Category Archives: Latest News

University Center for the Arts, UCA

The Slusarski-Harris Scholarship Encourages Dance Students’ Thirst for Excellence

Rod Harris and Jane Slusarski-Harris continue to support student work in the dance program at Colorado State University with the Rod Harris and Jane Slusarski-Harris Dance Scholarship. “Dance brought much to our lives: discipline, artistic expression, and physical accomplishment,” said the couple. “These are vitally important in a dance career and equally valuable in life itself.” […]


Annie Hennen

CSU Theatre Students Win USITT24 Awards

Colorado State University Theatre proudly announces USITT student awards. The United States Institute for Theatre Technology, Inc. (USITT) connects performing arts design and technology communities to ensure a vibrant dialog among practitioners, educators, and students. The USITT24 award winners, Annie Hennen and Dani Ranisate will be celebrated at the “Awards, Awards, Awards” ceremony in Seattle, Washington, on March 21, 2024.



JoAnna Mendl Shaw

Interspecies Journey: A residency with unlikely partners

The Colorado State University Dance and Equine Sciences programs collaborated for a week in the Fall of 2023 to find connections and intersections between dance/arts and work with horses to enhance each other’s practices, learning, and research. These unlikely partners came together to find new ways of listening and discovery across disciplines.

Guest artist JoAnna Mendl Shaw and The Equus Projects were invited to work with students and faculty in residence. In the studio and the arena, they explored a common language, physical dialogue, and ways to honor and give voice to humans and equines.


Body/Speak builds an inclusive dance community

Body/Speak is a community concert featuring guests from colleges, universities, and dance companies across the region who join CSU Dance for an evening of diverse dance genres. The aim is to support artists and build networks within the Colorado and Wyoming dance communities.

At the end of the showcase, participants are invited to collaboratively create an ‘Instant Dance’ together as an opportunity to truly dance together, in the same piece instead of simply on the same stage!


Erin Carignan with her book

Erin Carignan, CSU Costume Design Professor, Releases Dyeing for Entertainment

Erin Carignan, Colorado State University assistant professor of Costume Design, is a versatile costume designer and textile artist whose research centers around her most passionate subjects: costume design, textile surface, modification, and wearable art. She intentionally pushes the boundaries of design and technology using unusual mediums and unlikely intersections.

This research culminates in her book, Dyeing for Entertainment: Dyeing, Painting, Breakdown, and Special Effects for Costumes from Routledge Press.


Bugs Bunny

Dr. John Pippen, Bugs Bunny, and the American Musicological Society

What do Bugs Bunny, Leopold Stokowski, and examinations of socioeconomic class have in common? They are all part of a paper presentation by Dr. John Pippen, assistant professor of Ethnomusicology at Colorado State University. Dr. Pippen presented the paper, “Putting Class Back into Classical Music Studies,” at The 89th Annual Meeting of the American Musicological Society in Denver, Nov. 9-12, 2023, held jointly with the Society for Music Theory.



CSU Trombone Choir performing at ITF 2023

CSU Trombone Choir at the 2023 International Trombone Festival

Colorado State University’s Trombone Choir performed four world premier pieces at the 2023 International Trombone Festival, including compositions by Chris Evan Hass, Amber Sheeran (B.M. Music Education, CSU ’21), James M. David (CSU Professor of Music), and Kevin Poelking (CSU Assistant Professor of Bands). The group was invited to perform based on a submitted recording. […]