Tag Archives: Alumni Work

Alumna Introduces Chinese to Fine Arts Curriculum

This spring the Kansas City Art Institute will introduce a Chinese language and culture course into its curriculum. The course will provide an introduction to Chinese characters, and students will focus on daily conversational skills, including speaking, listening, reading and writing standard Mandarin Chinese. The course also incorporates relevant topics related to Chinese arts and culture from the past to the present.

Art Center Illustration alumna Valda Hsu, born and raised in Taiwan, will teach the course. Hsu came to the U.S. in 1983 to attend Art Center. Prior to her journey, she received advanced training in traditional Chinese brush painting with landscape master Yu Wei.She teaches Chinese brush painting for adults at KCAI, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and the Confucius Institute at the University of Kansas, where she is also special programs instructor for Chinese language and culture. 

Hsu said her frequent visits to China and Taiwan have inspired her to teach Chinese to visual artists “in order to promote the understanding of its culture and its timeless, authentic art form through the language.”

Fisker Karma Wins Accolades

The Fisker Karma plug-in hybrid electric car has received the 2009 Spark Design and Architecture Award, a competition promoting great design and designers and encouraging creativity.

The Karma is the first luxury plug-in hybrid electric vehicle, and the first vehicle released by Fisker Automotive. The company’s CEO and design director is alumnus Henrik Fisker, acclaimed designer of iconic cars such as the BMW Z8, Aston Martin DB9 and Aston Martin V8 Vantage.

Congrats to Henrik and his team! Read more at autoevolution:  Fisker Karma Wins 2009 Spark Design and Architecture Award and Fisker Automotive: The Karma

Niero’s Elle Among Best Designs of the Year

Environmental Design alumnus John Niero’s Elle is a finalist in the fourth annual Interior Design Best of Year Awards in the Seating: Contract/Lounge Category.

The Best of Year Awards is the preeminent design competition recognizing superior interior design projects and products in over 50 categories. More than 600 products were entered in this year’s competition. The awards ceremony will be held Dec. 3 in New York.

Earlier this year, Elle was awarded Best of NeoCon 2009 in the Seating: Sofas and Lounge category at the NeoCon World’s Trade Fair in Chicago.

Congrats, John!

Schwab Poster Earns Accolades

You might have already noticed the striking image used for the Campaign for Art Center, created by acclaimed graphic designer and alumnus Michael Schwab. We’re happy to report that the poster has won a second gold award in the international design publication Graphis, and will be featured in the Graphis Poster Annual 2010. Earlier this year, it was added to the permanent collection of San Francisco’s Legion of Honor fine arts museum. Schwab’s donation of time, vision and talent underscores the lasting impact that an Art Center education has had on his life and creative career. Congratulations, Michael!

Read more about the poster and the genesis of the Art Center pencil in this intersting article at @Issue.

Alumni Featured in PDC Show

More Diana Thater news: She has curated a very cool show with several Art Center alumni at the Pacific Design Center in West Hollywood as part of their Design Loves Art program. The program features a series of rotating contemporary art exhibitions and talks with artists, galleries, curators and architects in ongoing project rooms as well as exhibitions, multimedia events and film/video screenings.

Comprised of three exhibits, Thater’s show opens this Friday, Nov. 6. Be sure to stop by!

Through the Eyes of an Alumnus

The Pasadena Museum of California Art (PMCA) presents Population: Portraits by Ray Turner, an exhibition of 150 portraits by the Art Center alumnus and former faculty member.

Turner ILLU ’58 fashions a uniquely seductive and engaging fusion of lyrical realism and abstraction in portraiture. A prescient interpreter, Population features intimate portraits of Pasadena residents.

The exhibit runs through Jan. 31. Read more about the exhibit at artdaily.org.

An Evening with Matthew Rolston

We’re super excited to welcome acclaimed photographer, director and alumnus Matthew Rolston to campus on Oct. 29 for a conversation with celebrity journalist Merle Ginsberg.

Widely recognized as one of the leading photographers and directors of his generation, Rolston’s imagery has helped define today’s aesthetics of celebrity and beauty photography. In 1998, he endowed the Matthew Rolston Scholarship for Photography and Film, and in 2008 he renewed his support for the scholarship, adding the very special privilege of serving as a mentor to recipients.

Join us for a lively evening of conversation, imager and a unique viewing of his latest book, beautyLIGHT.

Seating is extremely limited for this event, and reservations are required to attend. RSVP by Oct. 27 to rsvpaccd@artcenter.edu or 626.396.4327.

Muñoz Participates in Art Exchange

The exhibit LA Artcore Artists, including work by alumnus and faculty member Ramone Muñoz, opens this week in Bakersfield. Part of an “art exchange,” the first show, featuring L.A. artists, will hold an opening reception Oct. 15 at Bakersfield College’s Wylie and May Louise Jones Gallery. Next year, Bakersfield artists will exhibit at the Artcore Brewery Annex in downtown Los Angeles.

Bakersfield Express has a nice write-up previewing the show as well as an interview with Muñoz.

 (Pictured: “Towers of Vik” series of paintings by Ramone Muñoz)

Exploring Sound with Doug Aitken

Artinfo (in an article from the October 2009 Modern Painters issue) visits Art Center alumnus Doug Aitken ILLU ’91 to explore the audio experiments of the renowned video artist.

This month his “sound pavilion” will debut at Brazil’s Instituto Inhotim. For this piece, Aitken drilled a hole deep into the ground to broadcast the earth’s “primal, geologic sounds.”

“As if putting a stethoscope to the planet’s heart, he has used a system of ultrasensitive amplifiers and geomicrophones (like the ones geologists use to record the breaking up of glaciers in Antarctica) to transform these guttural registers into audible sounds that fill a ground-level glass pavilion above. He expects the visitors in the pavilion both to have intensely private experiences and to become part of a larger community—the audience created by sound.”

Read the article here. For more on Aitken, read Art Center’s interview with him here.