Arts Institute honors campus arts excellence

A string teacher, a furniture designer, a choreographer and a mixed-media artist have received awards from the Arts Institute this year. The winners are:

Janet Jensen, associate professor of string pedagogy, Joyce J. and Gerald A. Bartell Award for the Arts

This award recognizes faculty and staff in the creative arts for their outreach, public service and community activities. From K-12 students around Wisconsin to adult learners, Jensen has shown her dedication to lifelong music education through her national leadership as director of the National String Workshop, Orchestral Conducting Seminar and String Instrument Repair Clinics, in which more than 1,000 teachers and performers take part every summer. In 2000, the Wisconsin American String Teachers elected her to a six-year term as president. Jensen has been on the UW–Madison music faculty for 12 years. Her award carries a $16,000 grant.

Tom Loeser, professor of art, Arts Institute Creative Arts Award

Loeser has achieved international acclaim for his experiments in fusing furniture form and function in unique and original ways. His work has been featured in exhibitions around the world. The Smithsonian Institution, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Brooklyn Museum, the Mint Museum of Craft and Design, the Cooper-Hewitt Museum and the Yale University Gallery have Loeser’s pieces in their permanent collections. Most recently, he is exhibiting at the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters. He has been a member of the UW–Madison art faculty for 13 years. The award, funded by the Bassett and Evjue foundations, provides a $30,000 grant.

Jin-Wen Yu, associate professor of dance, Emily Mead Baldwin-Bascom Professorship in the Creative Arts

Yu has created, performed, directed and produced more than 50 works, including 24 commissioned pieces. Currently chair of the UW–Madison Dance Program, he founded Madison-based Jin-Wen Yu Dance in 1999. During the last five years, the company has performed in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Yu has received the Wisconsin Arts Board Choreographer Award, the first Madison CitiARTS Commission Signature Grant, the Ira and Ineva Reilly Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Endowment, and Outstanding Dance Artist Award from his native Taiwan. He has been on the UW–Madison dance faculty since 1997. The professorship provides $16,000.

Megan Lotts, master of fine arts student, Department of Art, David and Edith Sinaiko Frank Fellowship for a Woman in the Arts

Lotts uses drawing, painting, digital imaging and more to create mixed-media collage. She says she seeks to bridge the gaps among artist, gallery and community; to that end, she created a mural for a pool in her hometown of Mattoon, Ill. The fellowship provides $1,500.

In addition, the Arts Institute recognized campus arts faculty who have received other awards this year. They are poet Amy Quan Barry, assistant professor of English, and metal worker Lisa Grahlik, assistant professor of art, Vilas Associates, administered by the Vilas Trustees; Sonya Y. Clark, associate professor of environment, textiles and design and an artist who uses traditional African forms, Romnes Fellowship through the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation; and Beverly Gordon, professor of environment, textiles and design specializing in materials culture scholarship, Kellett Mid-Career Award administered through the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.

For information about the UW–Madison Arts Institute, call (608) 263-4086.