "ECHO: The Fragility of Moments Suspended in Time."

Paul Hoppe’s installation “ECHO: The Fragility of Moments Suspended in Time.”

It’s the final week of the Fall 2012 term and “The Annex”—a nondescript temporary building on the northern end of Art Center’s Hillside Campus—is doing a good job hiding the feats of alchemy occurring within its walls.

Entering classroom A7 on the second floor of this battleship grey structure feels like stepping into Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory. In one corner, a student waves his hands to stir into motion a field of floating green particles. In another, students walk through a mirrored passageway that reflects their position in time and space from exactly 10 seconds ago. Elsewhere, two ellipses face one another—one on the floor, the other on the ceiling—as they project images of nature, architecture and words like “renewal” and “emergence.”

What is going on here? These upper-term Graphic Design students are tweaking final projects they created for Advanced Graphic Studio, a class that’s part of an ambitious undergraduate curriculum called transmedia within the Graphic Design Department.

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Puppy Love: Play Day lifts spirits during the dog days of week ten

Communing with canines at Play Day

Communing with canines at Play Day

The announcements for the Center for the Student Experience-sponsored “Play Day” touted an enticing array of activities designed to promote maximum stress release and lighthearted fun.  The calendar of events read like a childhood fantasy birthday party come to life: ceramic painting, chair yoga, pizza, goodie bags, ice cream sundaes and, perhaps most intriguing of all, therapy dogs. To this reader, that last element conjured visions of frankfurters spiked with ginko biloba. It was hard not to wonder whether this was some trendy new food experiment engineered to fuse childhood nostalgia with natural healing properties.

As it turns out, the above type of therapy dog is a culinary idea whose time has yet to come. Play Day’s dogs, of course, were of the canine variety. And their therapeutic benefits were immediately apparent to anyone who stepped foot into Room 201, the Play Day hub, where clusters of students huddled around the three furry pets laying on the floor basking in all the attention.

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