“Receiving a Florida Book Award Gold Medal means a great deal to me,” said Van Cleave. “I live and teach here, so having this work recognized in my home state feels especially meaningful.”

The book walks kids through the many dreams they may have and the successes they can achieve, from paleontology and treasure-hunting to painting a mural or fighting for fairness and equality.

“I collaborated closely with Keyshawn Johnson and Bettina Bush from the earliest stages, well before the book deal was even in place,” said Van Cleave. “This was Keyshawn’s idea from the start, though. He wanted to create something that spoke directly to kids about self-belief and authorship over their own lives.”

At the back of the book, Johnson tells the story of his own early life in South Los Angeles, how he was told he wouldn’t be able to achieve his dreams, and how he chose instead to listen to his inner voice.

“Working with Keyshawn and Bettina was a true partnership—they’re dynamic people who bring a lot of creativity to everything they do,” said Van Cleave. “My role as the Picture Book Doctor is to help translate lived experience and big ideas into language that connects with young readers. We’re still partnering today and are currently developing additional children’s books and animated series together.

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First created as a board game by veteran games designer and longtime ������Ƶ collaborator Pam Formato, Permutations is a sort of “Connect Four with math.” And ������Ƶ Virtual Reality Development faculty member Justin Gast is now bringing it to phones everywhere.

Gast worked with his partner, fellow designer Sumin Shim, to create a digital version of the game that recreates the original’s “addictive” qualities.

“It looked like a simple board game you would play with your parents,” Gast said. “But I brought it back to my partner to try it out, and we stayed up until midnight playing it. That night, we knew we had to work on it.”

Game play begins on a grid numbered 1 through 60. Players roll dice and incorporate the resulting numbers into a math problem. They’re awarded the square on the board that corresponds to the answer to their problem (provided it’s open). The goal is to be the first player to string together a line of four squares. (There are, of course, additional wrinkles.)

“The game has been used for education, competition, and leisure for years, and it was one of Pam’s favorites,” Gast said. “I only had to play it once, and I immediately understood the appeal. It is one of those ‘Wordle-type’ games that are fun to play for short sessions and always revisit. It is a great mental exercise, especially for an older demographic—‘yoga for the brain,’ if you will.”

Gast and Shim initially researched other physical-to-digital board game transitions, including classics like chess and Yahtzee. Their first instincts were to incorporate flashy animation and unusual interfaces.

“However, [Pam] quickly pointed out that while some of the more experimental flows appealed to younger players, they were less intuitive for older audiences,” Shim said. “Besides, we didn’t have to compete with 20-plus other chess games by using some obscure interface. Permutations was a unique game by itself! That insight led us to stay faithful to the simplicity of the original board game and focus instead on making the digital experience feel clear and natural.”

Permutations is already available on the Apple App Store and is currently being beta tested for Android devices. So far, the response has been enthusiastic.

“I have already gotten one of my students addicted!” Gast said with a laugh.

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Now in its third iteration, GENESIS is a student-led fashion show and cross-disciplinary collaboration that draws from virtually every major on campus. This year’s show, Woven in Time, followed a soul’s journey through three acts: Birth, Battle, and The Unknown, guided by the mythological Fates. The theme shaped everything from the garments on the runway to the motion graphics pulsing behind them to the dress code for guests.

“I was drawn to the contrast between love and hate, the softness and the hardness of those images, and how that reflects the battles humans face today—personally and on a global scale,” said Lindelwa Ntshakala ’28, Visual Studies, and this year’s GENESIS President and Creative Director.

“Bringing the Fates into the story introduced an existential crisis, because it links to the idea that we’re all born into something we didn’t choose.”

Twenty-one designers presented 30 original garments, each the result of months of experimentation, sewing, fittings, refinement, and more sewing. 

Outside the venue, guests were welcomed with a photo booth, live caricature artists, and GENESIS-branded swag before making their way inside to a show that opened with booming narration guiding the audience into the world of the Fates.

The production was entirely student-built. Motion design students created the visuals projected across the LED wall. Set design, sound, hair and makeup, photography, and film documentation were each led by a dedicated student department head. Lily Bean ’26, Visual Studies, Head of Designers, described their role as part creative collaborator, part coordinator, working with each designer to tailor their looks to the theme while managing fittings and keeping communication flowing between teams.

“It’s really cool to see all the looks and talk to everybody during the process,” Bean said.

This year also saw a new layer of support added to the production. Matt Myers, who teaches costume construction in Entertainment Design, led a workshop for GENESIS designers, not on design itself, but on the practical challenge of getting from sketch to garment. “There’s a lot of creativity not just in the design, but in the fabrication,” Myers noted. “And those are actually two very different jobs professionally.” For students working without a fashion major to draw from, that kind of hands-on guidance made a real difference.

Central to that process was a new resource that didn’t exist in previous years: a sewing lab in Hammond Studios. For GENESIS designers, the space became a second home—a place to work through construction challenges, test materials, and turn their sketches into reality. Myers had been working toward something like this for years, advocating for a dedicated fabrication space on campus long before one existed. The opening of Hammond Studios made it possible. “The building opening opened a door to having this space,” he said. 

GENESIS grew out of an earlier student fashion show called Fresco and has expanded year over year in scale, production value, and campus reach. This year’s leadership team logged close to a year and a half of planning by the time of the event. 

GENESIS 2026 — Core Team
Lindelwa Ntshakala — President & Creative Director
Timo Kisyeri — Vice President & Brand Executive
Amanda Godines — Vice President & Project Manager
Mobtagha Bejaoui — Co-Creative Director
Samantha Balikowa — Outreach Coordinator
Tia Kassim — Lead Set Designer
Lily Bean — Head of Designers
Abigail Atwell — Head of Motion Design
Martina Belanche Castillo — Head of Graphic Design
Allegra Bortoni — Head of Film
Savannah Carroll — Head of Photography
Meline Dupont — Head of Hair & Makeup
Lyra Kolesar — Head of Models
Jetta Gerdts — Head of Models
Zeta Bengoechea — Campaign Strategist

For those who were there, the result spoke for itself: a runway show that felt less like a student event and more like a fully realized production, the kind that leaves you wondering what they’ll do next year.

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At first glance, the gallery feels soft, almost sweet. Walls washed in pastel pink and powder blue hold what appear to be abstract landscapes: rolling curves, gentle shadows, fields of color. Some visitors pause. Others hesitate. A few turn around and walk out.

Then comes the realization.

They are not landscapes at all—they are bodies.

Currently on view at Sarasota Art Museum, Selina Román: Abstract Corpulence transforms tightly cropped photographs of the artist’s own body into large-scale abstract compositions. Through careful framing and pastel bodysuits, ������Ƶ Fine Arts faculty member Selina Román turns stomachs, thighs, hips, and backs into studies of line, shape, and color. The result is both intimate and disorienting; a quiet challenge to traditional notions of beauty and femininity.

But perhaps the most fascinating part of the exhibition is not what hangs on the walls—it’s how differently people see it. Sandra Lefever, a staff member at the Museum, has observed audiences navigating the space over the past six months. She noted that older and younger women often spend the most time with the work, studying it closely. Others, she observed, step inside briefly before deciding it may not be for them.

One piece in particular became her favorite after hours of looking. At first, she wasn’t sure what she was seeing. Eventually, she recognized it: “It’s her back,” Lefever explained, pointing out the mirrored spine within the composition. That moment of recognition changed everything. “The whole thing reminds me of an iceberg,” she added, suggesting that what viewers first see is only a fraction of the meaning beneath the surface.

Even now, she says, visitors frequently misidentify the body parts. One canvas in the lower right remains “pretty ambiguous… it could be anything.”

The exhibition takes on yet another life through younger viewers. Lefever recalled guiding a group of third graders through the gallery. Many of them interpreted the works as landscapes, drawn especially to the pastel tones they described as “ice cream” colors. Their reactions reveal something essential about abstraction: meaning shifts depending on who is looking.

Organized by Sarasota Art Museum of ������Ƶ, and curated by Rangsook Yoon, senior curator at Sarasota Art Museum, Abstract Corpulence turns the gallery into a space of subtle resistance. By magnifying the body until it becomes unrecognizable, Román invites viewers to reconsider scale, perception, and the politics of size.

As the exhibition approaches its closing in March, one question lingers in the quiet, color-washed room: Is this exhibition about the body or about the way we choose to see it?

Perhaps it is less about identifying what part of the body we are looking at and more about recognizing how our own experiences shape what we see. In the end, the work does not demand a single interpretation. It asks only that we stay long enough to look and to look again.

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Avant was contacted by Kyle Geon, producer for jazz vocalist Samara Joy, who asked whether he would be interested in creating the album cover for her upcoming release. Initially skeptical, Avant soon realized the opportunity was legitimate after a Zoom meeting with Joy and representatives from Universal Records.

“I remember being taken aback by how young and soft-spoken Samara was,” Avant said. “My first thought was that I felt like I was talking to one of my students.” At the time, Joy was just 24 years old and already had multiple Grammy Awards under her belt.

Curious about how his work had come to her attention, Avant asked Joy how she became familiar with his art. She explained that she discovered his work on and was deeply moved by his series depicting African American women in a positive light. Joy was particularly drawn to Avant’s use of oil paint, feeling that the traditional medium naturally aligned with jazz, a genre rooted in history and currently experiencing a resurgence.

While excited about the opportunity, Avant faced a tight timeline. He had approximately 10 days to plan and complete the album cover. His usual process involves an in-person photo shoot with the client, but due to scheduling constraints and geographic distance, that was not possible. Instead, Universal Records provided reference images for him to use as a starting point.

The project unfolded from there through a series of Zoom meetings. In an early session, Avant shared a charcoal drawing rendered with a painterly approach, along with several color ideas to establish the overall mood. No final direction was selected at that stage. During a subsequent meeting, Avant presented several digital color studies designed to replicate the look and feel of an oil painting. Joy immediately connected with two of the options but found it difficult to choose between them. Ultimately, she placed her trust in Avant to make the final decision.

“There was no art director involved—it was just Samara and me going back and forth,” Avant said.

Back in his studio, Avant made the final selection while listening to Joy’s music on repeat, allowing the sound and mood to guide his creative decisions. Over the course of three days, the final oil painting came together.

The last Zoom meeting was dedicated to approval. Avant recalls watching Joy’s reaction as she saw the completed cover for the first time. “Her eyes lit up,” he said. “She absolutely loved it.”

The album would go on to win a Grammy Award, marking a significant milestone in both Joy’s and Avant’s professional careers. Reflecting on the experience, he describes the collaboration as both affirming and inspiring.

“Having the opportunity to work with such a talent as Samara Joy was a blessing,” Avant said. “I look forward to what’s to come.”

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As Lead Character Designer, Computer Animation Faculty Joseph Pepe began creating the iconic Ash Na’vi (Mangkwan) Clan in 2013. Pepe’s work involved meetings with Academy Award-winning writer/producer/director James Cameron and producer Jon Landau, as well as an extensive collaboration process with production designers, effects and animation teams, makeup artists, and costume designers.

Over nearly 30 years in the entertainment and effects industry, Pepe has worked in a wide range of creative roles, including visual effects artist, concept artist, and character makeup designer. His extensive film credits span numerous major productions, including Alien vs. Predator, Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus, The Cabin in the Woods, and all of the Avatar films—bringing a depth of industry expertise that continues to inform his work and teaching at ������Ƶ.

“My role as Lead Character Designer entailed designing and managing many aspects of the character design process,” Pepe said in an Instagram post. “From faces and bodies to strip patterns, bioluminescence patterns, and makeup, plus many other minutiae involving character details.”

After the generic Ash female and male characters were designed, along with concepts for the Tlalim (Windtraders) Clan, the Sully Family, and the Recoms, Pepe began working out the specific details of evil sorceress Varang, played by Oona Chaplin. That design process stretched into 2017, including another meeting with Cameron and Landau to review screenshots from auditions.

“I had been creating initial concepts of Varang using various female faces from my selected references,” Pepe said. “I had already established the feathered headpiece, tight-bound breast ropes, and a loincloth. In the middle of 2017, Legacy Effects began their ZBrush and digital scan design process as Varang began to take shape.”

Pepe was also a key character designer for the original 2009 Avatar film. More details about his contribution to Avatar: Fire and Ash can be found in a new hardcover book, The Making of Avatar: Avatar | Avatar: The Way of Water | Avatar: Fire and Ash, available now. A book of artwork from the film will be released this summer.

“As each one of the sequels are released, I am honored to have been part of this team of incredible artists and people,” Pepe said.

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Directed by Benjamin Kegan, Seconds Away offers an intimate view of the close relationship between the Olympic-hopeful Belgian American runner Peter Callahan and his coach Patrick McHugh, who is diagnosed with cancer. Kegan’s work often explores how relationships to our bodies can reveal something deeper about who we are as a society and individuals, situating the body within a larger political, cultural, or social context. In the 2009 short film Team Taliban, he explored post-9/11 politics through professional wrestling and his 2020 documentary Expiration Term of Service centered on the labor tensions of aging soldiers caught in military bureaucracy.  

“Stylistically, we wanted the film to feel more like a narrative feature than a traditional talking-heads documentary,” said Kegan, shining light on Webley’s cinematography on the project. “Drawing from works like Chloé Zhao’s The Rider and Kon Ichikawa’s Tokyo Olympiad, we leaned into vérité intimacy and a cinematic, subjective style to immerse the viewers in the rhythm, breath, and inner world of our subjects.”

A Forbes review compared Seconds Away to the renowned 1994 documentary Hoop Dreams, noting that “Kegan and Webley captured a slice of life in a way that is not often presented on screen for professional runners.”

The Voyage Out,��directed by Barlow Jacobs, follows professional hunter Mark Warnke, survival expert Callie Russell, and 28-year-old tech entrepreneur Mansal Denton on an eventful eight-day bow-hunting trip in the Sawtooth Mountain Range in Idaho. Webley shot the film using Super 16mm film. Executive producers Ley Line Entertainment also produced Best Picture Winner Everything Everywhere All at Once.

Jacobs described the logistical challenges Webley and the rest of the crew faced during the shoot: “I knew we were going to be deep in the mountains and fully off the grid for eight to 10 days, shooting on film, with a three-man crew: cinematographer, an assistant cameraman, and a sound guy. I knew the logistics of that were going to be a massive challenge. Marc told me we would be hiking five to eight miles per day at around 9,000-11,000 feet elevation. And we would be doing that with all of our film gear, off-trail, traversing a raw and brutal landscape. The temperature fluctuates from 11 degrees to 78 degrees on any given day. We were sleeping on the ground. I could go on and on.”

Webley previously served as the cinematographer for the 2020 Peruvian comedy La Restauración by writer/director Alonso Llosa and as director/cinematographer for the 2022 short film Beef.

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Among the lineup of authors, editors, and industry experts were several familiar faces from ������Ƶ’s Creative Writing faculty and alumni community. Creative Writing faculty members Glenn Schudel, Sylvia Whitman, Esty Loveing-Downes, and Creative Writing Interim Department Head Dr. Ryan Van Cleave also contributed to panel discussions. 

Schudel presented Which Path Is Right for You? Big Publisher, Indie Press, or DIY? and co-led the interactive workshop First Pages That Stick: Hooking Readers from Line One, where participants read opening pages aloud and offered supportive, constructive feedback. He also joined the lively Pitch, Please! speed-pitching event for aspiring authors.

Whitman’s session, Voice, Vision & Vibe: Finding the Heart of Your Project, encouraged participants to reconnect with the emotional core of their work. She was also part of the Pitch, Please! speed-pitching.

The day also featured industry consultations through Ask an Editor/Agent, where writers could get real-time feedback on their pitches and publishing questions. Among the professionals fielding those questions was literary agent, Ringling alum, and adjunct faculty member Esty Loveing-Downes, who shared insider insights on navigating the industry.

Interim Department Head for Creative Writing Dr. Ryan Van Cleave also consulted at the Ask an Editor/Agent event. Additionally, he contributed to the Beyond the Book: Getting Paid to Write—Magazines, Freelance Markets, and More panel, helping participants learn to identify the right markets, craft effective pitches, and get their work published and paid for.

Attendance exceeded expectations, with more than 90 participants attending the morning panel alone. “It was out-the-door popular,” said Van Cleave.��

Film grad Patricia Pete, who now works within the Sarasota County Library system and is publishing her own books, also served as a panel moderator.

The Off the Page Literary Celebration continues throughout November, featuring author talks, workshops, and the keynote appearance of bestselling author Amy Tan (The Joy Luck Club, The Backyard Bird Chronicles). Learn more and see the full schedule for on the Sarasota County Libraries website.

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Patton, a field scientist, restoration professional, and one of ������Ƶ’s Subject Matter Experts, takes students outside of the classroom to learn face-to-flower about the environments around them—whether it’s the landscaping on campus, the wildflowers along the side of the road, or the greenery growing wild in local parks. More than just identification, the goal is to learn about the interconnectedness of species, the effects of invasive flora and fauna, and the ways students can affect even a small patch of earth for the better.

In addition to his campus strolls, Patton leads six to eight accessible field trips per semester to local parks, including nearby North Water Tower Park and The Bay, as well as northwest Bradenton’s Robinson Preserve.

The trips usually involve hands-on projects like removing invasive species or planting trees, demonstrating in real-time the difference students can make. (Field trip participants earn an automatic A toward 20% of their grade.)

“I just kind of wanted to get active, be out in the environment,” said Sebastien Vaughn ’28, Film, during a recent field trip to North Water Tower Park to remove invasive air potato plants. “When we do [other] classes, we’re just kind of stuck doing stuff at a desk. We rarely get outside, and this is nice because we get to see nature and impact nature.”

Even outside of class, Patton’s students are encouraged to be observant. One-fifth of their grade involves using the iNaturalist app to identify 100 species over the course of the semester, whether they’re here in Sarasota, back at home, or anywhere else in the world.

For their final project, assigned on the first day of class, students must use their art to address issues related to biodiversity. The assignment has yielded some scientifically significant works, some of which have been published in naturalist magazines.

For instance, due to Patton’s connections in the scientific community, classes are sometimes exposed to newly discovered species. “I’ve had several students draw plants that have never had art of them before,” said Patton.

Patton also owns environmental consulting firm, Stocking Savvy, which uses ecological principles to restore and manage native Florida ecosystems. He’s been able to include his classes in projects that benefit the College in more ways than one.

“Most schools don’t think about their maintenance department, and maintenance departments also tend to be the lowest funded,” he explained. “So, by having the students design a landscape on campus that maintenance would have had to redo anyway, it saves [the College] design time. And we install it, too. They just have to take care of it afterwards. And because maintenance sets the parameters, and they pick the winning design, we know they’re going to be fine taking care of it.”

His next class project will be the installation of an on-campus bat house. “It’ll pull bats out of all the buildings, so that’s actually going to lower the chance of bat encounters,” Patton said. “They’ll eat mosquitoes and moths all over campus, including those annoying little moths. We’ll have like an hour each night where we’ll see thousands and thousands of bats pour out.”

Students ultimately come away with a new appreciation for the interconnectedness of nature and the ways that knowledge can elevate their work.

“We get to go out and see all of the creatures,” said Rebecca Peitz ’27, Computer Animation. “And I think it’s helpful to my major because obviously you have to design environments and that kind of stuff. Being in nature and learning about why things happen and why they’re there, it gives you a more detailed relationship and knowledge as you’re constructing and reconstructing those environments.”

Sean Patton is an expert in Florida ecology, habitat restoration, aquatic landscaping, invasive species management, science education, butterfly gardening, and Florida native landscaping with a focus on aquatic ecosystems.

������Ƶ’s faculty and staff are practicing artists, designers, industry leaders, and educators on the cutting edge of their fields. Learn more about ������Ƶ’s Subject Matter Experts on our website. Here, you will find distinguished experts on a diverse range of topics, from West African textiles to macroeconomics to the history of Sarasota.

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The current exhibition, running through November 29, features storybook depictions from The Wizard of Oz, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and fairy tales such as The Little Mermaid, as well as characters from Greek mythology, including Odysseus, Medusa, and Achilles.

Freeberg studied painting at the New York Academy of Art and has worked as a freelance children’s book illustrator for more than 20 years. His awards include an Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation Grant, the Holbein Prize for Fantasy Art, and the 2024 Colorado Book Award for Juvenile Literature.

The Clymer Museum in Ellensburg, Washington, was created to honor noted 20th-century illustrator John Clymer, whose work included cover illustrations for The Saturday Evening Post, Woman’s Day, and Field and Stream.

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