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BFA Pictorial Art Alumnus, Titus Kaphar paints cover image for June 2020 cover of Time Magazine.
'I Cannot Sell You This Painting.' Artist Titus Kaphar on his George Floyd TIME Cover.
August 2014
Digital Media Art student's BFA project featured in Contra Costa Times
SJSU Digital Media Art major Genki Hagata is about to make a 350 mile bike ride from San Jose to Santa Barbara, capturing the event on a small camera which Hagata will be wearing on his ride. The ride will be reproduced for gallery goers-who ride a stationary bike installed in Hagata's BFA gallery. To learn about Genki Hagata's Kickstarter campaign, click here.
June 1 – October 1, 2014
Community Matters: SJSU Alumni in San José
In 2011, San José State University’s Department of Art and Art History celebrated
its centennial anniversary, an occasion that has been marked with a series of exhibitions,
programs and projects, both on and off campus. Community Matters: SJSU Alumni in San José is the last in a series of exhibitions that were created to showcase the Art Department’s
long history, to celebrate a century’s worth of achievements, and to welcome the next
one hundred years of artistic endeavor and innovation.
May 27, 2014
Current and Emeritus Art Faculty Receive Awards
Spatial Art lecturer Ryan Carrington was awarded the 2014 Silicon Valley Creates Emerging
Artist Award. Emeritus Spatial Art professor, Consuelo Underwood, was awarded the
Artist Laureate Award for her work in textiles and installation. Both were honored
at a ceremony at the Zero1 Garage on May 27, 2014.
May 26, 2014
Three SJSU Art Students featured in National Veterans Art Museum
The work of three SJSU Art and Art History Department students is currently on exhibit at the National Veterans Art Museum in Chicago. Mark Pinto, a 2014 Photography MFA
graduate; Amanda Brannon, a 2014 Spatial Art BFA graduate, and Roger Ourthiague, a
Pictorial BFA student, collaborated on an "Exquisite Corpse" for the exhibition. See
the story in the Huffington Post.
May 17 & 18, 2014
SJSU Digital Media Art Program lights things up at MAKER FAIRE 2014!
Over 25 students and faculty from the Digital Media program invaded MakerFaire for the 3rd time this year. Over 30 projects were shown by students from the Art 106 Human Machine Interface Class, the Art 107 Advanced Projects Class and also video games from the SJSU Game Developers Club. The artwork ranged from glowing interactive kinetic electronic objects to gesture recognition software interfaces, to the 16' Litewall LED display playing an updated version of Pong. The installation was situated in the cavernous dark space known as Fiesta Hall and was well received by the attendees of the Faire. The diverse and engaging collection, resulted in 3 awards from the judges panel, 2 Maker Faire Editors Choice awards were given to our booth, as well as Best in Class for Education. The intrepid students included: Angie Sham, Athena Chow, Benn Caldeo, Elmer Wang, Garrett Beleu, Laurence Simmonds, Michelle LaChance, Val Laolagi, Charuta Seith, Enki Tovuuch, Jarry Truong, Kelsey Higham, Michael Layman,Tyson Frederick, Genki Hagata, Jun Huang, Mikey X, Andrew Puentes, Daniel Evans, Scott Blackwell, Ashley Jenkins, Faculty and Advisors: John Bruneau, Steve Durie, Craig Hobbs, Kyung Lee, and James Morgan.
May 17 & 18, 2014
Spatial Art Students Score at MAKER FAIRE 2014!
Spatial Art students had their inaugural experience as Exhibitors at Maker Faire Bay
Area 2014, in May. While the Ceramics, Glass and Small Metals students worked with
attendees on body casting and building a clay "exquisite corpse," students from Professor
Wright's Installation Art class built a small beach and operated large interactive
sculptures. Installation Art students Tomoko Shiino, Michelle Frey, Richard Mendez
and Camille Campos-Shanahan created a life-sized Foosball game which was awarded a
Best In Class award for Interactive Projects. The Spatial Art students working with
the body casting and the exquisite corpse, also won a Best in Class award. Congratulations,
all-- and we will be back next year!
May 2014
"Data Exchange" Exhibition at ZERO1 Garage
Scotty Gorham (MFA Digital Media Art) showed his interactive light installation Pulse as part of "Data Exchange" this May at the ZERO1 Garage in San Jose. Several other
DMA students participated in the exhibit as part of Professor Joel Slayton's class.
For more images and information on Pulse visit scottygorham.com/pulse.
Friday, April 11, 2014, 6-8.45pm
18th Annual Student Showcase at the deYoung Museum
Eleven MFA students and three BFA students from SJSU's Department of Art and Art History have been selected to exhibit in this year's Annual Student Showcase at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. The event is free and open to the public.
Pictured, left to right: Aimee Santos, Jay Ruland, Tamara Danoyan, Daniel Salcedo, Jon Stewart, Thomas Sanders, Alyssa Eustaquio, Brittney Cathey-Adams, Eliana Cetto, Joon Park Novak, Nathan Cox, Isaac Lewin.
Not pictured: Patrick Kingshill
Feb 5-22, 2014
MFA NOW at Root Division, San Francisco
Four MFA students from SJSU's Department of Art and Art History have been selected to exhibit their work in MFA Now 2014. Alyssa Eustaquio, Ninh Filip, Mark Pinto and Biagio Scarpello will exhibit their work in sculpture and photography in the exhibition. According to the US News and World Report survey from 2013, the Bay Area is home to seven of the top one hundred MFA programs in Visual Arts in the country: California College of the Arts, Mills College, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco State University, San Jose State University, Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley.
Photo: Alyssa Eustaquio, Keeping FEMINISM Fresh, 2013
November 11, 2013
SJSU MFA Student Takes the Pentagon by Art
Mark Pinto, a 3rd year grad student in the Photography department was recently selected from amongst military veteran artists from across the US to be featured in the first Veteran's Art Show at the Pentagon in Washington DC. The juried art show, which opened on Nov 11, 2013, Veterans Day, will run for a year and be visible to the thousands of Pentagon employees as well as the public on the Pentagon tour. Pinto's art work is a digital photograph titled "Homeless Joe", part of a 10 picture series depicting the difficulties of veterans as they are reintegrated into society. Each photo uses the GI Joe action figures, as a way of disarming the viewer, and bringing them closer to the work. When asked about the show, Pinto said, "As a Marine, I spent some time at the Pentagon, and now for me to have a photograph there is very satisfying." He went on to say that he was surprised and happy that the Pentagon has chosen his work which has a strong anti-war message. "Because my work wasn't the traditional patriotic work, there was a lot of behind the scenes meetings and delays to the opening of the show, which was originally slated for March 2013" Pinto said.
About the artist:
Mark Pinto is a retired Marine helicopter pilot, Gulf War veteran and former Buddhist priest. He plans to graduate in May 2014 with his MFA in Photography.
Photo: Mark Pinto, Homeless Joe
November 2013
Creativity, Change, Commitment: A Celebration of 100 Years of the Department of Art
ISBN: 978-0-9721984-3-1
$30 SJSU Students, Faculty, Staff, and Alumni
$50 Public
Please add $10 for shipping within the United States
Available through the Thompson Art Gallery; make checks payable to the Gallery and mail to:
Jo Farb Hernandez, Thompson Art Gallery, Department of Art and Art History
San José State University
San José, CA 95192-0089.
For further information, please contact Professor Hernandez at 408.924.4328 or jo.hernandez@sjsu.edu.
October 25, 2013
SJSU Art at the Humanities and the Arts Student Showcase
Students from the Department of Art and Art History showed off their skills at this
year's College of Humanities and the Arts Student Showcase. Click here to read the article in SJSU Today. Below: Spatial Art BFA student Matthew Eaton blows glass for an audience in the
Art Quad.
October 2013
Jonathan Huang receives Honorable Mention from International Sculpture Center
Jonathan Huang, Spatial MFA Graduate 2013, received Honorable Mention in this year's International
Sculpture Center Student Competition. Over 200 graduate students were were nominated by their professors from over 50
countries, only five were selected for an honorable mention. Jonathan's installations
seek to induce empathy, and contemplation, on behalf of victims of sex trafficking.
October 2013
The Department of Art - The Graphic Eye
This exhibit is one of several on campus organized to celebrate the centennial of the founding of the art department in 1911, a part of what was then the San José Normal School, an institution aimed primarily at educating future teachers. The department grew and diversified as the decades passed and the School evolved into the San José State Teachers College, then into San José State College, and finally, in 1972, to San José State University. An early and ongoing commitment to the funding of public education in California made this, for a time, the largest and most important public art school in the Western United States, as well as the largest unit on campus, with a range of facilities which made it possible to encourage a wide range of creative endeavors exploring a range of media, aesthetic, genre, and technique.
The posters in this exhibition, dating mostly from the 1970s and ‘80s, give testimony to a particularly flourishing and productive period in the history of art and design at SJSU. Conceptualized and designed by teachers and students, they were produced to publicize a wide range of department events, exhibitions, and programs. Graphically compelling and evocative, they demonstrate the lively and sometimes irreverent creative spirit of students and faculty alike.
Poster design by Sam Smidt for the First National Invitational Photography Exhibition at San José State College back in 1967.
SJSU Art Collection
Art Building, SJSU
October 2013
Robert Dawson awarded 2013 Creative Work Fund Grant
SJSU Photography faculty member Robert Dawson has received a 2013 Visual Arts Award form the Creative Work Fund. The grant will support a collaborative project between Dawson and the Library and Literacy Foundation for San Joaquin County.
Photograph by Robert Dawson.
September 2013
Pictorial Art Student Jordan Gonzales Awarded CSU Trustee Award
Jordan Anthony Gonzales has been named the 2013-14 Trustee William Hauck Scholar, one of 23 CSU Trustees Awards for Outstanding Achievement.
September 3–October 31, 2013
“Picturing Our Library: Watercolors by SJSU Art Students,” an exhibition featuring 18 of the student watercolors, opens Sept. 3 on the fourth
floor, and will continue through the end of the month. Rendered this spring, these
paintings captures the remarkable vantage points of interior and exterior landscapes
of the King Library.
August 6, 2013
Art History MA Student featured in SJSU Today
SJSU Art History graduate student Sarah Dragovich discusses her internship at the
San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, in SJSU Today.
July 2013
MFA student Nathan Cox Participates in Artists' Residency in Latvia
In July, 2013, Spatial Art graduate student Nathan Cox participated in ArtLab ROJAL, a 2-week residency in Roja Municipality, Latvia. This event brought together 11 international artists to create public works in a variety of media, each inspired by the town and its surroundings.
Above: Nathan Cox, Rest Stop for Lost Souls, 2013
June 8–September 14, 2013
SJSU MFA Grads in NEXTNEWCA at the San José ICA.
Two 2013 MFA graduates have been selected to exhibit their thesis artworks at NextNewCA at the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art. Barbara Boissevain (MFA Photography, 2013,) and Jennifer Groft (MFA Spatial Art, 2013,) will exhibit their work along with 13 other MFA graduates from 11 MFA programs across the state, including: University of Southern California (UCSC), San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI), California College of the Arts (CCA), Claremont Graduate University (CGU), Mills College, California Institute of the Arts (CalArts), San Francisco State University (SFSU), University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC), University of California Berkeley, and Stanford University. “The works in the show reflect broad perspectives present in the contemporary artistic landscape that explore innovative approaches to new media, installation, photography, painting, drawing and sculpture.” (SJICA.)
Above: Jen Groft, “Within Her Breath,” 2011-2013. Fir, redwood, steel.
May 17–19, 2013
CADRE Students Exhibit at MAKER FAIRE
Students from SJSU’s CADRE Lab for Digital Media Art exhibited interactive projects at this year’s Maker Faire festival in San Mateo. Student projects ranged from 3D virtual environment programs to games from the SJSU Game Development Club played on “old school” arcade cabinets.
One project, called “Quakebot,” visualizes recent earthquake activity by using CNC technology to physically “poke” epicenters into a miniature sandbox in the shape of California.
A collaborative project called the “Litewall” includes the contribution of over 90 people, each building a super-sized pixel. This giant “DIY” pixel screen was created to allow art students to write their own software programs, including interactive games.
Above: “Quakebot” and “Litewall” photograph by Jillian Strahler.
MAY 3–19, 2013
MFA LIFT-OFF Exhibition
Nineteen graduating Master of Fine Arts students from SJSU’s Department of Art and Art History are featured in the current issue of Content Magazine. To read the article, click here. The students will exhibit their thesis art projects at Art Ark Gallery from May 3-19, 2013. Designed by independent curator and art writer Christian L. Frock, the exhibit illustrates the depth and breath of the department’s MFA program.
Graduating students represent the Pictorial Art, Spatial Art, Photography and Digital Media Art programs in the Department of Art and Art History. The artists are A R A, Armine Sargsyan, Avery Palmer, Barbara Boissevain, David Kempken, Elena Polanco, Esteban Salazar, Gloria Huet, Jacqueline Donecho, Jeffrey Opp, Jen, Jonathan Huang, Kat McKinnon (KGM), Lan Liu, Marianne Lettieri, Meiru Huang, Sieglinde Van Damme, Wesley Wright, and Yvonne Escalante.
The MFA studio art students collaborated with MA art history graduate students to
produce a 100-page publication for the Lift-Off 2013 exhibition. Copies will be available
at the exhibition and can be ordered here.
April 19, 2013
Yvonne Escalante (MFA Spatial Art, 2013) took second prize at the 2013 de Young Student
Showcase for her piece, Kernel of Truth. Twelve Bay Area universities and art schools participated in this year’s exhibition.
APRIL 19, 2013
17th Annual Student Showcase at the De Young Museum
Sixteen MFA Students and two BFA students from Pictorial Art, Photography and Spatial Art have been selected to exhibit work in this year’s New Generations Student Showcase. The exhibition runs from 9:30 AM to 8:45 PM on Friday, April 19th. SJSU exhibiting artists include Brittney Cathey-Adams, Tamara Danoyan, Yvonne Escalante, Scott Gorham, Meiru Huang, Gloria Huet, Kristen Jones, Lan Liu, Kat McDonald, Sam Metcalf, Galen Oback, Avery Palmer, Esteban Salazar, Kurt Salinas, Thomas Sanders, Aimee Santos, Biagio Scarpello, and Wesley Wright.
Above: Spatial Art MFA student Biagio Scarpello with his piece, “Stress Relief,” which was
awarded first prize in last year’s student showcase at the de Young. Images via Flickr.
April 19, 2013
Iron Pour at the SJSU Art Foundry
The SJSU Sculpture Guild will host its bi-annual Iron Pour at the SJSU Art Foundry, located at 1036 S. 5th St in San Jose. Students and faculty from Mission and Gavilan College will join SJSU Spatial Art faculty and students in this half-day event, with hot metal at 1pm. For information about observing the iron pour, please contact Spatial Art Lecturer Ryan Carrington at rtcarrington@gmail.com.
Click here to see videos of previous semester’s iron pours.
April 2, 2013
Melanie Mandl: From Tiny Town to Tinsel Town
Filmmaker and artist Mandl will discuss her work in light of how her history of working
in the entertainment industry has shaped her process as a fine artist. She works in
a variety of media, including painting, sculpture, and installation, stop-motion animation
and puppeteering; much of it has the quality of fairytales that collide with technology.
Mandl will also have an exhibition in the Freight and Cargo Galleries at the SJSU
Foundry, opening April 4, 6.30-8.30.
March 8, 2013
“Dirty Brushes” Student Club Begins Phase Two of Campus Mural
Students in Pictorial Art have resumed work on their “Better Than Blue” mural project, painted on a section of blue construction wall surrounding the Student Union. The students are recreating artists’ self-portraits that they have selected. The collection includes work from important European, Southeast Asian, North and Central American artists from the fifteenth through the twentieth centuries. Students pictured: Stephen Leber, Brandy Damian, Charles Thompson and Shannon Belardi are painting the portraits of Anita Rée, Egon Schiele, Suzanne Valadon and Henri Matisse.
Click here to view Youtube video.
FEBRUARY 27, 2013
SJSU MFA Students Present at Pechakucha Night
Eighteen graduating MFA candidates from the Department of Art and Art History presented
their work to the public at a “Pechakucha” Night at Café Stritch in downtown San Jose.
PechaKucha is a global phenomenon in which participants discuss 20 images for 20 seconds each
before an audience. Artists pictured above, left to right: Esteban Salazar, Kat MacKinnon,
Jeffrey Opp, Meiru Huang, and Wesley Wright.
February 6–23, 2013
MFA NOW Exhibition in San Francisco
Three SJSU Master of Fine Arts students: Barbara Boissevain (Photography,) Jonathan Huang (Spatial Art,) and Kat MacKinnon (Spatial Art,) were selected to participate in the MFA Now 2013 Juried Exhibition at Root Division in San Francisco in February. The exhibition showcased work from visual arts MFA programs at SFAI, UC Berkeley, CCA, Mills, SJSU, SFSU, and Stanford. Pictured: Jonathan Huang’s ceramic and mixed-media piece, “Lumakad,” installed at Root Division.