STUDENTS + DONORS = SUCCESS The faculty and staff in the College of Fine Arts are blessed with opportunities to work with many talented students. Fundamentally, it's students in pursuit of the arts that bring us all together. Our students aspire to personal and professional lives full of the meaning that the arts can provide. They also desire to position themselves for future opportunities to share their creativity and their knowledge with others. Their future is fundamental to the well-being of our society.

Quality students help make quality educational programs. Talented students, for example, attract talented faculty--just outstanding faculty attract outstanding students. The scholarship support we receive from alumni and friends serves to sustain quality arts programs at UNM. For that, we are grateful!

This newsletter focuses on student excellence and the financial support that encourages student achievement. We offer, as examples, profiles of our students, programs and donors which are characteristic of the quality that exists in the College of Fine Arts and of those who believe that an investment in today's arts students is an investment in the future. We hope you enjoy learning more about these individuals!

In addition, Michelle was the state winner in both the MTNA National Collegiate Piano Competition, and the MTNA National Collegiate Chamber Music Competition. She went on to compete with distinction at the division level, where she received an honorable mention and was named first alternate to the chamber competition at the national level. "Michelle is a shining example of accomplishment brought about by hard work and determination," glows her teacher, Keyboard Professor Arlette Felberg. "She sets a very high standard for her peers in both her desire to experience all things musical, and her love for spontaneous music-making. It has been a source of pride to watch her develop over the past three years into a mature artist.

"As she heads to the University of Michigan (my alma mater!) For graduate work, her professors, peers and I wish her a very happy and fulfilling future," says Felberg. Michelle plans to "pursue a career as a professor of music, and be involved in community performances where ever my music leads me." Her advice. "Give it all you've got. Music is alive. Music can be a means of speaking. Don't think of this as just a competition, but as an opportunity to tell people about music and you."

Gene helped produce and mix a CD to be produced in Japan this summer; he characterizes the music as Japanese fantasy-pop. "It is computer generated music mixed with real vocals. I like the complexity possible using created sounds," he explains. Currently a percussionist with his band, "Little Show on Earth," Gene is working on an original CD to be released this summer. "It is a fusion of funk, jazz and blues with electronic elements in the background," he explains.

Fuller's interest in cinematography is on how a shot is composed and how the camera moves, more than plot. He also enjoys mixing analogue and digital signals using various synthesizers and real (ambient) instruments. As part of a UNM music class on digital synthesis, Gene recently taught an elementary school class about audio equipment in relation to film. "The kids also told me stories that I plan to incorporate into future film scores," says Gene.

Designers work behind the scene and that makes Brian Bustos keenly appreciative of the recognition his work is receiving. "Actors are always seen, designers aren't," states Bustos. "Recognition is important for up and coming designers; the scholarships show recognition for my work." Bustos began studying with UNM Theatre Design Professor Dorothy Baca after transferring from Colorado College. He took her class, Research for Theatrical Design; worked as her assistant for both Hydrogen Jukebox and Dancing at Lughnasa in fall 1997; then got his chance to be principal designer for a student-produced original, MacBeth.

Last summer, Bustos worked at the Williamstown Theatre Festival in Massachusetts. "Technically, I was a stitcher," explains Bustos, "but because 11 large-scale shows are produced in 10 weeks, I worked in every area of costuming--draping, cutting, millinery, and dying cloth." And this summer, Bustos is working as a stitching apprentice for the Santa Fe Opera--one of the 21 chosen from 360 applicants.

Erin Clotworthy's main focus is modern dance choreography, but it is the dance program's wide range of education that excites her. She likes the academic orientation, the faculty's varied knowledge, and the opportunity to stage her own work. "We get to taste many aspects of dance," explains Erin. "Dance history and criticism, choreography, and dance technique in modern, Flamenco and ballet are required courses. "The faculty has so much to offer," continues Erin, noting Bill Evans' wealth of modern dance knowledge, and Eva Encinias-Sandoval's dynamic Flamenco classes. "Eva gives her students a lot, while she also pushes and encourages them." Larry Lavender, dance program head, calls Erin "one of our best choreographers and scholars. Her academic work is at a high level and so is her creative work." For Erin, a junior who plans to choreograph professionally, "One of the most beneficial things is the opportunity to present my work each semester in a student-produced show."

Kelly Donahue-Wallace, doctoral candidate in art history, wrote in her winning fellowship proposal to assist in building the Bainbridge Bunting Memorial Slide Library's collection of images of Mexican colonial prints: "Until the invention of the photograph, prints recorded the events and people that shaped the world. Prints immortalized kings, documented inventions and curiosities, recorded coronations and deaths, and spread religious devotions. Woodcuts, engravings, etchings, messotints, and lithographs were the social document and the human historical record for more than 400 years. To understand the printed images produced by a country or a culture is to understand a people."

The resulting collection brought together images from diverse sources into a concentrated body from which study of the techniques, materials, styles, and iconography of Mexican colonial illustrations can spring. Based on the foundation of Kelly's work, the collection will continue to grow and support future study and lectures on Latin American colonial and modern art--to the lasting benefit of all who view it.

Damian Espinosa, a master's degree student in Music Theory, is receiving just recognition. In addition to a Graduate Tuition Fellowship, Damian received the first-ever prize given for best graduate student paper delivered before this year's annual meeting of the Rocky Mountain Society for Music Theory. Hosted by the UNM Department of Music, the March meeting was held in conjunction with annual regional meetings of two other professional scholarly organizations--the American Musicological Society and the Society for Ehtnomusicology.

Espinosa distinguished himself, in a group which included doctoral candidates from the University of Texas at Austin and Stanford University, with his discussion of the aesthetics and techniques of improvisation in the time of C.P.E. Bach and Mozart. Espinosa climaxed his talk by improvising a short fantasia-type piece in that style. This project started as a presentation and term paper for a course, Theory and Performance, given last summer by Music Professor Richard Hermann.

Damian will expand this topic into a master's thesis that he hopes to finish next fall semester. Espinosa's interest in improvisation has involved him in performing with the rock band Paradox and the study of jazz with Albuquerque jazz pianist Stu MacKaskie. Espinosa plans to work with a jazz piano trio this summer, and finish a score to a film directed by his brother Michael. His long term plans are to earn a Ph.D. in music theory, and teach that subject at the college level. When asked how he got interested in music theory, the Albuquerque Academy and Creighton University graduate replied, "I wanted to figure out how it all worked."

A single mother returning to school, Dani is appreciative and touched by receiving the Nat Moore scholarship.

Bilal refused to fight in Saddam Hussein's army and escaped in 1991, walking through the desert for seven days to reach the Saudi border, and then living in a refugee camp in the Saudi desert for two years. Coming to Albuquerque at the encouragement of a friend from the camp, Bilal found the landscape similar to his home. And at the University of New Mexico, he found freedom and inspiration.