2021-22 In Review

An end-of-year message from Dean Brett Steele

2021-22 In Review

It’s hard to believe that we are at the end of another academic year. A year in which—after 18 months of extraordinary loss and difficulty and unprecedented remote teaching, learning, and working—we returned in-person to a campus we’d left behind in March 2020. And though we returned, the pandemic persisted (and continues to persist) alongside so many unfathomable and unjust horrors in a world literally growing hotter and more volatile every year, making the context for our work that much more challenging, yet more urgent. 

Through it all, we persisted, we organized, and we created with renewed vigor and focus as a creative community. 

This spring, I was amazed by the incredible work that our students produced in their final presentations and shows—a true testament to our collective ability to rise above life’s daily struggles to make work that reflects our values and challenges our world. In myriad forms across all of our departments, research centers, and public arts units, vital work is being made—work that not only reflects the critical challenges of the world, but work that strives to make positive change, broaden horizons, and pave the way to a better, more inclusive, more sustainable, and more just future. 

Above all else, this year has shown us, once again, that there is great power in both our individual voices and our collective voice as a community, and that the harnessed power of our voices can bring us together and bring about change that pushes at the boundaries of our world. 

 

GRATITUDE FOR OUR EXTRAORDINARY UCLA ARTS COMMUNITY 


UCLA Arts held a Creating Community welcome event for incoming students on September 22, 2021. Photo by UCLA Arts.

As we close the book on this academic year, I’d like to extend my deepest gratitude to our faculty, who have brilliantly navigated another challenging year as campus transitioned back to in-person instruction. I have profound respect and admiration for all that you do and for your dedication to teaching, research, and service at UCLA.  

Our indefatigable staff must also be acknowledged for their extraordinary work. You’ve kept our institution moving forward amidst myriad challenges this year. You’ve supported our faculty, our students, and each other—and consistently exceed the bounds of your individual roles to take care of our community. I recognize and appreciate your commitment and service. 

Finally, I’d like to honor our students. Your resilience and perseverance in continuing your studies amid so much uncertainty, so much turmoil and distress, so much heartbreak in the world is inspiring and reaffirming. You bring our mission to life, challenge us to do better, and it gives me hope to know that it is you who are shaping our future. 

Alongside our students, staff, and faculty, I’d like to extend thanks to the parents and caregivers, friends, supporters, and loved ones who have helped to make this school year a success. 

We are, indeed, stronger together. 

 

A CELEBRATORY RETURN TO IN-PERSON COMMENCEMENT 


UCLA Arts held its first in-person commencement ceremony since 2019. Photo by Todd Cheney.

On Saturday, June 11th, hundreds of students, faculty, staff, and parents gathered in Dickson Court to celebrate this year’s graduating class at the school’s first in-person commencement ceremony since 2019. As I looked out across the crowd and had the pleasure of shaking hands with each of our graduates, the excitement and joy that filled the air was exhilarating.

Our undergraduate and graduate student speakers, Nina Diaz-Klein and Akana Jayewardene, spoke stirringly about the challenges they overcame and the uncertain paths they followed before arriving at UCLA, and how their studies have prepared them for the next chapter in their lives and careers. Our keynote speaker, Mercedes Dorame, a UCLA alumna who has shown work at the Hammer and the Fowler museums and taught in the Department of Art this year, spoke beautifully about how her Tongva heritage informs her multimedia practice as well as her own circuitous path to becoming an artist. Her father, Robert Dorame, Tribal Chairman of the Gabrielino Tongva Indians of California, had us dancing and singing as he performed two celebratory songs in honor of our graduates. 

It was a joyous occasion and a beautiful culmination to the 2021-22 academic year.

TRANSITIONS

Every year we mark the departure of some honored members of our faculty. This year, we express our appreciation for: 

  • Jennifer Bolande, who retires after 18 years as a professor in the Department of Art;
  • Willem Henri Lucas, who retires after 18 years of service in the Department of Design Media Arts, including seven years as department chair;
  • Christopher Waterman, who retires after 26 years as a professor in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance, including 13 years as dean of the school;
  • Cheng-Chieh Yu, who stepped down after 21 years as a professor in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance.

Alongside these departures, we look forward to announcing several exciting new faculty hires this summer and fall. 

This year, we are also grateful to those faculty who have stepped into or continue to serve in leadership roles:

  • Catherine Opie, who took over as chair of the Department of Art in the fall;
  • Angelia Leung, who returned from retirement to serve as interim chair of our Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance;
  • and, of course, Rebeca Méndez and Mariana Ibañez who continued to serve as chairs of the Departments of Design Media Arts and Architecture and Urban Design, respectively.

As we begin the new academic year, we welcome Janet O’Shea as the new chair of our Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance. 

We are also grateful to Lionel Popkin for stepping into the role of Associate Dean of Academic Affairs last July and, more recently, were thrilled to welcome Anya Booker into a newly established full-time role as Associate Dean and Executive Director of Anti-Racism, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion.

This year, we offer best wishes and a fond farewell to several staff members from the Dean’s office who have moved on from UCLA:

  • Avishay Artsy, assistant director of strategic communications;
  • Raymundo Baltazar, community engagement coordinator for the Visual and Performing Arts Education (VAPAE) Program;
  • Jennifer Wells Green, executive director of development;
  • David Hodges, help desk manager;
  • Annie Love, director of academic personnel;
  • Jane McCarthy, director of strategic engagement and outreach;
  • and Amorette Muzingo, program coordinator for the VAPAE Program.

Alongside these transitions, we pay tribute to several influential figures in UCLA Arts’ history who we’ve lost this past year: 

  • Samuel Aroni, professor emeritus and longtime faculty member in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design, died in April;
  • Margo Leavin, renowned gallerist, art dealer, UCLA alumna, and namesake of our Margo Leavin Graduate Art Studios, passed away in October;
  • Allegra Fuller Snyder, professor emerita and former chair of UCLA's Department of Dance, and former director of the World Arts and Cultures interdisciplinary program (merged in 1995 to create the UCLA Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance), died in July;
  • Emma Lewis Thomas, who taught for over 35 years in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance, including serving as Associate Dean of the School of the Arts and Architecture for several years, died in September.

 

A YEAR OF GROWTH AND EVOLUTION 

In a year marked by so much challenge and uncertainty, there have also been many bright moments and advances that demonstrate the impact of our collective efforts to move the needle in providing our students, our campus, and our broader community with vital education, exposure, and experiences in the arts. The following are just a few highlights from across the school: 


Unidentified artist (Dahomey, Republic of Benin), figure group, before 1931; brass, wood; Fowler Museum at UCLA, X65.5793; Gift of the Wellcome Trust

Centering our Core Values 

In alignment with the school’s Strategic Plan and to more deeply center and build upon our commitment to anti-racism, equity, diversity, inclusion, and all forms of social justice, earlier this spring we appointed Anya Booker as our new Associate Dean and Executive Director, Anti-Racism, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. In this newly expanded full-time role, Anya will play a key role at the school. She will partner with school leadership, including academic department chairs and public arts unit directors, to advance the UCLA Arts strategic plan, and will guide the new AEDI Council. She will also collaborate with university partners and external stakeholders to develop and carry out initiatives that contribute to our strategic goals, will coordinate initiatives across the school, and will serve as our school’s Equity Advisor to UCLA’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Office to help facilitate coordination of campus-wide diversity and inclusion best practices. 

This year also saw the launch of the UCLA Arts Racial Equity Fund, a scholarship fund created to address disparities in representation, increase access to education, strengthen the recruitment and retention of under-represented students, and promote and contribute to the progress of scholarship at UCLA Arts; as well as the development of several new AEDI-themed course offerings that set out to craft a more inclusive and representative curricula and pedagogy consistent with our values and the needs of 21st century higher education. 

 

Fowler Museum at UCLA
 
The Fowler continued to expand its outreach to students and the wider community this past year. The Fowler Student Council was launched in 2021, with members serving as advocates for diverse stakeholders across UCLA and Los Angeles. The Fowler also launched a free UCLA student membership in 2021—offering all the benefits of its general membership—and signed up more than 800 students over the course of the first year.
 
The museum’s accolades continued to accrue. The Textile Society of America named the Fowler publication Aboriginal Screen-Printed Textiles from Australia’s Top End winner of the 2021 R. L. Shep Award for best book in the field of ethnic textile studies. A partnership between UCLA's Islamic Studies Program and the Fowler named Edina Lekovic the inaugural Community Scholar of the Community Bridges Residency.
 
The museum received significant funding from The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation and the Nissan Foundation for the educational initiative “Art of Liberation: Africa and the African Diaspora.” Meanwhile, its three-year Mellon-funded African Arts Initiative continues to promote significant findings via public programs, academic conferences, and the anticipated exhibition Particular Histories: Provenance Research in African Arts, which opens July 10.

In the very near future, we will announce the Fowler’s new director, a much anticipated appointment that promises to usher in an exciting future for this extraordinary institution.

 

The Hammer Museum at UCLA


Andrea Bowers, Community or Chaos, 2016. Aluminum, cardboard, paint, and neon. 36 1/4 x 47 3/4 x 7 in. (92.1 x 121.3 x 17.8 cm). McEvoy Foundation for the Arts

In February, the Hammer Museum opened their new Works on Paper gallery, an important part of their multi-phased transformation, and a major opportunity to highlight one of the finest collections of works on paper in the nation. The gallery was made possible with a $2 million gift from Margo Leavin, who has been an incredibly generous donor to our school. This was the largest gift she made to any museum. The Works on Paper study center will open this fall while the next major phase of the museum’s transformation—a reimagined lobby and main entrance, will open in spring 2023.
 
Lulu, the new restaurant at the Hammer, opened in October 2021 to widespread praise. Led by acclaimed chef, writer, and cookbook author David Tanis and conceived with legendary chef and food activist Alice Waters, we are grateful to Lulu for their support this past May of our inaugural Yummy Bowl benefit, which raised funds to fight student hunger at UCLA. 
 
The Hammer presented a number of important exhibitions this year, including Witch Hunt, No Humans Involved, Lifes, and Ulysses Jenkins: Without Your Interpretation. The museum also produced a short documentary on Jenkins’ work and legacy.
 
Finally, last summer the Hammer announced multidisciplinary artist, author, and curator Kandis Williams as the winner of the 2020 Mohn Award. 

 

UCLA’s Center for the Art of Performance


Ronald K. Brown/Evidence, Equality. Photo by Christopher George, courtesy of The Kennedy Center

UCLA’s Center for the Art of Performance (CAP UCLA) welcomed audiences back with eight in-person performances. Choreographer Ronald K. Brown’s The Equality of Night and Day: First Glimpse featured Brown’s unique dance vocabulary in an exploration of liberation, community responsibility, spirituality, and struggle. This resonant and moving new work marked CAP UCLA’s emotional return to live performance and received a standing ovation from a deeply supportive audience. In conjunction with the themes of the performance, CAP UCLA presented special activities and an exhibit featuring the work of Angela Davis and her relationship to UCLA with archival materials drawn from UCLA Library Special Collections. 
 
Across the season, the Center’s Education Department collaborated with the Student Committee for the Arts on a series of interactive activities for students and audiences, featuring the return of CAP UCLA’s Poetry Bureau, open mics, hands-on art making activities, and performance opportunities for UCLA students. 
 
After many years of planning and preparation, The UCLA Nimoy Theater is set to open in the spring of 2023. CAP UCLA has over 30 performances programmed for the inaugural season in a wide range of disciplines. $19 million has been raised for the capital campaign with $4 million left to go.
 
I also want to recognize the excellent leadership of Meryl Friedman and Fred Frumberg, who have led CAP UCLA through a year of uncertainty and transition after Kristy Edmunds stepped down as executive and artistic director last fall. I am grateful to Meryl and Fred, and the entire staff at CAP UCLA, for their steady stewardship through the year. 
 
An international search for the Center’s next executive and artistic director will be launched shortly, and I hope to name a new director by early 2023. Stay tuned for updates.

 

Impact Through Arts Education  


Artwork created as part of VAPAE’s Multigenerational Afterschool Arts (MASA) Program at the UCLA Community School.

Our Visual and Performing Arts Education (VAPAE) Program announced the publication of their scholarly article "Multigenerational Art Making at a Community School: A Case Study of Transformative Parent Engagement" in Harvard Educational Review’s Winter 2021 issue. Their study explored family engagement, creativity, and culture in VAPAE’s Multigenerational Afterschool Arts (MASA) Program at the UCLA Community School. VAPAE’s research was shared at the annual conference for the National Association for Multicultural Education, California Chapter in March, and at the National Community Schools & Family Engagement Conference in June.

Building on a long-time partnership with the Center for Community Schooling, VAPAE was delighted to work with 40 teachers at the UCLA Community School in a professional development workshop in April.

VAPAE continues to play an important role in arts education in the community, serving a diverse multigenerational audience, which is critical to the mission of the school and university.

 

Expanding the reach of the arts at UCLA 


The crowd, including UCLA Chancellor Gene Block, left, views Refik Anadol’s “Moment of Reflection” multi-media installation in the Franklin D. Murphy Sculpture Garden on April 19. Photo by Matt Harbicht/UCLA.

The Chancellor’s Council on the Arts, on which I serve, brings together leaders from across UCLA’s three professional arts schools, four public-facing arts organizations, the Humanities and Social Sciences Divisions, and campus’s International Institute and Institute of American Cultures to increase collaboration and coordination of arts activities and programming at UCLA. This year, the Council launched Go Arts, a web portal that shares news and events from across the arts at UCLA. 

This fall, the School of the Arts and Architecture presented 10 Questions: If not now, when?, the fourth installment of the hallmark event series that gathers some of the most compelling thinkers from UCLA and beyond to consider how best to chart a path forward. UCLA students, faculty, alumni, and community members met in the virtual classroom to engage in vibrant conversation—drawing from the fields of arts, activism, health, law, science, technology, and more—about how we might heal, connect, build, and sustain, among other questions. 

As part of the 10 Questions series, VAPAE collaborated with a range of participants, including middle and high school students from public schools across the city as well as cohorts of local senior citizens and families. Each group generated their own classroom and program conversations and created artwork in response to select questions. 

The School of the Arts and Architecture also partnered with campus to present Department of Design Media Arts alumnus and media artist Refik Anadol’s dynamic multimedia installation “Moment of Reflection”  in the Franklin D. Murphy Sculpture Garden. Attracting an audience of more than 5,000, attendees were invited to transcend their surroundings and contemplate the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on their lives. It was a moving and powerful tribute to our community’s resilience and the power of art to bring people together.

Dozens of our students also participated in UCLA’s new “First Thursdays” block party events, which take place each first Thursday evening of the month on Broxton Ave. in Westwood Village. Students were commissioned to create artworks in a variety of media, which were on display at the events and shared widely on social media.

 

Updated infrastructure and expanded support

This year, thanks to the generous support of our incredible donor community, we opened the new Lynda and Stewart Resnick Photography Lab in Fall 2021, ushering in new darkroom experiences for undergraduate students in the art department. We also were able to complete major upgrades in both the undergraduate and graduate ceramics facilities thanks to two new gifts totaling over $1 million. And, in alignment with the school’s larger strategic aims, and thanks to the generosity of our alumni, parents, and campus community, the new UCLA Arts Racial Equity Fund was awarded to five scholars for the upcoming academic year.


LOOKING AHEAD


Photo by Gavin Aleshire/UCLA

As we look forward to the fall quarter and a new academic year, I am energized and optimistic. I look forward to working alongside all of my colleagues, our students, and our broader UCLA Arts community as we continue to harness the power of the arts and architecture to strengthen our communities and shape a better future for all. 

Wherever you may be in the world, I hope that you all have a restful and restorative summer.

With best wishes, 

Brett

Brett Steele
Dean

 

HEADER IMAGE: Obos 69 by George Tsutakwa, 1969. The Franklin D. Murchy Sculpture Garden. Image courtesy UCLA.

 

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