New Director of UNM ARTSLab
Assistant Professor Stewart Copeland named Director of ARTSLab
Harris Smith, Dean of Fine Arts, is pleased to appoint Assistant Professor of Art Stewart Skylar Copeland as Director of ARTSLab. ARTSLab is a transdisciplinary research facility and exhibition space serving UNM and the greater New Mexico community. Established in 2005, The UNM ARTSLab (Art, Research, Technology, and Science) is an award-winning interdisciplinary center for emerging media with an emphasis on immersive and interactive technology.
Prof. Copeland, a transdisciplinary artist with expertise in emergent media and artistic research, joined UNM as a professor in the area of Experimental Art & Technology in The UNM Department of Art in January 2021. A former award-winning documentary filmmaker and musician, Copeland holds an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in Digital + Media. He taught in the New Media Art department at the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana and in the Landscape Architecture department at RISD. He is the co-creator of VIS-A-THON, an NSF-funded art-based visualization program.
This year also marks the twentieth anniversary of ARTSLab. “For 20 years, ARTSLab has fostered innovative collaborations between art and technology, laying the groundwork for interdisciplinary research at UNM. ARTSLab is dedicated to supporting cross-disciplinary partnerships,” stated Prof. Copeland. “It is an honor and a privilege to build on that foundation and lead our research into the future.”
Prof. Stewart Skylar Copeland and Jim Pinkerton celebrate the Groundbreaking Ceremony of CCAT, the Center for Collaborative Arts & Technology in October 2024.
To honor the 20th anniversary of ARTSLab, UNM alumnus Jim Pinkerton, Computer Science 1995, and Principal Software Engineer at Google, established a Director’s Fund. “I’m pleased to support ARTSLab, and their new Director, Stewart Copeland, by establishing the Director’s Fund for ARTSLab,” Jim said. “It’s been exciting to attend the groundbreaking for CCAT and the new home for ARTSLab. I am happy that the future is bright for research and collaboration between Fine Arts and Computer Science at UNM. Here’s to twenty more years, and beyond.”
To learn more about ARTSLab, visit artslab.unm.edu. To support the new ARTSLab Director’s Fund, please visit ARTSLab Director Fund.
Neon Forge: Expanding Immersive Art Through NASA-Funded VR Innovation
Congratulations to MFA graduate student Ella Pigg and undergraduate student Finn Ellis on the success of their project, Neon Forge.
UNM Theatre and Dance Faculty Member Sara Curran Ice accepted to 2026 OISTAT India Research Trip
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