Twelve art students currently studying in the West Virginia University School of Art & Design were recently awarded scholarships to study in the school’s new Global Positioning Studies program.

The GPS Studies program is an interdisciplinary visual art and design initiative that positions students at the crossroads between a local sense of place and a global understanding of that place in the world. Through direct experience, GPS courses encourage students to engage the world as a fertile ground for art making and critical research.

The scholarship funds were raised during a recent art auction held in conjunction with the West Virginia Mountaineer Film Festival, sponsored by the School of Art & Design and held at the Creative Arts Center this spring.

The silent auction included works of art by WVU School of Art and Design students and faculty, as well as artists from the local community.

The winners of the two Distinguished Art Auction Awards of $1,000 each were Sara Botralik and Elizabeth Roth.

The $500 award winners were James Addison, Ashley DeMotto, Ben Gazsi, Christopher Linden, Jennifer Marcus, Amy Metz, Bart Myles, Mindy Sizemore, Rachel Taylorson and Kenji Yamashita.

All of the students are currently enrolled in one of the GPS courses which include: Space: Atacama, a multimedia adventure course in Chile; the Jackson Hole Photography Workshop; Art & Environment classes in Hawaii and coastal Maine; and a Medieval Stained Glass class in France, among others.

“I’m using the award money to fund my trip to Hawaii with the Art & Environment: Hawaii class this summer,” said Roth. “While I’m there, I’ll be working on a couple of projects. One focuses on water issues, and the other is about the USS West Virginia, one of the battleships that sunk during the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The USS West Virginia project is a collaborative project with the other students in the class.”

In addition to GPS-related courses, the School of Art and Design weaves community and environmentally driven components into much of their programming, including core-curriculum courses, school-wide projects and visiting lectures.

For more information on the Global Positioning Studies program, contact Erika Osborne at Erika.Osborne@mail.wvu.edu or by phone at 304-293-3021.

-WVU-

Lb/5-15-13

CONTACT: Charlene Lattea, College of Creative Arts
304-293-4359, Charlene.Lattea@mail.wvu.edu

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