Arts Institute honors five with awards

The UW Arts Institute has selected the recipients of its 2003 awards in the arts. Honorees, who were judged on creative inquiry, outreach and professional excellence, will be recognized at a program and reception on April 25.

The following is a list of the honorees and the awards:

Nietzchka Keene
Professor, Department of Communication Arts
Arts Institute Creative Arts Award

Funded by the generosity of the Bassett and Evjue foundations, the Creative Arts Award recognizes the achievements of a tenured member of the arts faculty and provides general research support for a period of three years. Keene received her MFA from UCLA. Her first feature film, “The Juniper Tree,” which starred Bjork, has been screened at many venues, including the Sundance Film Festival. Her second feature, “Heroine of Hell,” starring Catherine Keener, was made for PBS. Both works are currently in release on DVD, domestically and internationally. She also works in animation, including photographing and animating a seven-minute piece called “Aves,” which has been shown at such festivals as the International Women’s Film Festival at Creteil, France. Her current feature film was shot digitally in the summer of 2001. Entitled “Barefoot to Jerusalem,” it was filmed in Madison and its surrounding small towns, Milwaukee and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The film is currently in post-production.

Li Chiao-Ping
Associate Professor, Dance Program
Emily Mead Baldwin-Bascom Professorship in the Creative Arts

The Emily Mead Baldwin-Bascom Professorship in the Creative Arts recognizes the achievements of a tenured member of the UW–Madison arts faculty and provides general research support for two years. Chiao-Ping is an acclaimed dancer, choreographer/director and videographer. A member of the faculty since 1993, Chiao-Ping has toured extensively as a solo artist with her evening-length works, “Yellow River,” “Entombed Warrior” and “The Men’s Project.” Her work as a videographer in collaboration with Douglas Rosenberg has been presented and screened at festivals throughout the United States, South America and Europe. Chiao-Ping has received numerous awards, grants and honors, including grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and choreographic fellowships from the Wisconsin Arts Board.

Ralph Russo
Wisconsin Union Galleries
Joyce J. and Gerald A. Bartell Award in the Arts

The Joyce J. and Gerald A. Bartell Award recognizes and honors the achievements of UW–Madison faculty and staff in the creative arts, in the areas of outreach, public service and other activities involving the larger community. Russo serves as adviser to the Wisconsin Union Directorate Art Committee and manages the Wisconsin Union Galleries. Working as a program adviser for the Wisconsin Union since 1984, Russo has proven himself to be a dedicated and devoted educator who has worked with generations of students to develop activities programming in all areas of the arts for the university. He is also an accomplished photographer and a leader in the photography movement in the city. As co-founder of the Center for Photography in Madison, Russo helped that organization attain non-profit status and broaden its membership. He has also generously lent his expertise to numerous organizations, including the Madison Civic Center Foundation, the Dane County Cultural Affairs Commission Grant Review Committee and the Midwest Museums Conference Planning Committee.

Bea Drysdale
Department of Art
David and Edith Sinaiko Frank Graduate Fellowship for a Woman in the Arts

The David and Edith Sinaiko Frank Graduate Fellowship for a Woman in the Arts is designed to support and encourage women musicians, dancers, artists, actors and creative writers by providing them with an opportunity to present their work in public. Drysdale is a second-year MFA art student working in the area of mixed media sculpture and fibers. A prolific artist, Drysdale has exhibited her work professionally in Chicago, La Crosse and elsewhere in Wisconsin. The Frank Graduate Fellowship will enable her to mount an exhibition of room-size fabric pieces.

Chris Walla
Department of Art
Lyman S.V. Judson and Ellen Mackechnie Judson Student Award in the Creative Arts

Walla is a third-year MFA student in the 3-D area of the Department of Art. Not only a promising young artist, Walla is also an outstanding teacher and a highly valued graduate teaching assistant in the department. The Judson Student Award will help defray the cost of mounting his final show for the MFA.

Created in 1998, the UW Arts Institute is an intercollege unit of the College of Letters and Science, the School of Education and the School of Human Ecology at UW–Madison. Governed by the arts faculty and staff, its mission is to develop, promote and administer interdisciplinary artist residencies, fellowships and awards, public programming and outreach activities for the benefit of the university and the public.