Fall Message from Dean Brett Steele
How do we begin?
I'm beginning. You're beginning.
All of us, in one way or another, are trying to engage or reengage both with our institution and our respective forms.
I’m honored to join you as the new dean of UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture. I am excited about a new beginning.
Beginnings are a time of great potential and a time of great possibility but they can also be daunting, especially in times of crisis. And, regardless of where you are from, what you do or what you believe in, the world around us is reverberating with uncertainty, challenge, and crisis. We are struck by the images that fill our screens. We are moved by the the heroism of strangers and the power of nature. Among these crises, natural and otherwise, it can be difficult to gain our bearings, to find our direction.
What do we hold onto in these moments of profound challenge or crisis?
We hold on to and embrace our forms. We hold onto and support our communities. We reaffirm and clarify what is important to us and why we do what we do.
As I join your community in the School of the Arts and Architecture, I am reminded of these lessons. I am reminded of the strength of this community. I am reminded by the power of our forms’ endurance and the possibility of the forms we have yet to create. I believe deeply that the arts and architecture broadly, and our school specifically, has a profound role to play in both understanding and addressing the challenges that surround us.
I believe our work, whether as an artist, an architect, a performer, a scholar, an administrator, or supporter must be in dialogue with the world around us. While it is challenging to navigate these early years of the 21st century—a time dominated by monologues, PowerPoints, and one-dimensional, one-directional thinking—we must find ourselves in dialogue.
In the days and months ahead, I look forward to getting to know you, to becoming familiar with your work, and to creating—and strengthening—the platforms for dialogue and discourse that will allow us, individually and as a community, to engage with the complexities of our world, to receive and share knowledge, and to boldly put forth the creative possibilities, ideas, and solutions that will help shape our future.
My best wishes to you all for an invigorating and productive fall quarter,
Brett
Brett Steele
Dean, UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture
Header Image Credit: Valerie Green