Alumni Spotlight: Winter 2026
UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture alumni from all four academic departments—Architecture and Urban Design, Art, Design Media Arts, and World Arts and Cultures/Dance—have shared updates about their work and accomplishments since graduating from UCLA. This column features their recent awards and recognitions, publications, exhibitions, performances, and career updates.
Awards, Recognitions, and Fellowships
Exterior view of DNA Architecture + Design's Mississippi Longhouse. (Courtesy of the architects)
Valery Augustin M.Arch. ’01 (Architecture and Urban Design) and his architecture and interior design firm DNA Architecture + Design was awarded a Future House Award from Global Design News. DNA Architecture + Design’s Mississippi Longhouse is a standout example of how traditional forms can be reinvented within a modern architectural framework, blending the historical significance of Native American longhouses with contemporary design principles.
Batay-Csorba Architects was recognized with a 2025 Architecture MasterPrize Award for this Toronto home. (Courtesy of Batay-Csorba Architects)
Andrew Batay-Csorba M.Arch. ‘05 and Jodi Batay-Csorba M.Arch. ‘05 (Architecture and Urban Design) of Batay-Csorba Architects (BCA) received the 2025 Architecture MasterPrize Award in the single-family residential category for their Westminster Residence. BCA is currently hard at work on their 3239 Dundas building in Toronto, which includes 128 purpose built rental units. Construction is set to start early this year.
A photo of Nat Decker. (Courtesy of the artist)
Nat Decker ‘22 (Design Media Arts) was awarded a 2026 United States Artists Fellowship. Decker is a Los Angeles-based artist working across digital media, sculpture, and performance. Decker’s practice critically engages disability and technology to examine complex layers of embodiment, virtuality, and liberatory networks. They make fantastical assistive devices, community archives, and infrastructural critiques to render the aesthetics of abnormality and resistance.
Russell Fortmeyer M.A. ‘04 (Architecture and Urban Design), sustainable design leader for Arup, is part of a nine-person research team that received a 2025 Latrobe Prize from the American Institute of Architects College of Fellows. The $150,000 grant supports research exploring how building façades can enhance human health by functioning as air purifiers. As outdoor air pollution increases in cities—disproportionately impacting disadvantaged communities—the team aims to transform building envelopes into smog-filtering systems.
Research Professor Dan Froot M.F.A. ‘00 (World Arts and Cultures/Dance) is currently participating in a month-long artist residency near Genoa, Italy, as a Bogliasco Foundation Fellow. During his residency, he is developing a theater piece that examines the plastics industry’s harmful suppression of information about the toxicity of its products.
In March 2025, Friends of Architecture Santa Fe hosted over 50 participants in a half-day design charrette aimed at envisioning a Santa Fe decades from now.
Anthony Guida M.Arch. (‘00), architect and board president of Friends of Architecture Santa Fe, led the 2024-2025 ReVision: The Future of Santa Fe Style, which included public presentations, tours, a design charrette, and a capstone gallery exhibition on the past, present, and future of the regional revival style. ReVision was recognized with a 2025 AIA Santa Fe Honor Award in December.
The cover of Jeremy Jacob Peretz and Joan Cambridge-Mayfield's poetry chapbook. (Courtesy of the authors)
Jeremy Jacob Peretz Ph.D. '20 (World Arts and Cultures/Dance), along with collaborator Joan Cambridge-Mayfield, was nominated for a 2025 Pushcart Prize for their poem AI, which first appeared in About Place Journal. You can hear Jeremy read the poem at an event hosted by the Black Earth Institute. Jeremy and Joan's chapbook of poems, Jombii Jamborii, written and translated collaboratively in English and Guyanese Creole, was published in November by Ugly Duckling Presse. Their film Just 3 People Talking is now available online through Alexander Street.
Emily Yang, right, and Maciej Kuciara with their Emmys for White Rabbit.
Emily Yang ’15 (Design Media Arts) won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Innovation in Emerging Media for White Rabbit. White Rabbit, co-written and co-directed by Yang and Maciej Kuciara, is an interactive anime series. Released by crowdfunding platform Shibuya, White Rabbit features a “choose your own adventure” mechanic that lets the audience shape the story. Suddenly, viewers became fans, fans became collaborators, and the world of White Rabbit took on a life of its own.
Exhibitions, Performances, and Screenings
Anna Boyiazis ’89 (Art) has two upcoming exhibitions. Women by Women at the PhotoVogue Festival in Milan, Italy, from March 1–4, 2026, celebrates the multifaceted ways in which women express and imagine themselves while challenging the assumption that women’s rights, visibility, and recognition are guaranteed. Boyiazis’ work will also be featured at The Photography Show presented by AIPAD in New York City from April 22–26, 2026. Her work is currently on view at the Natural History Museum in London, as well as at other major galleries worldwide.
A still from Erin Cooney's Aire Libre. (Courtesy of the artist)
Erin Cooney M.F.A. ‘20 (Design Media Arts), an adjunct assistant professor in the UCLA Department of European Languages and Transcultural Studies, premiered her community-engaged and dance-based film Aire Libre at the Torrance Art Museum in the spring of 2025. Aire Libre sheds light on the toxic air and soil pollution that has affected lower-income communities of color in Los Angeles who live amid heavy industry, busy freeways, and other polluting facilities. Cooney's I AM A RIVER, a film about the L.A. River and the rights of nature, premiered at Shatto Gallery in the summer of 2025.
Clockwise from top left, Moodzi, Arushi Singh, Valeria Tizol Vivas, and Negar Kamali will perform at ICA LA on February 20. (ICA LA)
FIRST DRAFT is an ongoing performance series that showcases works in progress by Los Angeles–based artists. The series comes to the Institute of Contemporary Art Los Angeles (ICA LA) on February 20, 2026, presenting three performance works: one by current World Arts and Cultures/Dance graduate students Arushi Singh and Moodzi (Abhijeet Mudgerikar), another by Valeria Tizol Vivas M.F.A. ’22 (Art), and a third by Negar Kamali. The event is organized by choreographer and educator Emily Barasch M.F.A. ’21 (World Arts and Cultures/Dance) in partnership with FIRST DRAFT.
Dan Froot's Arms Around America had its world premiere at the UCLA Nimoy Theater. (Bailey Holiver)
Research Professor Dan Froot M.F.A. ‘00 (World Arts and Cultures/Dance) of Dan Froot & Company will bring Arms Around America (AAA) to Kingsbury Hall in Salt Lake City on April 9 and 10, 2026. AAA is an evening of six short radio plays based on the oral histories of families around the country whose lives have been shaped in some way by guns.
Sharon Kagan's practice explores knitting as an allegory for human interconnectedness and intergenerational trauma. (Courtesy of the artist)
Sharon Kagan ‘76 (Art) has a solo exhibition at the Museum of Art and History (MOAH) in Lancaster, Calif. Bearing Witness is a 25-year survey of Kagan’s practice across drawing, painting, installation, and performance. The exhibition is on view through April 19, 2026. Kagan will present the durational performance Leaping, Together at MOAH on February 21 and 22, 2026. Her work will also be featured in a three-person exhibition, What Remains: Memory, Ritual, Trace, at Los Angeles Valley College from March 9 through April 3, 2026.
Installation view of Blue Sky and Yellow Sunflower at Wolfpack HQ. (Courtesy of the artists and Wolfpack HQ)
Zoe Koke M.F.A. ’19 (Art) has an exhibition at Wolfpack HQ in Gardena, Calif. Blue Sky and Yellow Sunflower is a multidisciplinary project curated by Koke, bringing her work into dialogue with that of Luchita Hurtado and former UCLA Arts faculty member Lee Mullican. All three artists share a geography of living and working between the desert and Los Angeles, and the exhibition takes this movement as its point of departure. Blue Sky and Yellow Sunflower is open by appointment until February 28, 2026, and will conclude with performances and readings.
eternity calendar by Amelia Lockwood, currently on view at Morán Morán. (Courtesy of the artist and Morán Morán)
Amelia Lockwood M.F.A. ‘20 (Art) has a debut solo exhibition at Morán Morán Gallery in Los Angeles. Lockwood’s Pocket unfolds as a constellation of ceramic sculptures arranged around a central table of jars and vessels. At first glance, the works appear to draw from the ornamental excess of the Rococo movement of the eighteenth century, characterized by elaborate surface detail, pastel palettes, and sinuous forms that spilled outward into space. However, Lockwood engages this visual language only to quietly undo its hierarchy. Pocket is on view through February 7, 2026.
Pat O’Neill's Los Angeles, from the series Cars and Other Problems, is on view in Made in L.A. 2025. (Courtesy of the Hammer Museum)
The Hammer Museum at UCLA’s exhibition Made in L.A. 2025 remains on view through March 1, 2026, and features several alumni: Carl Cheng M.A. ‘67, Hanna Hur M.F.A. ‘19, Beaux Mendes M.F.A. ‘19, Na Mira M.F.A. ‘13, and Pat O’Neill M.F.A. ‘64, all from the Department of Art. Made in L.A. 2025 is the seventh iteration of the Hammer’s signature biennial exhibition that showcases artists practicing throughout the greater Los Angeles area. Neither myth nor monolith, Los Angeles is many things to many people, and its dissonance is perhaps its most distinguishing feature.
The Day Tomorrow Began, curated by Diana Nawi, reflects Tavares Strachan's passion for science and his desire to showcase inspiring figures from Africa and the Black diaspora. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Diana Nawi ‘06 (Art) curated the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) exhibition Tavares Strachan: The Day Tomorrow Began, on view through March 29, 2026. Strachen’s first museum exhibition in L.A. invites viewers into immersive multisensory installations. His singular artworks—across media including neon, ceramics, bronze, painting, text, music, and performance—illuminate stories through which new ideas can emerge.
Open Inquiry: UC Arts features over 20 current students and alumni, including Haniko Zahra, whose work is pictured here. (Courtesy of the artist)
Open Inquiry: UC Arts, curated by UCLA Arts Board Member Jennifer Wechsler, at the Sausalito Center For The Arts brings together a new generation of artists emerging from the renowned art practice programs at UCLA, UC Berkeley, and UC Davis. The art departments at these universities have long been recognized as seminal hubs of artistic experimentation and critical thought, consistently incubating artists who merge academic inquiry with artistic rigor. The exhibition runs from March 14 through April 16, 2026, and features current students and alumni from the past two decades, including Theodora Allen ‘14, Alex Anderson M.F.A. ‘18, Audrey Leshay ‘19, Amelia Lockwood M.F.A. ‘20, Nick Lowe ‘02, Haniko Zahra M.F.A. ‘24, and more. The opening reception will take place on Saturday, March 21, 2026, from 3 to 6 p.m.
Splitting Heaven is a performance piece by Perry Picasshoe. (Courtesy of the artist)
Perry Picasshoe ’24 (Art) is featured in a two-person exhibition with Lindsey Cherek at The Delaware Contemporary, titled Creative Influence(r), on view through April 26, 2026. Picasshoe recently completed two performances: one in Puerto Rico conceived as a ritual practice of surrender to life, and another in which they painted the sky and sea over five days, then split the painting in half on the sixth.
The cover of John Rock's Architectural Compositions.
John Rock M.Arch. ‘80 (Architecture and Urban Design) has an upcoming solo exhibition, Architectural Compositions, at the California Heritage Museum in Santa Monica, Calif., from Feb. 8 through April 19, 2026. The exhibition will be accompanied by a book of the same name.
Patricia Sandler ‘73 (Art) exhibited last May on a Los Angeles billboard for The Billboard Creative (TBC), a nonprofit organization that reimagines how art is viewed by offering alternative platforms beyond traditional museums and galleries. Sandler is currently exhibiting with an international group of artists at the Los Angeles Center of Photography. The works in Reservoir: Photography, Loneliness and Well Being examine themes of loneliness and will travel internationally following the Los Angeles presentation. The exhibition is on view through March 14, 2026.
Installation view of Mary Shelley Must Never Die at Konstnärshuset. (Giulia Cairone / Konstnärshuset)
Henrik Soederstroem M.F.A. ‘23 (Design Media Arts) participated in the exhibition Mary Shelley Must Never Die at Konstnärshuset in Stockholm, Sweden. The show surveyed the gothic in contemporary art through the works of five artists and received favorable reviews from Swedish outlets Dagens Nyheter and Art Notes. Soederstroem presented for a self returning mostly memory, a continuation of work first conceived for his Design Media Arts M.F.A. show in 2022. The project renders dark virtual environments from old post cards advertising hotels and restaurants, continuing Soederstroem's preoccupation with the overlaps of architecture, digital environments, and subjective emotional space.
A photo Ofelia Esparza whose work is currently on view at the Vincent Price Art Museum. (Courtesy of VPAM)
Steven Wong ‘96 (Art) is director of the Vincent Price Art Museum (VPAM) at East Los Angeles College. Currently on view at VPAM is Ofelia Esparza: A Retrospective, which celebrates the life and work of Chicana artist, altarista, and educator Ofelia Esparza, whose cultural impact on East Los Angeles and beyond spans more than seven decades. Widely recognized as one of California’s most revered folk artists, Esparza helped bring the traditions of Mexican altar-making and Día de los Muertos into the American mainstream.
Elena Yu ’16 (Art) has a site-specific installation at the UC Santa Barbara Library titled Weaving Ephemera, created in celebration of the 30th anniversary of the Ethnic and Gender Studies Collection (EGSC). In fall 2023, Yu was invited to create work in response to the history of the EGSC and was drawn to two untouched back rooms. She was inspired by ephemera connected to the history of Ethnic Studies at UCSB and the day-to-day occupations of library staff, including file cabinets filled with book dust jackets and printed correspondence. Weaving Ephemera is on view through March 13, 2026.
Publications
The cover of Mary Uyematsu Kao's Rockin' the Boat.
Mary Uyematsu Kao ‘71 (Art) recently published a new edition of her book Rockin' the Boat: Flashbacks of the 1970s Asian Movement. The book offers a photographic journey through the Asian American Movement from 1969 to 1974, featuring over 350 black-and-white images—many previously unseen. Personal stories from the participants bring to life the beginnings of Asian America, Southern California Japanese American youth organizations, and multigenerational community activism across the country.
Ariane Vielmetter made this illustration in collaboration with her son Theo. (Courtesy of the artist)
Ariane Vielmetter ‘08 (Art) and her son Theo created illustrations as an homage to the plant species that have “grown, recovered, and sprouted” on their lot since the Eaton fire destroyed their home and community in January 2025. Ariane began the drawings as color-by-number illustrations, and Theo used watercolor pencils to animate the plants. Zocalo Public Square has now published the sketches. The works document the impact of the fire on the ecology of their family garden. “I wanted [Theo] to be able to understand their resilience and feel a sense of hope in their recovery,” Vielmetter said.
Career Updates
Felipe Antonio Hernandez M.Arch. ‘17 (Architecture and Urban Design) is Head of Accessibility for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games, leading efforts to deliver a barrier-free Games that redefine inclusion and universal access. Over the past three years, he has guided the integration of accessibility across every phase of Games planning and delivery, drawing on his prior experience with LA28’s Venue & Infrastructure team and his advisory roles with the International Paralympic Committee for the Santiago 2023 Para Pan American Games and Paralympic Games in Paris 2024.
Interior of Room Key Studio in Los Angeles. (Courtesy of Stephen Ou).
Stephen Ou ‘14 (Design Media Arts) is co-founder of Room Key Studio, a recording studio in Los Angeles. Room Key Studios is a space for artists who want to immerse themselves in the joy of recording.
Christy Ross next to one of her paintings. (Courtesy of the artist)
Christy Ross ‘99 (Design) teaches art at St. Didacus Parish School in San Diego by day and leads Paint & Sip classes across San Diego County by night. She also owns Christy Ross Art and maintains an active practice as a working artist. Through her teaching and business, Ross is committed to building community through art—something she believes is especially vital in today’s digitally connected yet increasingly isolated world.
New Podcast
Kristina Wong ’00 (World Arts and Cultures/Dance) has a new podcast, Killing Your Number. Not so much a true crime podcast as a ”post-crime” one, the series explores the growing Asian American prison population and the impact of incarceration on those communities, which often goes unaddressed because of the cultural shame and stigma of incarceration in Asian American families. The podcast is co-hosted by Kirn Kim, who spent 20 years in prison.
First AI Art Museum
A first-look at the Infinity Room gallery from Refik Anadol’s new AI museum, opening this spring in the Grand L.A. (Dataland)
Refik Anadol M.F.A. ’14 (Design Media Arts) will open DATALAND, the world’s first museum dedicated to AI art, this spring at the Frank Gehry–designed Grand L.A. complex in downtown Los Angeles. Anadol also unveiled a sneak peak at the Infinity Room, one of the museum’s five discrete galleries. The immersive room features Anadol’s distinct swirling colors and images and will be infused with AI-generated scents, creating a multisensory experience powered by its very own AI model, called the Large Nature Model.
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