“The sky had never been so quiet…” Becca Spencer said as she recalled her experiences from Sept. 11, 2001. On the same day, exactly 13 years and 12 hours after the four planes crashed, SFUAD students gathered in the Visual Art Center courtyard to join together in honoring the lives that were lost. Sophomore Devon McNickelson hosted the event, at which students shared stories, had moments of silence and lit candles in an effort to pay tribute. “It was a very tragic day, and we just wanna dedicate our time to this to show our respect to the lives lost,” McNickelson said. For students who did not wish to speak, there was a table set up with paper on which memories and thoughts could be written. Information was provided on the exact flights, where and when they crashed, and how many people were killed. The event showed a true solidarity amongst the students present, and was a beautiful reminder of the unwavering love and support that often stems from...
Nuclear Drama
posted by Charlotte Martinez
Since its July premiere on WGN America, the new TV series “Manhattan,” shot in SFUAD’s very own backyard, has fans and critics exploding with positive feedback and heightened anticipation. TV critic Ed Bark of Unclebarky.com says the network’s second dramatic series is a “cerebral, character-driven morality play in which the stakes couldn’t be higher.” From Denver Post Television, critic Joanne Ostrow calls the show “Harvard with sand,” a “well-crafted, historically based drama” that “works its magic through a talented cast and a taut script.” In an interview conducted by Fox6Now news, “Manhattan” TV star John Benjamin Hickey (“The Good Wife,” “The Big C”) comments that writer Sam Shaw has taken an “imaginative leap of faith” in creating a show that could have been “historically accurate [to] this time and place and instead has focused on the emotional truth.” Unlike the city landscape of Woody Allen’s 1979 romance Manhattan, the “Manhattan” TV series takes place during WWII in the isolated desert of Los Alamos New Mexico, in which the race to create the most destructive weapon of war burdens top scientists and their families with maddening pressure and secrecy. With series like “Breaking Bad” and “Longmire” (recently cancelled pending new network ownership) in the New Mexico’s back pocket, “Manhattan” has kept the state thriving in network drama, bringing in names like director Thomas Schlamme (“The West Wing,” “Murder in the First”), writer Sam Shaw (“Masters of Sex”), and actors John Benjamin Hickey, Olivia Williams (The Sixth Sense, Hyde Park on the Hudson), Daniel Stern (Home Alone, City Slickers) and Christopher Denham (Argo) to New Mexico. In an interview with Jackalope, creator and writer Sam Shaw with director Thomas Schlamme describe how the historical drama relates to New Mexico’s Manhattan Project and what they hope the locals will get out of it. Actors Daniel Stern (scientist Glen...
Androgenicity
posted by Adriel Contreras
Androgenicity is a newly formed club at the Santa Fe University of Art and Design dedicated to the great art and theatrics of dressing in drag and putting on a show. The club aims at breaking the ice with a hammer, and showing its members how to entertain as well as provoke an audience to consider the circumstances of gender. Through Androgenicity, members and supporters will work throughout the semester to produce a Drag show. This club is headed by student ambassador Gelo Guisti, whose alter ego, the fabulous Miss Gelato, has become a regular presence on campus from school-hosted events to simple walk arounds. Miss Gelato struts around with thick heels and deep eyeshadow. Her pale complexion and often vivid attire and wigs explode along with her personality. As Gelo sees his alterego, Miss Gelato is very much a dear character of his own person, which exists on her own with her own variation of personality. This past week I had the pleasure of sitting down with both Gelo and Malcom Morgan, the club administrator as well as a very proactive enrollment advisor of the Performing Arts students. Over the last week, Androgenicity held its first meeting and appointed cabinet members for the club: President Gelo Giusti; Vice President Isaac Navaro; Secretary Mariah Faye; Treasurer Jake Oliver and Historians Bythe C. Brooks and Lauren Eubanks. According to Malcom Morgan, these students will learn to manage their positions in the club and develop strengths in leadership and organization. One of the heavier questions that I asked Gelo and Malcom is what drag means to them. A general consensus between the two is that drag is a form of art in which one builds up a character. “We are taking these structures and just breaking them apart. We...
Ready to Ride
posted by Luke Henley
SFUAD students will soon have access to free transportation downtown, following the Santa Fe City Council’s Sept. 10 approval of a pilot shuttle project. The program builds on the three-day Night Wave event held last summer. Night Wave was intended to provide a model for what project director Vince Kadlubek hopes will become a regular, city-funded infrastructure for a more vibrant night life in downtown Santa Fe. Even before this most recent decision to approve the shuttle project, Kadlubek said that the Night Wave Project had been receiving “really solid cooperation from the city,” which be believes signifies a shift to what he referred to as a “culture of yes.” The Night Wave weekend featured a wide array of concerts, late-night food trucks and shuttles. These events covered diverse genres and demographics, featuring everything from stand-up comedy to a heavy metal showcase at Evangelo’s. One of the weekend’s largest draws was a double-headline concert at the recently opened night club Skylight, which featured highly buzzed-about national acts: experimental EDM artist Pictureplane and the transgender hip hop MC Mykki Blanco. Throughout the three nights, food trucks were able to serve food and shuttles ran fare-free until 2 a.m.. Kadlubek said that downtown business reported on average a “200 percent increase” in business during the weekend. Kate Noble, acting director of the Housing and Community Development Department, said that the Council resolution for the pilot shuttle program is intended “to provide better integration of students of SFUAD into the Santa Fe community,” adding also that with wider available transportation options students can “potentially get to jobs and be consumers” in the downtown Santa Fe area. Kadlubek agrees that “The university is a key” to the success of the Night Wave project and the overall initiative to...
Ready To Dance
posted by Amanda Tyler
The first week of school usually consists of meeting classmates and reading through countless syllabi. In SFUAD’s dance department however, rehearsals are already in full swing. With the dancer’s first performance this weekend as a part of The After Hours Alliance Festival of Progressive Arts, and their second just two weeks later in celebration of Greer Garson’s 110th birthday, all seven dance majors have schedules full of rehearsals and brains full of choreography. Shannon Elliott, the chair of the dance department, described a vibrant, eclectic group of five new students. With three new women and two new men, all with different dance backgrounds, hailing from various parts of the country, the diversity and collective experience of the department only seems to be growing. “It’s nice to have this new energy, and just a new comradery that I see occurring. Them working together not only in class, but also in rehearsals,” Elliott says. There are also two new faculty members contributing to the further growth of the department. Banu Ogan, who will be teaching both ballet and modern classes, taught at Juilliard for almost an entire decade after her career with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. A new ballroom class that will address swing, tango and salsa will be taught by Mike Garcia, a prominent figure in the Santa Fe dance scene. “I think it’s great to actually have them here and to see who the dance majors are,” says Elliott. “And to begin conceptualizing how we can move this group forward together.” Elliott also has plans to bring in guest choreographers not only to make original works, but also to teach master classes and set existing pieces on the dancers. With only a week of the new school year under their belts, this upcoming semester is already...
SFUAD Fiesta Float celebrates history of school
posted by Zoe Baillargeon
There are few greater ways to kick off a school year than with a parade. Every year in early autumn, the city of Santa Fe mobilizes around its most cherished of local traditions, Fiesta. Originally established in 1712 to celebrate the Spanish re-conquest of the city, the Fiestas de Santa Fe may have a religious overtone, involving several masses throughout the week, but perhaps most beloved are the ritualistic burning of Zozobra, Desfile de Los Ninos, or as it is affectionately known, the Pet Parade, and the Historical/Hysterical parade, a salute to Santa Fe’s past and current quirky citizens. This year, the broiling Sunday afternoon was greeted by devoted Santa Feans lining the streets of downtown, caked in sunscreen and hovering under umbrellas for protection from the fierce desert sun. Everywhere, women and young girls twirl their traditional fiesta dresses, colorful concoctions of lace and satin. Men roar “Que Viva!” while pumping their fists skyward. The air is ripe with celebration. Midway through the parade, a truck driven by Peter Romero, head of SFUAD facilities, chugs down the street, dragging behind it a trailer covered along the bottom with a flowing silver tinsel skirt, and on the wooden flats above, an eye-catching display of earthy-toned triangles. A huge black arch protrudes from the back, proudly proclaiming SFUAD. On the back of the arch, the names of the various departments are written carefully in white paint, each with a different font or symbol to celebrate the department’s specialty. People cheer as students wave from the float, throwing candy into the crowds. A few students on the sidelines cry “Que Viva SFUAD!” The float was the handiwork of senior Chelsea Kuehnel, who played a key role in deciding a theme, as well as in making the float safer for students to ride on, thanks to her background as a technical theater major. “My experience with technical theater was definitely a plus, especially having worked a lot with flats and painting,” she says Friday afternoon, having set up several volunteers with tasks before hurrying off to class. But this was not her first time being involved with the Fiesta Float. “I first did it my freshman year. I walked behind it in the parade.” The 2014 float theme centered around SFUAD’s distinctively shaped and colored logo, as demonstrated by the cuts of the flat boards, the multi-colored array of triangles, and the black arch with the department’s names. “We wanted to showcase the overall unity of the campus,” Kuehnel says. Raya Lieberman, a freshman photography major, notes that the colors used “went with the landscape of the school and Santa Fe.” But there was more inspiration behind the design than met the eye. “We tried to incorporate a little bit of College of Santa Fe into it (the float), because there is a historical component (to the parade), and in fact one of the categories for the float was historical,” says David DeVillier, the new assistant director of student life, who collaborated with Kuehnel and other student leaders and organizations, such as the SFUAD Student Ambassadors, to create the float. “We wanted to really be a part of Fiesta Parade as it was intended… there is a rich history of celebrations and festivals. So, since there’s a religious component to the parade itself, College of Santa Fe also had a religious component, with the LaSallean brothers…. so we tried to build on that, and we thought of using some icons and images relating back to the history and how we have come to this creative art school.” DeVillier also expressed gratitude to Kuehnel and the...
Meet PAD’s new chair
posted by Nick Martinez
Laura Fine Hawkes may be the new head of the Performing Arts Department, but her ties to SFUAD run back to the College of Santa Fe days. A graduate from CSF, Hawkes has worked as a scenic designer and art director in Minnesota, Los Angeles and Houston before returning to SFUAD, officially taking over July 15. She’s also been a guest artist for the past three years and was a contributing faculty member last spring. “I knew the student population and faculty before I came here,” she said. “Although the freshmen and sophomores were newer to me, I knew a number of the juniors and seniors.” This familiarity lends her a distinct advantage over the typical new hire. But, recognizing the foundation the previous PAD chair Victor Talmidge established, Hawkes hopes to continue SFUAD as a school for professional development. “I’ve long known [PAD] to be a strong pre-professional program,” she said. “We can build on that same legacy. My specific passion is design and technology. That would be related to both theater and the greater entertainment industry.” Hawkes’ first step is to make technical upgrades to the Greer Garson Theatre. As a result, all shows will be performed in the round, on stage in Greer Garson, with the audience sitting on stage with the performers. She doesn’t believe the work being done in the theater will disrupt the work in the classroom. “It doesn’t interfere, I would say they interlace,” she said. “Much of our curriculum is geared to what we do that season.” SFUAD’s first show of the season will be The Cave Dwellers, by Samuel French, opening Oct. 3, but the real kickoff will be Greer Garson’s 110 birthday party on Sept. 26. Unfortunately, Mrs. Garson will be unable to attend herself, though a scene from The Cave Dwellers and a stair performance from the Dance Department will entertain. This event is open to the public. After this, shows include Some Girls, Hotline and Den of Thieves, all culminating in new contributing faculty member Alaina Warren Zachery’s Musical Theater Workshop’s showcase, featuring music from Nine. Hoping to extend an olive branch across campus, Hawkes also plans to collaborate with other departments, with film being the obvious suitor. With her improvements on the technical side of PAD, she’s employing a sort of trickle-down eduction that will spread to other aspects in the department. “We’re looking at what partnerships we can have to mutually support each other and to cross collaborate,” said Hawkes. Hawkes began her first year in the chair with a full plate, but if her youth and enthusiasm is any indication, the PAD is in for a fresh start....
Jackalope Magazine is the student magazine of Santa Fe University of Art and Design. Building on the interdisciplinary nature of our education, we aim to showcase the talent of our university and character of our city.
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