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From international fellowships and impactful travel to receiving renowned awards and significant grants, our Meadows faculty members have been busy this summer. Learn more about what they’ve been up to below!

The Division of Dance’s Silas Farley, Armstrong Artist-in-Residence in Ballet, received the 2025 John Neumeier Prize for Choreography. The prize includes €25,000 for Farley as well as a commission to make a new ballet for the National Youth Ballet of Germany (Bundesjungendballett, BJB) which is directed by the prize’s namesake, John Neumeier. Neumeier is one of the leading choreographers in ballet history and served as the Artistic Director and Chief Choreographer of the Hamburg Ballet for 51 years. Farley will make the ballet in 2027, to be presented in Hamburg and Baden-Baden, and the BJB will receive an additional €25,000 to cover additional costs for the new production.

Jennifer Thompson, Assistant Professor in the Division of Theatre, published a new book in June with Northwestern University Press. Her book, , considers the ways theatre and performance artists have enacted modes of democratic citizenship, both during Pinochet’s military dictatorship and after, as the country transitioned to democracy. It is broadly concerned with the relationship between artists and the state and considers how artists contribute to the political imagination.

Thomas Keck (far left) and Margaret Winchell (far right) accompany students to a welcome banquet on their first night in China.


Director of the Division of Music Thomas Keck and Director of Choral Activities Margaret Winchell traveled to China with a cohort of 32 music students for the Bond with Kuliang 2025: U.S.-China Youth Choir Exchange Festival in July. Hosted by the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (CPAFFC), the festival brought together nearly 30 choirs from the U.S. and China to celebrate cultural exchange through the universal language of music. Between the ample musical opportunities, where they proudly represented ÕýÆ·À¶µ¼º½, the group also got to tour historic and cultural sites like the Forbidden City and the Great Wall of China.

Assistant Professor of Art Frederico Câmara has been working on the second phase of a four-month research fellowship at the Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg (HWK), an independent Institute for Advanced Study in Germany. His project, The Aesthetic Experience of Science, involves creating a visual ethnography of scientific institutions in Bremen and Lower Saxony, with a focus on documenting laboratories through photography and examining contemporary scientists' use of drawing. HWK brings together international scientists and artists, fostering interdisciplinary collaboration, and Câmara has already made meaningful connections that could extend his work to France and other parts of Germany. He intends to present the outcomes of his research through exhibitions, publications and conferences.

Amber Bemak, Associate Professor for Film & Media Arts, received a from the LEF Foundation for her ongoing documentary Cosmic Moose and Grizzly Bears Ville. The film follows Peter Valentine, a diagnosed schizophrenic living on disability in an apartment near MIT, as he fought MIT while they demolished his neighborhood claiming he couldn’t leave because it was his electromagnetic laboratory. Eventually, MIT gifted Valentine the entire building, moving it to another street. LEF is a family foundation that supports the creation of new work by documentary filmmakers working in the New England region.

Carter Gill movement directed "CLUE" at Dallas Theatre Center (above) before landing his gig with "Torera."


The Division of Theatre’s Visiting Professor of Acting Carter Gill has been named the Movement and Intimacy Coordinator for , a new play directed by Tatiana Pandiani being co-produced Off-Broadway in NYC this August. Brought on board by Pandiani, with whom he has an ongoing collaboration, Gill will be enhancing the show’s physical storytelling with movement techniques inspired by his work in Sleep No More. His choreography includes both realistic and stylized bullfighting, integrating modern dance, Flamenco, and puppetry, as well as staging moments of violence and intimacy. The project offers Gill the rewarding challenge of honoring a traditionally male-dominated Mexican ritual through a female-centered narrative.

Vonnie Smith, Professor of Practice for the Division of Film & Media Arts, was selected as an Inaugural Fellow of the University Film & Video Foundation (UFVF). The Foundation is a nonprofit corporation that engages in and promotes worldwide education, research, innovation, and charitable activities in the arts and sciences of moving images. As the Inaugural Fellow of UFVF, Smith will have all his travel and expenses paid for attending the 2025 University Film & Video Association conference, where he will be presenting a research presentation on Vertical Cinema.