April 2025
Hello, alums and friends,
I hope each of you are finding moments of sunshine as spring approaches.
At PNCA, we are navigating the dramatic changes at the Department of Education in real-time. As we pivot in response to this new climate for higher education and art in our nation, we remain focused on supporting students as learners, as creatives, and as humans. Central to this work is supporting the care and artistic and academic freedom of our faculty. Our 21 full-time and 100 + part-time faculty drive critical inquiry and creative risk-taking. To fuel this, we’ve reinstated sabbatical and faculty development grants that support faculty creative work, professional conferences, and research. I’d love to share just a few highlights of our exemplary faculty who are leading the way as teachers, artists, and truth-tellers.
Assistant Professor Melanie Stevens and recent alumni Sade duBoise were chosen as lead public artists in the re-imagination of the North Portland Library and its first embedded Black Cultural Center. Stevens worked alongside the other artists and the construction team on a series of woodblock prints of prominent Afro-Futurists.
Professor Emily Ginsburg was recently selected as one of 151 exemplary artists as a 2025 MacDowell Fellow, the longest standing artist fellowship program in the U.S.
And, in just a few weeks, Associate Professor Kristin Bradshaw will depart for Belgium as a 2025 Fulbright Scholar. Her research with the Ruusbroec Institute, University of Antwerp, focuses on the 15th-17th century Flemish emblem book and links how typographic history and book production responded to technological and social shifts in Europe. Through the project, she will explore how social and technology upheavals shape contemporary word/image practices such as comic books, zines, and alternative press publications.
In this moment, artists, designers, creative scholars remind us that imagination, ideas and truth-seeking are what amplify joy and shine light in darkness. At PNCA, our faculty are our heart, our soul and our foundation. I hope you’ll join me in lifting them up and thanking them for all they do for our students and for human experience!
All my best,
Jen Cole
Jordan Schnitzer Dean of PNCA
