Emory Report
March 16, 2009
Volume 61, Number 23


Funding creativity
Emory College faculty, students and staff are eligible to apply for CCA Project Grants of up to $2,500. The grants support arts-related projects and cultural activities that fall outside of the regular academic responsibilities of Emory College individuals and departments.

Summer 2009 proposals are due by Friday, March 27 at 4 p.m. For more information on recent recipients and for applications, go to www.creativity.emory.edu.

   

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March 16, 2009
Creativity & Arts grants propel collaborative projects

By Becky Herring

Project grants from the Emory College Center for Creativity & Arts funded unique artistic explorations this academic year. The most recent recipients developed stimulating research and presented stirring documentaries, vivid exhibitions and engaging performances. Grants were offered in three waves over the last year, and this spring the CCA funded four very diverse projects.

The CCA program encourages interdisciplinary collaboration, as reflected in the project of Anthony Martin, Lore Ruttan, Linda Armstrong and Pat Marsteller, College faculty members from the arts and sciences, to present “The Art and Science of Ray Troll: A Visual Celebration of Evolution and Natural History.” Troll, a renowned natural history artist and author, visits Emory April 13–15 to present a creativity workshop and two public lectures. Martin hopes that Troll’s visit will “further inform the Emory community about the role that science plays in inspiring art, and how art likewise can educate about science.”

Music majors William Pitts and Jonathan Hoffmann are using grants to develop senior honors theses. Pitts’ project is the first combined honors project in conducting and composition. This spring he will premiere new compositions and conduct works for Emory’s wind and chamber ensembles, including “Turbo Scramjet” for the Emory Saxophone Quartet inspired by a NASA experiment. Hoffmann is composing works for three ensembles. His aim for “transient,” written for Emory’s Vega String Quartet, was to express musically his experience of being displaced by Hurricane Katrina. The composers’ collaborative recital is April 4.

College junior Emma Greenberg is writing a research paper on visual artist Cindy Sherman for an art history course. Her focus is Sherman’s early photomontage series, “A Play of Selves.” The grant enabled a research trip to New York, to the galleries and museums that represent Sherman. Greenberg says her trip helped enormously to inform the direction of her project.