Photo & Film student Mark Strandquist developed the idea for The People’s Library through his work with the Art Museum of the Americas in DC. His project, which directly involves the Richmond community, receives discarded books from The Richmond Public Library. Strandquist and his collaborators, recipients of an Undergraduate Research Grant, recycle the books into new paper.

The old books from the library have their pages stripped, re-pulped, made into new paper, and then bound into those books again as blank pages. Once these blank books are made, members of the community may check out the books, write/mark in them as they choose, and return them. The books will be a permanent part of the library collection.

This collection will be presented at the Open Engagement Conference in Portland, OR and also at April’s Feast RVA.

The project was recently covered on CBS6.

TED, a platform to share ideas, offers the opportunity for locally organized events. The Richmond version, appropriately named TEDxRVA, brought several passionate Richmond speakers as well as international guests to the stage. Speakers from four different departments within VCUarts shared their ideas and talents based on the theme Create.

Communication Arts Chair Bob Meganck and Associate Professor Matt Wallin spoke about the logic of a universal color system.

Graphic Design MFA student James Walker, new to Richmond, took notice of bicycles missing wheels and started a banner project for Dead Bikes.

VCU Music student Eric Stanley and Communication Arts student Rob Gibsun wowed the crowd with their combination of spoken word and violin.

Fashion Design alumnus Michael Birch-Pierce gave us insight into his creative process as he sewed a portrait of a member of the audience.

Amy White, an alumna from the Department of Kinetic Imaging, is senior editior at Gameskinny. She was quoted in in Forbes Magazine about the recent performance issues in Electronic Arts’ online gaming. “(Amy) has been monitoring the situation and taking fan feedback on her social community. She explains what Digital Rights Management (DRM) is all about, why Maxis’ good gameplay is useless when gamers can’t access it right away and why DRM could cause a problem with next gen consoles like PlayStation 4 and the next Xbox in this exclusive interview.”

Light Industry, a venue in Brooklyn, recently screened Talking to Strangers, written and directed by Rob Tregenza, Director of the Cinema Program. This 1988 film, shot in Baltimore, Maryland, shows nine different 10 minute segments in a continuous take on a single roll of 35mm film. The intricacy and innovative originality of these shots has obtained widespread international acclaim including recent press in The New Yorker. The film also received nomination by the IFP/West “Spirit” Awards in 1990 in two categories: Best First Director and Best Cinematography.

Richard Brody of The New Yorker says “The sheer and overt virtuosity and sinuosity of the filmmaking—nine shots, done with a craning, roving, tracking 35mm camera, each running an entire thousand-foot reel of film (and each, according to Tregenza’s website, was done only once, with no second take)—is all the more remarkable in relation to the “story,” to the experience, activity, and ambition of its protagonist. It’s the kind of movie that’s all the more amazing when it’s compared with the modern-classic subject it tackles and the nearly overfamiliar character at its center, a sensitive young man in the city.”

In 2013, the University is participating in the 150th anniversary of the Civil War by celebrating the “Year of Freedom,” which is 1863, the year of the Emancipation Proclamation. The committee is asking faculty, staff and students to make 12″ by 12″ panels for the VCU Freedom Quilt Project. The process is quite simple and artists from the School of the Arts are encouraged to add some flavor to the project.

These panels will be sewn together to create a quilt.  Click here for instructions on how to create your quilt square. We are hoping that each school will have enough panels sent in to make large size quilts that will be displayed throughout campus. We ask that the middle square display what freedom means to you. It can include artwork or an image. Panels are to be turned in by April 19th.

If you have any questions please contact Holly Price Alford at hpalford@vcu.edu.