NEWS
Faculty News
RECENT ACCOMPLISHMENTS
- Heather Hart is a recipient of a 2025–26 Nancy B. Negley Rome Prize and will reside at the American Academy in Rome to advance her interdisciplinary practice. The Rome Prize is awarded to about 30 artists and scholars each year. ART & DESIGN
- Didier William‘s solo exhibition Living In Brilliant Suspension is on view at ArtYard in Frenchtown, NJ, from October 18 through January 18, 2026. ART & DESIGN
- Frederick Curry has been named a 2025–26 Provost Teaching Fellow, which supports pedagogical innovations designed to improve learning outcomes for students. DANCE
- Jeff Friedman is a recipient of a 2024 Fulbright Specialist grant to travel to New Delhi, India, where he was in residence in the Art, Media and Performance Department at Shiv Nadar University, Uttar Pradesh through May 12, 2025. DANCE
- Pam Tanowitz choreographed the Opéra National de Paris’ Gala Lyrique Anthony Roth Costanzo, a multi-media theater experience that combines opera, art, dance, film, and fashion. The event took place November 14 and featured music by Philip Glass and George Frideric Handel, costumes by Raf Simons (co-creative director of Prada), and videos by Tilda Swinton and others. In January, Tanowitz returns to Lincoln Center with Pastoral, set to an evening-length reworking of Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony by composer Caroline Shaw, with set design by Sarah Crowner. Pastoral will be onstage January 11–13. DANCE
- Thomas F. Lennon, director of the Documentary Film Lab, has a short film featured in the New Jersey International Film Festival. He produced and directed Marine Field Station, a 10-minute film about the scientists who track marine life at this Rutgers research center in New Jersey’s coastal marshes. The festival ran from May 30 through June 8. He also served as contributing producer on Cutting Through Rocks, which won the Documentary World Cinema Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival in January. FILMMAKING
- Anthony Branker is a recipient of a 2025 New Jersey State Council on the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship in Music Composition. He’s also a recipient of the 2024 International Songwriting Competition where he won 2nd place in the Performance category for his composition “To Be Touched (By The Spirit).” His composition “Praise” also received an Honorable Mention Award as a finalist in the Jazz Category. MUSIC
- Bille Bruley debuted as Erste Jude in Strauss’s Salome at the Metropolitan Opera on April 29. As part of The Met: Live in HD series, the performance was broadcast in movie theaters worldwide on May 17. MUSIC
- Bille Bruley will appear on a new recording of Strauss’s Salome with Orquesta Sinfonía de Minería under Maestro Alexander Prior. The album was recorded in Mexico City in early October 2025 and is set for release in 2026. MUSIC
- Composition faculty Scott Ordway‘s new concerto for violin and string orchestra, The Memory of Snow, premieres November 22 at Carnegie Hall. The piece was commissioned by Ruda Lee and the Hong Kong-based Anima Ensemble. MUSIC
- A new recording, Threads of Eternity: Orchestral Visions by Lili Boulanger and Unsuk Chin, out now from Albany Records, features performances by four Rutgers ensembles: Rutgers Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Ching-Chun Lai; Rutgers Glee Club and Rutgers Kirkpatrick Choir, directed by Brandon Williams; and Voorhees Choir, directed by alum and former faculty member Stephanie Tubiolo. MUSIC
- David Gordon designed Eboni Booth’s Pulitzer prize-winning play Primary Trust, which ran September 19 through October 5 at Philadelphia Theatre Company. Associate Dean for Equity Marshall Jones III directed a production of the same play at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, October 11 through November 16. THEATER
- Valerie Ramshur curated and participated in Threaded Paths: Global Stories, an exhibit and archive that was part of New York Textile Month. The project, which brought together more than 75 stitched projects from around the world, was on view September 16–28 at 3rd Ethos Gallery in Brooklyn, NY. THEATER
- Lee Savage designed the set for The Inheritance, Parts One and Two at Round House Theatre, which ran August 27 through November 2 in Bethesda, MD. THEATER
FACULTY VOICES IN THE MEDIA
- Gerald Casel is quoted in Dance Teacher Magazine‘s feature “Teaching Politically Engaged College Dance Students.” DANCE
- Ian Koebner spoke to WWFM about the school’s efforts in the area of arts in health. DEAN’S OFFICE
- Jeff Friedman spoke with NorthJersey.com about the Disability Studies minor, a collaboration between MGSA, SMLR, Bloustein, and SAS, as part of the website’s feature “Rutgers launches disability studies minor to explore world of oft-ignored community.” DANCE
- Patrick Stettner weighed in about the benefits and limitations of using a smartphone to shoot a movie in a WIRED article, “You Can Shoot a Movie on a Phone. Just Don’t Expect It to Be Easy.” FILM
- Composer and multimedia artist Scott Ordway speaks about the relationship between art, landscape, and emotion on the Climate Change and Happiness podcast (Helsinki, Finland). MUSIC
- Kraig Williams discusses the Rutgers Wind Ensemble’s concert featuring a live performance of the film score along with a screening of 1931’s Frankenstein on WWFM’s A Tempo radio broadcast with host Rachel Katz. MUSIC
- Amanda Eubanks Winkler is featured prominently in CNN.com’s “Are We Living Through an Andrew Lloyd Webber Renaissance?” MUSIC
- Christopher Cartmill is quoted in this NorthJersey.com feature on a limited run of Oedipus on Broadway. THEATER
FACULTY FEATURES
Review: Mark Armijo McKnight‘s Whitney debut (The New Yorker) ART & DESIGN
Haiti-born Didier William’s dazzling, gazing paintings are literally an eyeful (Los Angeles Times) ART & DESIGN
Oakland Museum of California Opens an Exhibit Highlighting the Life and Career of Angela Davis (Gerry Beegan in Ebony magazine) ART & DESIGN
How to Decolonize a Museum? Try an Ax. (Raphael Montañez Ortiz in The New York Times) ART & DESIGN
Road Trip to Escape, USA (Julie Langsam in Dense Magazine) ART & DESIGN
Hear a Chopin Waltz Unearthed After Nearly 200 Years (Robinson McClellan in The New York Times) ARTS ONLINE
Review: The Miraculous Simplicity of Patti Smith’s Childhood (Gerald Casel in The New York Times) DANCE
Best Dance Performances of 2024 (Pam Tanowitz in The New York Times) DANCE
Review: Pam Tanowitz’s Witty Dance Secrets in London (The New York Times) DANCE
Review: The Royal Ballet’s Mixed Bill Is a Winner (Pam Tanowitz in The Times of London) DANCE