A Winter Message from Dean Brett Steele
This new year finds us at a sobering and extraordinary moment in history.
While the arrival of COVID-19 vaccines offers a glimmer of hope, the pandemic runs rampant in our communities and is claiming lives at an alarming and heartbreaking rate.
As our new president prepares to assume office this month, the outgoing president continues to claim that the election was “rigged,” fomenting a level of rage, division and dissent that, last week, led to horrific violence in our nation’s capital and an attack on the very heart of American democracy.
In 2020, the movement for Black lives and social justice opened necessary discussions, but we are still early in our reckoning and much necessary change still lies ahead.
This has also been an extraordinarily challenging time for education and the arts everywhere—and no less for the School of the Arts and Architecture community. With the new year and the beginning of the winter quarter, we are returning to a teaching and learning environment that is far from optimal. Even as our faculty and students brilliantly adapt to Zoom instruction, online collaboration, and all kinds of new strategies and forms for creating and making, we all miss being together. We miss bumping into friends and colleagues in the halls and accidental, unexpected moments of connection and inspiration. We miss the gifts of being present with one another and sharing space.
And while the pandemic may be keeping the doors of our museums and performing arts program shuttered, our colleagues at the Hammer and Fowler museums and UCLA’s Center for the Art of Performance have not missed a beat – inventing new strategies and platforms to keep us all connected to their vital programs and offerings.
2020 demanded a spirit of cooperation and compassion never before summoned in our lifetimes. Despite countless challenges, the UCLA Arts community has come together with love and support for each other and for our wider community. Our resolve is strong, our sense of purpose redoubled, and our passion for making the world a better place never more urgent.
The arts continue to offer hope and guidance as we chart a path forward.
Rather than return to where we were, we must aim for something better – a more just and inclusive world, with our values and commitment to social justice grounding and guiding our thinking, our planning, our teaching, our programs, our work.
Whether you are here with us as student, faculty, staff, alumni, parent, or supporter, as we forge ahead, I hope that this new year brings with it a new resolve to work together to overcome shared challenges and reach shared goals.
Wishing everyone the best for a safe, healthy and productive winter quarter and 2021.
Best,
Brett Steele
Stay engaged. Use #UCLAarts to stay connected.
