The Daily Hub

Amanda Huynh, assistant professor of industrial design, received the IDSA Young Educator Award for 2023 for her “noteworthy impact on industrial design education within the early years of [her] academic career.” Huynh said she hopes to inspire students to “pursue industrial design as your whole selves, the same way I have come to.”

Maggie Brennan, MFA Digital Arts ’19, wrote and animated a new show as part of The Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim SMALLS program. Agoraphilia follows a woman named Brenda working as a nonprofit street canvasser. “This was the first time I had to think about making the animation process more streamlined and iterative while balancing my own preferences for how things look and move,” Brennan said. 

Pratt Trustee and alumnus Derrick Adams, BFA Art and Design Education ’96, has a new installation on display at the National Mall as part of Beyond Granite: Pulling Together. America’s Playground: DC “reflects the story of desegregated public spaces in the nation’s capital” and is open to the public through September 13.

Audrey Schultz, chairperson of construction management, facilities management, and real estate practice, has been awarded the 2023 CMAA Mark Hasso Educator of the Year honor. This award acknowledges excellence in teaching and “recognizes a full-time educator for outstanding professional accomplishments and a commitment to construction management education.”

Reid Davenport, former visiting assistant professor of film and video, is featured in GW Today in a profile of his career as a documentary filmmaker and efforts to advance the rights of people with disabilities. “The idea that disability isn’t an individual medical diagnosis but rather a political class of marginalized people with shared experiences. It’s about removing systemic barriers in society,” Davenport said.

Marland Backus, BID ’15, speaks with Vogue about her career trajectory and her love of wearables that reimagine what’s possible. “I like to be a little bit controversial and push the boundaries,” she said. “What’s jewelry? What’s fashion? What’s wearable?”

Loren Daye, MID ’06, discusses her latest projects, interests, and career in an interview with Surface. “I’m trying some new things out that I don’t have a model for, but the unfolding—not the future outcome—is the objective,” she said. “Even on the gritty days, I’m riveted at its evolution. No built project will ever keep adapting the way a group of people pursuing an idea does.”

Hiba Schahbaz, MFA Fine Arts ’12, offers a glimpse into her Bushwick studio for Curbed. “I started painting hundreds of myself and people I knew,” she said. “I still have them somewhere. They were all in profile because in Mughal paintings, you have the side profile, and in Persian ones, you have three-quarters. I think it took me another couple of years to face outward.”

Divya Anantharaman, BFA Fashion Design ‘06, discusses their Sunday routines and career as a taxidermist in The New York Times. “Taxidermy is a very homogeneous field. It’s very, very white and very, very straight,” they said. “I’m not either of those things.”

Daiwen Mila Wang, BFA Fine Arts (Jewelry) ’23, was selected for inclusion in the So Fresh + So Clean Exhibition by Ethical Metalsmiths. Her Glass Vitamin Necklace from her 2023 thesis collection will be featured.