Faculty Spotlight
Updates from the UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture Faculty
On any given day, the work of our faculty enlivens museums, galleries, performance venues, lecture halls, public spaces, and more—both at home and abroad. Their creative and scholarly contributions mine the complexities of the human condition, asking essential questions of our time while expanding the potential of creativity and the depth, diversity, and real-world impact of the arts.
This winter, Abraham.in.Motion, the dance company founded by Kyle Abraham, studio professor in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance, will present performances in San Jose, CA; Harrisburg, VA; Dallas, TX; and Seattle, WA.
Rebecca Allen, professor in the Department of Design Media Arts has a solo exhibition titled Rebecca Allen: Sync(Emerge (Consciousness)) on view at QUAD in the United Kingdom.
Neil Denari, professor in the Department of Architecture and Urban design published his latest book, MASSX, which offers both a rich history of projects and an in-depth examination of his firm's practice.
Anne Ellegood, Hammer Museum senior curator, is a juror for the Hudgens Prize in Atlanta, one of the largest national awards given to an individual artist. The final awardee will be selected in 2019.
Andrea Fraser, professor and chair in the Department of Art, is participating in the 12th Shanghai Biennale, which lasts through Mar. 10, and will give a lecture at the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. on Jan. 13.
Led by partners Marcelo Spina and Georgina Huljich, assistant adjunct professor in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design, architectural firm P-A-T-T-E-R-N-S was commissioned to design the set for the theatrical production of Joan Didion's White Album as part of the Next Wave Festival at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. The performance will be coming to CAP UCLA in April.
Jeffrey Inaba, associate adjunct professor in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design, and his firm Inaba Williams, were recognized for two projects in The Architect's Newspaper's Best of 2018 Design Awards.
Jimenez Lai, a lecturer in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design was named the DeZeen Emerging Architect of the Year, 2018.
Candice Lin, assistant professor in the Department of Art will give a lecture in the department’s lecture series at the Hammer Museum in January.
Lauren McCarthy and Casey Reas, professors in the Department of Design Media Arts are presenting Processing Community Day @ Los Angeles on January 19. Processing Community Day is an inclusive event that will bring together people of all ages to celebrate and explore art, code, and activism. McCarthy has also recently been recognized with a Google Focused Research Award, which culminates new work that will be shown in an exhibition at 205 Hudson Gallery in February; and she received a Mozilla MOSS Partners Grant for the continued development of p5.js, the JavaScript library that works with Reas’ Processing to make coding accessible for artists, designers, educators, and beginners.
Rebeca Méndez, professor in the department of Design Media Arts, is showing a new work titled Ascent of Weavers / Ascenso de Tejedorason in the group exhibition, Bajo La Bóveda Azul Cobalto, at MACO, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Oaxaca on view through June. You can also see her work in Los Angeles in LACMA’s West of Modernism exhibition through April. In addition to featuring her work in this exhibition, LACMA also added 21 of Méndez's artworks to its permanent collection this fall. And, in New York, Rebeca Méndez Selects, the exhibition Méndez curated at the Cooper Hewitt, is garnering much acclaim from publications like the New Yorker and Vogue.
This fall, Catherine Opie, professor in the Department of Art was honored at the LACMA Film + Art Gala as well as the Aperture Gala in New York. This winter, you can find Opie’s work on view at 11 museums and galleries across the United States and Europe.
In September, Janet O'Shea, professor in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance released a new book titled Risk, Failure, Play: What Dance Reveals About Martial Arts Training.
Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance Professor Lionel Popkin will present The Oedipus/Antigone Project at the Getty Villa on March 8 and 9.
Casey Reas, professor in the Department of Design Media Arts, is participating in the Whitney Museum’s exhibition Programmed: Rules, Codes, and Choreographies in Art, 1965–2018. Reas will also have work on view at the Kulturhaus der BASF in Germany. In February, Reas will give an artist talk at Tulane University in New Orleans, LA.
Peter Sellars, distinguished professor in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance will give lectures at Arizona State University and the University of Michigan, and will present two performances of operas that he directed in Europe: Girls of the Golden West will be performed at the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam, and Bach’s St. John Passion with Simon Rattle and Peter Sellars will be presented at the Berliner Philharmoniker in Berlin.
Header image: Joan Didion's White Album at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Set design by Architecture and Urban Design faculty member Georgina Hujlich.
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