All Stories

For SAIC students, the Art Institute of Chicago museum is an extension of their classroom, informing their creative and scholarly practices.

After 20 years in SAIC’s administration, Dean of Faculty Lisa Wainwright is hanging up her hat— figuratively, of course—as dean and returning to the faculty to teach art history. She started her career teaching in the Art History, Theory, and Criticism department, where she’ll return next year following a sabbatical. This return to her first love—art history—excites her. Here are some other things that are thrilling to this decorated art historian. 

The students graduating SAIC in spring 2018 are ambitious, dedicated, and a bit quirky. Meet four of our newest alumni.

Alum Elizabeth Buchsbaum Newhall’s (DIPLOMA 1932) whimsical black-and-white illustrations of worms, parasites, insects, crustaceans, jellies, and other invertebrates are featured throughout Animals Without Backbones (the University of Chicago Press, first published in 1938), written by her brother, Ralph Buchsbaum. 

Each year Lecturer Tim Nickodemus takes his Research Studio for Transfer Students class to visit SAIC's Roger Brown Study Collection in Lincoln Park to illustrate the connections between their art and their lives. 

Adela Goldbard (MFA 2017) is the final recipient of the Edes prize, a one-year, $30,000 award given to a recent alum from one of four Chicago-area institutions. For almost a decade, this highly competitive award recognized artists’ creative potential and enabled them to substantially advance their practice.

Preteens design a food-themed final runway show at SAIC’s fashion camp.

Here is an excerpt from our recent conversation with Jason Gillette (BFA 2010), founder of TURF design company, and his advice to current SAIC students and recent graduates. 

The generosity of alumni, parents, faculty, staff, friends, foundations, and corporations supports the artists, designers, and scholars who transform the world with their Beautiful/Work.

Tiffany Holmes, professor and dean of undergraduate studies, integrates her family life and art making on every level of her 100-year-old frame house in Chicago's Andersonville neighborhood.