School of Art Welcomes New Faculty

Photo Submitted

School of Art new faculty.

The School of Art in the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences welcomes new faculty to the University of Arkansas. These individuals bring a wide-range of experience and research to the School of Art in the areas of art history, art education, graphic design and studio art in ceramics, drawing, painting, photography and sculpture.

“We are thrilled to welcome this new cohort of faculty to the University of Arkansas and School of Art,” said Marty Maxwell Lane, director of the School of Art and associate professor of graphic design. “It is an exciting time join the School of Art as we prepare to open and expand the Windgate Art and Design District, launch graduate programs, begin renovation of the Fine Arts Center Building and above all, provide world-class art and design education to students. Their expertise and diverse research will enhance student experience and create new exciting collaborative opportunities for the school, campus and community.”

Carris Adams is a visiting assistant professor of art in drawing and painting and joins the School of Art from Sam Houston State University. She is an artist and her work explores the sign and signifiers that mark landscapes. Her work describes the appearance of subjects found during her day-to-day travels, while also reflecting the various social, cultural, political and economic circumstances under which we labor. Adams received her M.F.A. from the University of Chicago and B.F.A. from the University of Texas at Austin.

Ty Barnes is a studio art instructor teaching in the School of Art foundation program, a first-year program the majority of all first-year art students complete prior to selecting an art degree focus. Barnes is a multi-media artist with an emphasis in sculpture. His work uses role playing, economical craft and intuition to explore the transitional joint between childhood and adult consciousness. He is an alumnus of the University of Arkansas School of Art M.F.A. program graduating with a degree concentrating in sculpture and received his B.F.A. in sculpture from Mississippi State University.

Paulina Camacho Valencia is an interdisciplinary artist, educator and scholar who has joined the School of Art as an endowed assistant professor of art education. She recently graduated from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign with a Ph.D. in art education and holds a M.A. from the School of Art Institute of Chicago. Camacho Valencia's work invites others to engage in relational practices in order to generate collective deconstructions and analyses of power and colonialism that promote the development of strategies to creatively re-imagine possibilities for other ways of configuring the world. She sustains this work by spending time learning from her human and more-than-human relations.

Kes Efstathoiu is a visiting assistant professor of art in photography and printmaking and emerging artist. He joins the School of Art from Rochester Institute of Technology where he also received his M.F.A. in photography and related media. As an artist, Efstathoiu's work is largely influenced by the history of landscape photography and commercial depictions of the outdoor industry and uses a stereotypical western landscape as a backdrop to his disguised self-portraits and still life photographs.

Craig Hartenberger is an instructor for the foundations program in the School of Art. He is an artist working primarily in clay and has shown his work in a variety of exhibitions including locations throughout the United States, Mexico, Denmark, Taiwan and Australia. Hartenberger received his M.F.A. from Kent State University and his B.F.A. in ceramics from Missouri State University.

Nadia Issa is a teaching assistant professor of art in graphic design and joins the School of Art from Missouri State University. She received her Ph.D. and M.A. in visual arts from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, Poland. In addition to teaching, Issa is a photographer, multimedia artist and graphic designer. She is often a curator of exhibitions, peer reviewer, author of papers in monographs and books and conducts workshops on image perception and contemporary techniques of image creation. Her research explores themes of identity, both cultural and individual, and she is interested in the phenomenon of symbol and archetype in the context of both individual and collective experiences.

Qwist Joseph has joined the School of Art as an instructor, technician, and ceramics artist in residence. He graduated the from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with an M.F.A. in ceramics and received his B.F.A. from Colorado University. Joseph shows nationally and internationally, including The Anderson Museum in Roswell, New Mexico, The Gyeonggi International Ceramic Biennale, South Korea and most recently in the Officine Saffi exhibition in Milan, Italy. He has taught at Chaffey College, the University of Redlands, the University of Denver and Pitzer College.

Alexis Salas is an endowed professor of the arts in the Americas in art history and has Ph.D. in art history from the University of Texas at Austin with a specialization in Latin and Latinx art and visual culture. She is an art historian of global and modern contemporary art with a specialization in the Americas. Her curatorial projects, courses, and scholarship explore fine art as well as visual and material culture and emphasize the voices of people of color as well as feminist and queer critique. 

Jean Schmitt is an assistant professor of art in foundations for the School of Art. She is an artist and educator, combining a passion for creativity and sustainability with over 25 years of experience in leadership, instruction, administration and curriculum development. Schmitt's work searches for connections between nature and the human experience. She creates environments through projected light, video, animation and sound that use natural phenomena as metaphors, highlighting their expressive qualities. Schmitt holds a M.F.A. in visual art from Vermont College and B.F.A. in sculpture from Alfred University.

Madison Svendgard is an instructor in foundations for the School of Art. She is an alumna of the University of Arkansas School of Art M.F.A. program graduating with a degree concentration in drawing and received her B.F.A. from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. As an artist she explores the relationship between labor, boredom, exhaustion and escapism. Her work allows the viewer to peer through open windows, see-through walls and shuffle through cluttered surfaces to observe the minutiae of fictional character's lives. Svendgard uses these scenes to propose intrigue in the mundane and the importance of escapism.

Chase Young is the wood and metal shop technician for the School of Art. He is an alum of the University of Arkansas School of Art M.F.A. program graduating with a degree concentration in sculpture and received his B.F.A. in sculpture from Arizona State University. Young's work has been shown nationally in various exhibitions including Media Mattersat the Foundry Art Center, Digital Disconnectat Apothecary Gallery and International Sculpture Center Little Sculpture Show in Portland, Oregon.