Funding of $30,000 for Undergraduate Student Research Grants began five years ago with the purpose of encouraging curiosity, creativity, risk-taking and scholarly investigation into a project or subject of interest relevant to the student’s major. To date 50 big ideas have been funded at an average of $2,500 per proposal. Research and creative work that is: 1) interdisciplinary 2) involves student collaboration and 3) draws on the expertise of a faculty mentor is preferred.
Click here to learn more and to apply.
Past Recipients
2010-2011 Awards:
Photos by Photography and Film student Harrison Möenich
Chasing Forever: Higher Learning through Hip-Hop
A team of three students will explore the musical genre of hip-hop focusing on the investigation of perceptions of hip-hop that show averse or detached feelings towards hip-hop culture. In collaboration with the VCU Student Hip-Hop Organization (SHHO), they will launch a publication that defies negative perceptions towards hip-hop and informs about the worldly and multi-disciplined influence hip-hop has gained over the years.
Neil Lopez, Advertising
Duy Nguyen, Cinema and Philosophy
Rebecca Rice, Graphic Design
Award: $2,100
Faculty mentor: Dawn Waters
Remember Me
Two Painting & Printmaking students will create an installation consisting of portraits commemorating family and friends diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. There will be an interactive piece that prompts the viewer to contribute a feeling or remembrance. All drawings will be available for sale and donations will be accepted with proceeds going to the Alzheimer’s Foundation.
Mandy Fitzgerald, Painting & Printmaking
Virginia Wood, Painting & Printmaking
Award: $1,430
Faculty mentor: Reni Gower
Revelations of Feminism in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
A Painting & Printmaking student will cross-examine twenty-five paintings of nude women created by male artists from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. The objective will be to study the shifting visual presentation of women in different periods and better understand the evolution of representations of the female body in art. Five paintings that investigate this topic will be produced and exhibited. Women’s Studies majors will be invited to participate in a group dialogue.
Allison Jones, Painting and Printmaking
Award: $743
Faculty mentor: Ruth Bolduan
Breathing in the Performing Arts
Three Performing Arts students will coordinate a series of presentations by breathing specialists in each of the performing arts (Music, Dance and Theatre) as well as a medical specialist in respiratory therapy. The presentations will educate students on the mechanics of breathing, the development of breathing, and different perspectives on breathing from other performing arts. All presentations will be video-recorded, produced into DVD form, and housed at the Media Resource Center of Cabell library to be used as a resource for students.
Greyson Goodenow, Theatre Performance
Pace Short, Dance and Choreography
Joshua Wright, Music Education
Award: $3,000
Faculty mentor: Dr. Ross Walter
Glass Eye Prosthetics
A Craft/Material Studies student will travel to Luascha, Germany to learn the art of glass eye blowing, an art used to make medical prosthetics and realistic eyes for taxidermy animals in museums. A video will be made documenting the teachings of Walter Hellbach (3rd generation glass blower) to share with students in the glass program. Students at VCUarts will have access to learn a lost art that is not taught in the United States.
Sean Donlon, Craft/Material Studies
Award: $3000
Faculty mentor: Emilio Santini
The Imaginauts
Five students from various disciplines will create a series of short films aimed at children who have graduated from the ABCs and 123s and seek a program that continues to foster their curiosity and creativity. The series revolves around the adventures of the Imaginauts, a team of dimension-hopping, time-traveling muses who stimulate the imaginations of the creatively blocked. Using stop-motion animation, puppets, and music, the Imaginauts will make art theory and history accessible to post-elementary school children, building their confidence in their ability to learn and create.
Kirsten Cohen, Cinema
Emily Herr, Communication Arts
Allie Smith, Kinetic Imaging
Ha Tran, Sculpture + Extended Media and Craft/Material Studies
Jonathan Tune, Communication Arts
Award: $3,000
Faculty mentor: Matt King
Artistry and Athleticism through Capoeira
Capoeira, a Brazilian martial art, will serve as artistic inspiration for five students from Fashion Design, Art History, Cinema, Graphic Design, and Communication Arts. The students will combine the skills of each of their artistic trades to explore how artistry can meet athleticism through Capoeira. The students will learn the foundations of each discipline, incorporate their own skills and perspectives, and explore the ways in which art forms interact to create one cohesive gallery exhibition revealing the relationship between artistry and athleticism.
Christine Billard, Fashion Design
Cory Holm, Cinema
Corey Martin, Art History
Allison Simes, Graphic Design
Seth Ylitalo-Ward, Communication Arts
Award: $2,550
Faculty mentor: Henry Swartz
Chronicling Urbanism in-between: There/Here
One Interior Design major and one Architectural History major will combine their enthusiasm for their respective majors to draw attention to and document several vacant buildings on the iconic strips of East Broad Street and East Grace Street in Richmond. They will create a web site for a public database and interactive map of vacant properties to be used as a tool for the community of designers, historians, and prospective developers.
R. Tyler King, Art History (Architectural History)
Andrea Manrique, Interior Design
Award: $2,960
Faculty mentors: Camden Whitehead and Dr. Charles Brownell
NICA Initiative: Nicaraguan International Collaborative Arts
Three students will travel to Nicaragua for a two-week-long art education program, aimed at discovering the benefits of teaching art across international borders and socioeconomic levels. In partnership with Orphanetwork, a program that does mission work and educates orphans, the students will promote the implementation of art education programs in Nicaragua, incorporating elements and principles of conceptual art-making to initiate exploration of self-expression through different disciplines and mediums. The program will culminate in a gallery of student work at the orphanage and video documentation of the trip to be brought to VCU.
Amanda Hitchcock, Sculpture + Extended Media
Aissatou Barry, Kinetic Imaging
Rachel Schneider, Art Education
Award: $5,000
Faculty mentor: Sara Wilson McKay
Nonesuch
Students in Photography and Film, Kinetic Imaging, Communication Arts and History will explore something that we can’t tell you about right now or it could ruin their project. We will post their summary at a later date, after their anonymity is no longer necessary.
Anonymous, Photography and Film
Anonymous, Kinetic Imaging
Anonymous, Communication Arts
Anonymous, Photography and Film and Creative Advertising
Anonymous, History
Award: $2,950
Faculty mentors: Stephen Vitiello, Jacob Dodd and Dr. James Watkinson
Visualizing Sound
One Painting & Printmaking student along with one Engineering student will create a piece that combines painting and electrical engineering by converting sound into a visual display. The core of this project will use the fractal patterns detected in sound to convert into fractal images that constantly grow, develop, and change in real time, creating a piece of art that is constantly evolving. The outcome of this project will create art that is solely dependent on its environment.
Nathan Hilbish, Graduate Electrical Engineering
Theresa Painter, Painting & Printmaking
Award: $650
Faculty mentors: Ronald Johnson and Dr. Afoditi Vennie Filippas
The Whole Truth Museum
The Whole Truth Museum will represent a collaboration of VCUarts students, two from Sculpture+Extended Media and two majoring in Painting & Printmaking. Through the lens of modern feminism and institutional critique, these four women will create a museum aimed at opening the ideas of history to question. The goal will not only be to point out the weaknesses of the current museum system but to make a meaningful connection with surroundings through research and exploration. The WTM will establish a place in which we can react to our environment (downtown Richmond), its history and its community through a series of fabricated galleries containing artifacts-both real and handmade.
Brianna Gribben, Sculpture+Extended Media
Elise Isom, Painting & Printmaking
Jaimie McKay, Sculpture+Extended Media
Cameron Robinson, Sculpture+Extended Media
Award: $2,500
Faculty mentor: Hope Ginsburg
A Dance through the Decades
Students from Cinema, Fashion Design and Interior design will use lyrics to tell a love story through decades on film. Each segment of the film, and each room in the house, will depict a different decade to tell the story of a sixty-year relationship between a man and a woman. The short film will be one consecutive shot of the couple from childhood to old age dancing from room to room, and from decade to decade.
Danny Caporaletti, Cinema
Jacqueline Ferrer, Fashion Design
Mona Bonnot, Interior Design
Award: $1,800
Faculty mentor: Mary Beth Reed
Fluxscape
Three students from Kinetic Imaging, Communication Arts and Music will create a live kinetic performance-based installation. In a process known as urban mapping, they will utilize a venue projector to transpose images onto the façade of a building. The installation will be reactive and improvisational, a shifting visual and sonic landscape entirely dependent on its audience. The piece will be promoted as an event in a space downtown and entered in the 2011 InLight Festival.
Liz Baker, Kinetic Imaging
Devonne Harris, Music (Jazz)
Ginna Lambert, Communication Arts
Award: $3,000
Faculty mentor: Bob Paris
2009-2010 Awards
The 2009-2010 VCUarts Undergraduate Student Research Grants have been announced. Thirty-nine students from across the School of the Arts will be awarded a total of approximately $25,000 in funding for their creative ideas in 2010. Eleven proposals were chosen this year from a pool of nearly sixty competitive proposals received from every program in the School of the Arts.
Funding for the VCUarts Undergraduate Research Grants began in 2006 with the purpose of encouraging curiosity, creativity, risk-taking and scholarly investigation into a project or subject of interest relevant to a student’s major. A main focus of each grant proposal is interdisciplinary research and student collaboration. Take a look at what this year’s grant recipients have in the works.
Four students will create a full evening-length multimedia modern dance event to be held at the newly renovated Dogtown Dance Theatre. The theme for the piece is the study of the human subconscious. The starting point will be the investigation from Quadrifrons, a complete collaborative dance work based on hypnosis and the human subconscious.
Amy Kaeberle, Interdisciplinary Studies (Dance and Choreography and Kinetic Imaging)
Alyssa Gregory, Dance and Choreography
Amanda Patterson, Kinetic Imaging
Nathan Altice, Media, Art + Text
Award: $3,000
One Sculpture + Extended Media and one Craft/Material Studies student will marry their love affair with fabric in Eco-Chic. The central theme of this project is to take pre-existing fabrics such as curtains, upholstery or sheets from second-hand shops and transform them into new and original fabrics which will then be used to create a collection of one-of-a-kind clothing. A series of unique garments will be created drawing inspiration from the lines and shapes of intricate furniture.
Grace Johnston, Sculpture + Extended Media
Anne Douglas Shaw, Craft/Material Studies
Award: $1,800
In an ongoing Kinetic Imaging and Sculpture + Extended Media collaboration, two students will create a kinetic sculpture, which visually reacts to the sonic landscapes of public spaces in Richmond. Using audio-sensitive technology, programming, and robotics, parts of the sculpture will react to city noises. The piece will have a form suggestive of organic life and its sensitivity to our environment. Through this reaction, the project will increase awareness of the prevalence of sound and the importance of silence. Students will build on knowledge acquired in their separate robotics and sound classes, to learn about Richmond and interactive public art installations.
John Dombroski, Kinetic Imaging
Joshua Bennett, Sculpture + Extended Media
Award: $2,400
A team of four students will research the concept of using experimental film devices in a feature length narrative film. Adopting an original screenplay as the framework, their execution will include techniques such as multi-layered superimposition, traveling mattes and cut-out animation. Using high definition video and digitally transferred 8mm film and VHS, they will cross different filmmaking mediums.
Harrison Colby, Cinema
John Reaves, English
Knox Colby, Mass Communications
Jami Eaton, German
Award: $1,550
Seven students from various disciplines will create an art educational television program titled The Yellow House. Puppets will play a major role in the development of this program designed to teach audiences of all ages about artists and the inspiration found in their work. Vincent van Gogh will be one of the program’s reoccurring characters. The title The Yellow House references van Gogh’s house in the south of France that became a sanctuary for artists.
Kay Milne, Art Education
Gerry Perez, Art Education
Warren A. Hamilton II, Kinetic Imaging
Dennis Williams, Theatre and Art History
Rebecca Rudolph, Theatre (Scene Design)
Brian Glass, Kinetic Imaging and Computer Science
Emily Rosko, Theatre/ Stage Management
Award: $2,500
Students from Kinetic Imaging, Communication Arts, Cinema and Theatre will create a thirty minute film, The Persistence of Poe in Richmond, VA. The project will document Poe’s accomplishments as a resident of the city and how his presence is still felt by Richmonders today. Through its use of live action, animation, writing, narration, music, dance, and acting, the film will demonstrate the range, power, and ability of interdisciplinary art.
Christine Stoddard, Cinema and English
David Fuchs, Kinetic Imaging
Nina Stoddard, Communication Arts
Hilary Stallings, Theatre
Erica Breig, Theatre
Award: $2,250
Two Music majors will discover whether or not electronic aids and multimedia will pave a new frontier for the French horn in solo performance and ensemble performance. By focusing on the use of microphones, click tracks, digital and analog effects, and computers, the students will conduct research that will educate horn players and music educators on the possibilities of non-traditional electro-acoustic and multimedia uses in French horn performance.
Benjamin Faught, Music Education
Jesse Williams, Music Performance
Award: $1,200
As a reaction to archetypes in cultural fairytales and a discourse in the gender politics of the uniform, students from Sculpture + Extended Media and Women’s Studies will engage the imagery of Little Red Riding Hood to create an open edition of garments. Pieces will be sent to women across the country and the world who will be encouraged to modify, personalize, and alter their garment in any way they see fit and then send them back to Richmond. Using Little Red Riding Hood as a battleground for restoring the power of femininity to women, and the garment as a public space, the pieces created will function as both wearable art and social research.
Rebecca Henderson, Sculpture + Extended Media (major) and Painting and Printmaking (minor)
Shannon Le Corre, Women’s Studies
Award: $1,100
Students from Cinema, Music and Theatre will create Pomegranate, VCU’s first musical film based on the Greek myth of Hades and Persephone. Students will compose a visual and musical work exploring sacrifices made for love.
Mary Cox, Cinema
Savannah Berry, Music (Vocal Performance)
Jennifer Anne Ducharme, Theatre (Costume Design)
Award: $2,400
Art History and Cinema students will examine the former Old First African Baptist Church, one of the most historic buildings in Richmond and the first place a black clergyman was able to conduct services without white supervision. The church embodies legacies from most major ancient and medieval cultures, but has never been researched in detail. The project will result in a written report to be deposited at Cabell Library and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.
Kalitah Crawford, Art History
Thomas Flanagan, Art History (Architectural History)
Sophia Minnerly, Cinema
Award: $1,950
2008-2009 Awards
Congratulations to the twenty-six students and their faculty mentors whose creative ideas have been selected to be funded in 2009. Over fifty competitive proposals were received from every program in the School of the Arts. Preference was given to collaboration [teams, variety of Art/University majors and faculty mentors]. Approximately $25,000 will be awarded.
Through this interdisciplinary project, students from the Sculpture, Graphic Design, and Music departments will generate one multifunctional art work that personifies a percussion instrument and can take the role of a sculpture. Graphic artist will assist with computerized abstracts to help with construction and lecture/demonstrations. Musicians will play the sculpture as a percussion instrument and visual artists will present it as a sculpture. Each student will participate in every phase of development including design, sculpting, and musical composition. Developing the skill to collaborate with artists of other disciplines will build more opportunities for education and employment as well as enlarge audiences. The completed work will reach out to students through musical performance and visual aesthetics.
Kevin Estes, Music Performance
Peter Soroka, Music Performance
Brittany Shade, Sculpture + Extended Media
John Labra, Graphic Design
Award: $2,500
Faculty Mentors:
Robert Carter, Graphic Design
Kris Keeton, Music
Brian Jones, Music
This Craft-Sculpture team will attend the 2009 Magnetic Conference to learn more about magnetic and diamagnetic metals like bismuth and ferrofluid. Interested in how people fidget with their objects of adornment (rings, necklaces, opening lockets, braiding hair) they will create magnetic and scientific wearable art that the viewer can play with on and off the body.They also plan to integrate glass, metal and fibers into their designs and showcase the series as interactive sculptural pieces on and off the body.
Mary E. S. Cox, Craft/Material Studies
Jessica N. Price, Sculpture + Extended Media
Award: $2,900
Faculty Mentor: Susie Ganch, Craft/Material Studies
The project team will further practice and expand their knowledge of the Modaris program while creating a line of nine individual looks of women’s Haute Couture clothing. This practice of paying high attention to detail in the construction, embellishment, and fit of a garment has died in the American fashion industry. Haute couture embodies the highest quality of craftsmanship, fabrics, seam finishes, and incorporates details such as embroidery, beading, feather work, braiding, et cetera. It is the art of fashion at its best. If selected by the jury, the final collection would be showcased in the VCU fashion show as well and the independent senior fashion show.
Amy Galles, Fashion Design
Carole L. Jones, Fashion Design
Tonya Mixon, Fashion Design
Award: $2,489
Faculty Mentor: Holly Alford, Fashion Design & Merchandising
Counter culture is the swift current that moves beneath social experience. For the past two years Sera Tabb and Jon Headlee have challenged themselves to bring this growing phenomenon to a broader audience. From Lucha Libre wrestlers, to fire throwers, to drag queens and many social groups beyond, the Identity: Richmond documentary project has successfully documented Richmond counter cultures actively engaging in the creation of alternative identity. Identity: Richmond is the continuation of a project previously titled “Identity Formation in Urban Environments.”
Eden Papineau, Communication Arts
Adam Parker, Communication Arts
Christina Huther, Communication Arts
Mike Ng, VCU Brandcenter
Jon Headlee, Psychology, Philosophy, Religious Studies, minor in Creative Writing
Sera Tabb, B.F.A Communications Arts, B.A. English
Award: $3,000
Faculty Mentor: Robert Meganck, Communication Arts
This team will create a spectacular garment that will incorporate their specific mediums: fashion and sculpture. Together they will design, sketch, create and submit their design to the “World of Wearable Art” the world’s largest wearable art fashion show held annually in New Zealand. If accepted, they will travel to New Zealand to participate in the two opening nights of the show in September 2009.Together they won Richmond’s tenth annual Wearable Art fashion show and opened the SEAMLESS: Computational Couture fashion show in Boston, MA.
Grace D. Johnston, Sculpture + Extended Media
Melanie J. Hearn, Fashion Design
Award: $3,000
Faculty Mentor: Henry Swartz, Fashion Design & Merchandising
“Palladian window” – an expensive feature used to light grand spaces — migrated upstairs to become a common feature of American attics (1890-present). VCU not only owns the earliest Richmond example (at Ginter House, 1888-92) but also boasts13 other historic buildings with this motif. Studying how the influence of these windows traveled widely into the Fan can open up the national story. The first part will summarize findings; the second will provide a catalogue of attic Palladian windows in the Fan, with illustrations of the most significant ones.
Allison L. Frew, Art History
Award: $1,800
Faculty Mentor:
Charles Brownell, Art History
Investigation of scent by participating in the process of extracting essential oils from gathered natural materials and responding to findings using intaglio as a medium. The choice of intaglio as a medium is due to the similarity between the copper plate and scent in their abilities to hold a sense of memory and history. The opportunity to work with two different scent capturing processes (steam-distillation and enfleurage) will allow the scent to be experienced on a deeper level and with a strong spirit of exploration that will inform a coherent body of work in intaglio. The intended result of this research project will be an exhibition, in the VCU Student Gallery, composed of scent response prints in intaglio as well as an installation of my bottled extractions.
Caitlin Shields, Art Education major and Painting and Printmaking Minor
Award: $1,000
Faculty Mentor: Brooke Inman, Painting and Printmaking
The participants will examine the function of a conceptual mobile gallery within a contemporary art fair setting. They propose to take their miniature mobile gallery, WORN Gallery (worngallery.blogspot.com), to New York and participate in one of the yearly contemporary art fairs [Armory Show, Pulse NY, Affordable Art Fair]. Most galleries participating in international art fairs are exhibited from stationary booths, but as a traveling gallery affixed to gallery members, they propose to become a new form of gallery participant as well as spectator, learning about new and upcoming artists. This project will get participants involved in research, collaborative planning, creating presentations for fair administrators, designing exhibition materials, exchanging ideas with other artists, and learning how to maintain professionalism in the contemporary art market.
Diana Cavanaugh, Sculpture + Extended Media and Painting and Printmaking
Cara Frye, Communication Arts
Derek Cavanaugh, Communication Arts
Alexa Lester-Frazier, Sculpture and Painting
Joseph Whitfield, Sculpture + Extended Media
Award: $2,500
Faculty Mentor: Carlton Newton, Sculpture + Extended Media
2007-2008 Awards
In the fall of 2007, more than 100 VCUarts students submitted proposals for the 2008 Undergraduate Research grants. It was difficult selecting the most worthy, as so many of the submissions were impressive. The awards, totaling $25,000, are based on interdisciplinary interaction, collaboration, creativity, and potential significance of the project.
The students explored the feasibility and benefits that a film studio may have in the Richmond, Virginia area. This team examined the possibility, practicality, benefits and sustainability of the creation of a film studio in the community from an economic, technical and social perspective.
Ian Edwards, Cinema
Nathaniel Mollick, Cinema
John Charles Schneider, Cinema
Zach Snowden, Cinema
Award: $1,450 [additional travel funding support from Cinema Program]
Faculty Mentor: Rob Tregenza, Director of Cinema
VCU’s current recycling program only occurs within its buildings. Research involved analysis of critical high density pathways on campus in order to accommodate the need for recycling activity that occurs between buildings. VCU construction parameters, sustainable material specification options, and examples of successful institutional precedents were examined. Analysis of this information was synthesized for the design and manufacturing of a prototype recycling bin appropriate for utilitarian outdoor use.
Zachary Becker, Interior Design
Chase Cochran, Interior Design
David Choe, Craft/Material Studies
Matthew Brett, Sculpture + Extended Media
Carlton Morgan, Sculpture + Extended Media and Craft/Material Studies
Award: $4,250
Faculty Mentor: Camden Whitehead, Interior Design
VCU Fashion Design juniors collaborated with six Fashion Design seniors from VCU School of the Arts in Qatar on a project that used the abaya (robe worn by Muslim women) as inspiration. The designs were critiqued by the VCU Qatar students and produced by tailors in Qatar. The experience tested how well ideas are communicated and received. The finished garments were included in both the VCU and VCU Qatar annual fashion shows spring 2008. This project was the first cross-campus and cross-cultural collaboration between VCU and VCU Qatar fashion design departments.
Fashion Design students from Richmond: Natalie Hakim, Kelli Green, Nicole Osborne, Ra-Yeon Jang, Audrey Leeon, Shanna Shin, Shelby Day, Jessica Goodspeed, Corey Stewart, Lindsey French, Amy Galles, Holly Sullivan, Kendra Palin, Cara Hodge, Kathleen Gary, Darryl Schneider, Brittany Monteith
Award: $2,000
Faculty Mentors: Kim Guthrie, Department of Fashion Design and Sandra Wilkins, VCU Qatar Department of Fashion Design
The team researched aspects of postmodern works of literature that have been used to a film’s benefit. The students also examined previous attempts at adapting postmodern novels into films. They applied this research to the creation of a multimedia art installation the centerpiece of which was a short film that contains elements of postmodern narrative and visual interpretations of the literary techniques used in postmodern literature. The project’s investigation and application of research points toward a way in which postmodern novels could be better adapted into films.
Michael Bryant, Cinema
Stephen Farris, Cinema
Dominic Butchello, Art Foundation Program
Cole Sullivan, Art Foundation Program
Award: $3,700
Faculty Mentor: Rob Tregenza, Director of Cinema
The team created a multi-player real time strategy game for the 2008 Imagine Cup competition theme “Imagine a world where technology enables a sustainable environment.” Players were faced with the choice of using renewable energy sources or fossil fuels and other non-renewable energy sources to create a stable futuristic society. The goal was to make a digital experience that is fun and visually compelling while still having a prominent theme of environment conservation.
Cody Wright, Kinetic Imaging
Matt Taylor, Communication Arts
Francis Yaconiello, Business/Information Systems
Chris Bradford, Business/Information Systems
Award: $5000
Faculty Mentors: Cody Wright, Kinetic Imaging and Francis Yaconiello, Business/Information Systems
Garments and accessories were created using various construction, fabric manipulation, surface design, and stitching techniques in order to recycle and reuse the fabric scraps. Muslin and scrap metal were used in the construction of accessories and custom hardware for the pieces. One-of-a-kind garments and accessories will be entered into multiple design competitions.
Casey Bianco, Fashion Design
Sarah Holden, Craft/Material Studies
Brittany Felter, Craft/Material Studies
Jessica Lee, Fashion Design
Soo Kim, Fashion Design
Josefina Stephens, Fashion Design
Award: $3,600
Faculty Mentors: Kristin Caskey and Linda Lee, Department of Fashion Design; Sonya Clark, Susie Ganch, and Julia Pfaff, Department of Craft/Material Studies; Dr. Cindy Kissel-Ito, School of World Studies
2006-2007 Awards
You have an idea. Maybe it’s something that’s never been done. You’re passionate about seeing it to fruition, but you don’t have the support or the funds. That’s where VCUarts Undergraduate Research Grants come in.
In the fall of 2006 VCUarts initiated this grant program and helped fund nine student projects, with a total of $25,000. The proposals were intriguing, and we expect no less of the outcomes.
Kakuma Kenya – African Refugee Art Club
Kinetic Imaging student Gabriel Williams and Awer Bul, who studies Kinetic Imaging and Painting & Printmaking, will travel to Kenya to produce a video documentary about the African Refugee Art Club. The Art Club was founded by Awer Bul and other Sudanese artists who fled their country seeking safety. The group provides a rare artistic outlet for the “Lost Boys of Sudan.” Gabriel and Awer intend to build an identity for Sudanese refugees worldwide. The $5,000 award will fund travel to Kenya, lodging and video supplies.
Faculty mentor: Robert Paris, Assistant Professor, Kinetic Imaging
FroshArt.com
Graphic Design students Michael Garrett and Eric Wolinsky have teamed up with engineering student Clint Titsworth to create a web site that will provide free space for upcoming and professional artists to display their work. The software will be designed and coded from scratch and will allow for commenting and tagging, fan/friend/patron communication, artwork viewing and sales, and rankings. The $3,250 award will fund dedicated hosting and advertising.
Slow Brown Dinner
A diverse group of students including Sharon Moon and Ashley Pridmore from Sculpture + Extended Media; Cecelia Dailey, from Photography & Film and Philosophy;
Kevin Blow, a Fashion Design & Merchandising student; and Genevieve Kammel, from Religious Studies will employ absurd techniques to create humorous and “somewhat meaningless” films. Three of these will utilize mad libs, meaning selected words of a phrase are replaced with others as their point of departure. The project explores the narrative possibilities of pattern, texture, gesture, and non-sync sound to produce work that is more complex than would be possible individually. The $2,500 award will fund fabric, ink and sewing supplies for costumes and film festival entry fees.
Faculty mentor: Kristin Caskey, Associate Professor, Fashion Design and Merchandising
Identity in Urban Environments
Communication Arts student Sera Tabb and Jon Headlee, a student in Philosophy and Psychology, will examine why we see so many examples of extreme identities in urban settings such as Richmond. They will produce a documentary about those in the urban environment who choose to make radical changes in their personal representation. The goal is for the viewers to form a better understanding of the impact of urbanization on identity formation. The $5,000 award will fund supplies.
Faculty mentor: Robert Meganck, Professor, Communication Arts
TechNouveau
Fashion Design & Merchandising student Michael Birch-Pierce and Andrea Harriman of Craft/Material Studies will create a collection of women’s apparel and fashion jewelry inspired by Art Nouveau and technology. They will explore the relationship between these two vastly different ideas by combining old techniques, including traditional draping and embroidery, with modern fabric printing methods. The $2,000 award will fund a New York trip to visit the Art Nouveau collection at the Met and the purchase of fabric, precious metals, jewelry supplies, fabric printing and photography.
Faculty mentors: Susie Ganch, Associate Professor, Craft/Material Studies; Kristin Caskey, Associate Professor, Fashion Design and Merchandising
A Study of Time and Reality
Dance student Courtney Cooke investigates the effects of technology on performance. She will explore the time-controlled manipulated environment of a machine and its association with a moving body. Through the use of computer-generated images, pre-recorded and live feed video footage, the work will incorporate audience interaction to create numerous outcomes. The $2,100 award will fund costumes and equipment.
Faculty mentor: Scott Putman, Assistant Professor, Dance and Choreography
The Swap Meet
Macon Reed, a student in the Department of Sculpture + Extended Media will solicit artistic proposals from an eclectic group of participants in a variety of mediums, who will anonymously swap proposals with others. The new owner is charged with fulfilling the creative vision of a stranger. The emerging outcome crosses minds and cultures. The resulting work will be displayed at Epehemeroptera Gallery in Brooklyn. The $3,050 award will cover travel, printing, shipping and exhibition costs.
Faculty mentor: Robert Paris, Assistant Professor, Kinetic Imaging
Insiders/Outsiders
Through the study of portraiture, Douglas Colie, a Painting and Printmaking student, will examine the notion that an identity or community is the belief that something or someone lies outside of it, and that the construction of self is inherently “othering.” A group of large-scale oil paintings will be created which will describe the research and its relevance to contemporary art. The student plans a solo exhibition at a VCU student gallery space. The $900 award will fund two trips to the National Portrait Gallery, paint materials and framing.
Faculty mentor: Ruth Bolduan, Associate Professor, Painting and Printmaking
Untangling the Arabesque
Art history student Leila Prasertwaitaya will examine an accurate account of the purely Islamic architectural elements within Richmond’s Monroe Park District. The result will be a two-part catalogue to be deposited in the Special Collections at VCU’s Cabell Library. The $1,200 award will fund travel to DC to visit libraries and galleries, selected books, cost of images, supplies, stationery and printing. Faculty mentor: Dr. Charles Brownell, Professor, Art History in consultation with professors Sheila Blair and Dr. Jonathan Bloom, Hamad bin Khalifa Co-Chairs in Islamic Art.
