[vimeo http://vimeo.com/22633568]Eric Dyer, associate professor of Visual Arts, has been awarded a 2012 fellowship for creative arts by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Professor Dyer is an artist, filmmaker, experimental animator, and educator whose award-winning films have screened internationally at numerous festivals, including the Chicago International Film Festival, the Ann Arbor Film Festival, South by Southwest, and the Ottawa, Annecy, Melbourne, and London International Animation Festivals. His work has also been exhibited at the Exploratorium, the Hirshhorn, the Smithsonian National Gallery of Art, Ars Electronica, and the Cairo and Venice Biennales.

Much of his recent work focuses on the zoetrope, as shown in the video clip above. Dyer comments, “I have dug up the zoetrope, a pre-cinema optical toy, and am using it to create and explore a visual language of loops and spirals. When spun, the complex circular sculptures, dubbed cinetropes, are a blur to the human eye but come to full animated life when viewed through shutter glasses or the lens of a fast-shutter video camera. This video is a compilation of film clips and behind-the-scenes footage from [my zoetropes] Copenhagen Cycles and The Bellows March.”

The Department of Theatre’s current production, Incorruptible, which runs through April 28, received praise from critic Jack L. B. Gohn of BroadwayWorld.com in a review published on April 19 (click here to read). In conclusion he remarked, “Incorruptible is a hoot. You should go.” Theatre students Sydney Kleinberg, Christopher Dews and Jessica Ruth Baker all received mentions. For more information about the production, which is directed by Colette Searls, associate professor Theatre, visit the Arts & Culture Calendar.

The Center for Art Design and Visual Culture (CADVC) has received two 2012 publication design awards from the American Association of Museums. Within the category of institutions with budgets of less than $750,000, the CADVC received first prize for the exhibition catalogue Where Do We Migrate To? (pictured), designed by Kelley Bell, assistant professor Visual Arts (and Visual Arts MFA ’05). Additionally, the CAVDC received second prize in the scholarly journals category for the publication Visual Culture and Evolution: An Online Symposium, designed by Guenet Abraham, associate professor of Visual Arts. Both publications are distributed by Artbook.com.

Ellen Handler Spitz, honors college professor of visual arts, recently returned from Belgrade, Serbia, where she spoke on her book “Art and Psyche.”  The book was recently translated to Serbian.

While in Belgrade, Spitz lectured at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade; the Faculty of Philosophy, Novi Sad; the Institute for Mental Health, Belgrade; and Kolarac Hall.  The themes of her discussion were art and psychoanalysis, and children, space, and imagination.

Stories about Spitz’s visit appeared in the Serbian press both before and after her visit.  An example of a story can be seen here.

Kelley Bell, assistant professor of Visual Arts, will speak at American University on March 29 as part of a panel of four women in the District of Columbia area who currently work in animation and motion graphics. In honor of Women’s History Month, the Animator’s Roundtable will provide an opportunity for the artists to show samples of their work and discuss how they approach animation, from business to aesthetics.

Uncultivated, an art project by Lynn Cazabon, associate professor of Visual Arts, will be featured in two exhibitions and will be published in a digital media art catalogue, SCAN2GO. An ongoing public art project that explores wild plants in urban landscapes, Uncultivated began in Baltimore in late 2010 and has expanded to include other cities.

Photographs from Uncultivated are on display at the VisArts Gallery, at 155 Gibbs Street in Rockville, Maryland, from March 9 through April 14 in an exhibition curated by UMBC IMDA alumna Susan Main.

Photographs will also be on display at Brooklyn Utopias: Park Space, Play Space, at the Old Stone House, 333 3rd Street, Brooklyn, New York, from April 5 through June 25.

Uncultivated is also featured in the publication SCAN2GO, a printed catalogue of digital media art works produced by the College Art Association Services to Artists committee in collaboration with v1b3. The catalogue will represent the artworks by printed QR codes, which function to connect viewers to digital media art works by using a smart phone. The QR codes are linked to a web address/url that shows an art piece (sound art, video, code pieces or web art) that will be viewed on smart phones and camera enabled tablet computers.

John Sturgeon, professor of Visual Arts, was selected for a Fulbright Scholar award to the United Kingdom, 2012-13, as a Distinguished Chair at the London College of Art, London, England. This is Professor Sturgeon’s second Fulbright Scholar appointment (Argentina/Uruguay 1988-89), but his first since joining the UMBC faculty in 2000.

Writing and photography by Callie Neylan, assistant professor of Visual Arts, was featured on National Public Radio’s “The Picture Show” blog on March 17. Offering a St. Patrick’s Day reflection on a visit to Ireland, she notes, “One thing I stress when teaching design is the philosophy of austerity, simplicity, and that less is more. What you take out, I always say, is more important than what you leave in.”

Maurice Berger, research professor at the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture, will have a short film, Threshold, featured in the Whitney Biennial in New York. The film was commissioned as part of an artwork entitled BLEED by Alicia Hall Moran and Jason Moran that will transform the entire fourth floor of the Whitney into a performance/video exhibition space. Threshold focuses on the crossing of thresholds—walking through doors, entering trains, cars, and buses, moving across stages, approaching podiums, and even the imagined passage from Earth to heaven—that have defined the voice, place, and aspirations of a people during the historic struggle for civil rights.

The Biennial exhibition, which examines the current state of contemporary art in America, opened on March 1 and continues on display through May 27. The BLEED installation featuring Professor Berger’s film will run from May 9 through 13. The Whitney Museum of American Art is located at 945 Madison Avenue at 75th Street in New York. For directions and other visiting click here.

The Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture (CADVC) will partner with the Highlandtown Arts and Entertainment District (ha!) to present Wish You Were Here, a pop-up gallery installation March 3 through 17. A community opening event will be held on Saturday, March 3 from 5 to 7 p.m. Both the exhibition and opening event are free to the public.

Wish You Were Here, an exhibition by Lexie “Mountain” Macchi, interdisciplinary artist and CADVC graduate research assistant, recontextualizes the relationship of one leftover object to another, transforming and distorting the feeling of occupation, potential and space. Organized by the CADVC and ha! with additional support from the Highlandtown Community Association, this ground-floor installation calls towards a future of the space using the tools and language of its past—namely the detritus, debris, and accumulated silent memory-bearers within.

Pop-Up galleries and shops act as catalysts for activity that will help revitalize the Highlandtown business district and activate the residential community while providing UMBC students an opportunity for experiential learning. “We’re calling these ‘Pop-Up Galleries’ because they will suddenly appear in unoccupied spaces, and then close down shortly thereafter,” says organizer Sandra Abbott, ha! member, and curator of collections and outreach at UMBC’s Center for Art Design and Visual Culture (CADVC).

The Pop-Up Gallery opening event will be held at 3216 Eastern Avenue, a formerly unoccupied retail space. Charm City Land Co., LLC, which is currently planning a first-class residential rehab for the space, donates the space to the project. At the opening event, visitors will be invited to walk into the space and explore the first floor of the building. For the next three weeks, the installation will remain as a storefront installation featuring the site-specific artwork designed to activate the space from the vantage point of the curbside viewer.

The Pop-Up Gallery Series Installation will remain on view through the closing event on Saturday, March 17 from 5-7 p.m. Gallery admission is by appointment only, but the installation can be viewed from the storefront every evening starting at dusk.