Press Releases
HIXSON-LIED COLLEGE OF FINE AND PERFORMING ARTS ANNOUNCES 2008 ALUMNI AWARD WINNERS
Lincoln, Neb.—The University of Nebraska-Lincoln Hixson-Lied College of Fine and Performing Arts announces the recipients of the 2008 Fine and Performing Arts Alumni Board alumni awards.
The awards will be presented at the College's annual Honors Day Dinner on Saturday, April 26 at 5 p.m. in the Nebraska Union. The dinner is by invitation only.
This year's award winners are:
Faculty Service Award: Dan Howard, Professor Emeritus, Department of Art and Art History
Dan Howard came to UNL in 1974 and served as chairman of the Department of Art and Art History at UNL from 1974-1983. He returned to the faculty in 1983 and retired in 1996. In 2000, Dan and Barbara Howard and James and Dorene Eisentrager generously made a donation to the University of Nebraska Foundation for the Gallery of the Department of Art and Art History in the renovated Richards Hall, which was renamed the Eisentrager-Howard Gallery in 2001. This gallery space has allowed for graduate and undergraduate exhibitions, faculty exhibitions, as well as outside exhibitions. In 2005, the Howards established the Dan and Barbara Howard Achievement Award in the Department of Art and Art History. This provides one undergraduate and one graduate student in the department $1,000-$2,000, greatly helping individual student creative research. Additionally, Howard is as gifted an artist as he is an educator. His impressive exhibition record and accumulation of awards, prizes and honors have garnered him national recognition.
Award of Merit: Ernie Weyeneth, President and CEO of the Richard P. Kimmel and Laurine Kimmel Charitable Foundation
Ernie Weyeneth has been a strong supporter of the visual art program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, primarily through his work as president and CEO of the Kimmel Foundation. Through his support, the Kimmel Foundation awarded grants of $300,000 over a six-year period to provide graduate fellowships for our Master of Fine Arts program. This award allowed the department to recruit the best applicants and to increase the quality of our MFA program. In addition, the Kimmel Foundation Arts Residency program in Nebraska City has supported many Department of Art and Art History professors and graduates with exhibitions and other professional opportunities. Weyeneth has been the driving force for arts leadership and support in the state of Nebraska. He has also provided financial support to the department through his participation in the annual MEDICI fund-raising event.
Alumni Achievement Award in Art: Christopher Ervin (B.F.A. 1995)
Christopher Ervin is an extremely successful motion graphics designer, visual effects artist, creative director and designer. In the 13 years since his graduation, he has created a highly competitive Hollywood independent post-production television and motion picture digital effects studio, VelocityApe FX, Inc. His work covers all aspects of digital video/motion, web sequence interface, and print design work. To date, he has worked on more than 45 feature films and more than 150 television spots and persuasive promotional campaigns. Many may recall the opening sequence of the 2006 Academy Awards broadcast, featuring a riveting cascade of film clips with comic talent "dropped in," highlighting film from the past to the current (The Wizard of Oz, To Kill a Mockingbird, Spiderman, Jurassic Park), all composited and rotoscoped by VelocityApe Fx.
Alumni Achievement Award in Music: Dr. Eugene O'Brien (B.M. 1967, M.M. 1969)
Dr. Eugene O'Brien is recognized as one of America's premier composers and one of America's premier music administrators in academe. As Executive Associate Dean of the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, he presides over the academic and artistic affairs for one of the largest and most prestigious public university music schools in the nation. His achievements as a composer include Fulbright, Rome Prize, Guggenheim and Rockefeller Foundation fellowships; commissions from the National Endowment for the Arts, Koussevitzky and Fromm Foundations, and Meet the Composer/Lila Wallace Reader's Digest Fund. He has received awards from the American Academy and National Institute of Arts and Letters, International Society for Contemporary Music, ASCAP and BMI.
Alumni Achievement Award in Theatre: Dr. Alan Nielsen (M.A. playwriting, 1977)
Dr. Alan Nielsen was born and reared in Nebraska. He is a teacher, composer/lyricist, playwright and director. He received his M.A. in playwriting from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and his Ph.D. in theatre history and criticism from the City University of New York. Nielsen toured the United States as a professional puppeteer. He spent 10 years in New York City, working in Off-Off-Broadway theatre and in advertising. He spent two years with the Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis. Nielsen has had more than 20 original plays and musicals produced around the country. In addition to being a contributor to the International Encyclopedia of Censorship (London, 2001), he has written the following books: Historical Survey of Opera Houses and Legitimate Theatres Built in the State of Nebraska, 1850-1917 (1978); and The Great Victorian Sacrilege: Preachers, Politics and The Passion, 1879-1884 (1991). Nielsen is a tenured full professor and has taught at Stephen F. Austin State University since 1990. He is a member of the Association of Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE), the Texas Educational Theatre Association (TETA), and the Dramatists Guild of America.
Undergraduate Student Leadership Award: Matthew Miller, Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film.
Matthew Miller is a senior pursuing both a Bachelor of Arts degree in acting and a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in theatre design and technology. He has worked on more than 50 productions, both at UNL and in professional houses, as a lighting designer, scenic designer, technical director, master electrician, electrician and carpenter. As an actor, he has worked on more than 25 productions, both at UNL and in professional houses. He is the recipient of the F. Pace Woods Scholarship in 2005. In 2007, he was awarded a Hixson-Lied Undergraduate Creative Research Grant.
Graduate Student Leadership Award: Kimberly J. Thomas, Department of Art and Art History
Kimberly Thomas will receive her Master of Fine Arts degree this May. She is an active member of VAP (Visual Artists in Practice), a UNL MFA student organization. In her role as VAP president, she organized an open studios event that welcomed the university and community members into graduate students' studios. The event also showcased the work of select undergraduate students. In the fall of 2006, she proposed a joint fund-raiser for VAP and the Haydon Art Center in Lincoln, which included a one-week exhibition and silent auction. In 2008, they were awarded an exhibition for the month of February at the Haydon. In addition, Thomas is also a departmental representative of the UNL Graduate Student Association.
