Faculty and Staff for UAF Film
Film Faculty through the UAF Art Department
Miho Aoki
Miho was born in Tokyo, Japan. She studied at the Advanced Computing Center or Arts and Design and received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Ohio State University in 1998. She is currently teaching digital art at University of Alaska Fairbanks and is a joint faculty of the Arctic Region Supercomputing Center. Her art works have been exhibited at Well Street Art Gallery (Fairbanks, AK), MTS Gallery (Anchorage, AK), Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography (Japan), University of Alaska Museum of the North and Aichi Prefecture Ceramics Museum (Japan). Her computer generated images received the Grand Prize of TORAY Digital Creation Awards 2007. Miho participated in multimedia performances and created computer generated graphics for collaborative projects. Recently, she has been involved in Another Language Performing Arts Company's long-distance, collaborative InterPlay performances. Her computer generated animation is shown on on PBS Alaska One and also in PBS NOVA (WGBH Boston) television broadcasts.
907 474 5425
maoki3@alaska.edu
Film Faculty through the UAF English Department
Leonard Kamerling
Leonard Kamerling is Curator of Film at the University of Alaska Museum of the North, and Associate Professor of English at UAF. Over the last 25 years, he has produced numerous critically acclaimed, international award winning documentary films about Alaska Native cultures and Northern issues. He received his training at the London Film School, and earned his MFA in Creative Writing from UAF. He joined the Creative Writing Faculty in 1999 where he specializes in teaching writing for film, theater and television.
His film, "Heart of the Country," was nominated for the American Film Institute's prestigious Par Lorenze Award. Recently his documentary, "The Drums of Winter," was named to the National Film Registry at the Library of Congress.
Throughout his career, Leonard Kamerling has been concerned with issues of cultural representation in film, cross-cultural communication and the role that film and film writing can play in eliminating stereotypes and in credibly translating one culture to another.
Dr. Karen Grossweiner
I received my B.A. in English from Carleton College and my M.A. and Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Additionally, I was trained in the French Department at the University of Warwick in Coventry, U.K.; at the Centre d'Etudes Superieures de Civilization Medievale, Universite de 1Poitiers, France; and at the Newberry Library in Chicago, IL. I also have a professional background in film production and post-production including two years as a documentary film editor for ZDF in Germany. My specialization is medieval literature, and I wrote my dissertation on subjectivity in medieval English and French romance. Sections of my dissertation have been published in The Court Reconvenes: Courtly Literature Across the Disciplines (2003) and Neophilologus (forthcoming), and I expect the remainder of the dissertation to be published in the near future. I am also working on two new projects: a study of the effect of invisibility on female representation and a comparison of genre theory (both contemporary and modern) in medieval literature and film.
I taught for 3 years as a Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of North Florida before joining University of Alaska Fairbanks' faculty in 2005. My teaching interests are broad and encompass both literature and film. I have taught literature courses on medieval romance and dream vision, Chaucer, Arthurian literature, pre-1800 surveys, and Shakespeare as well as film courses on Film Noir and Neo-Noir, Alfred Hitchcock, Cinema of the Weimar Republic, Genre Theory and the Horror Film, and Introduction to Film History. I am also combining my interests in literature and film in a Women's Literature course which I focus on "dangerous women." I love innovating courses and hope to continue integrating my very diverse interests in new and exciting ways.
Film Faculty through the UAF Journalism Department
Robert Prince
M.A. Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media, Michigan State University
The career of award-winning documentary filmmaker Robert Prince started when he went to work for Emmy-award-winning television personality Bill Kurtis in Chicago. He continued on as a Producer/Director for Public Television and then as Video Producer for Calvin College. His experience includes work with ABC Sports, Investigative Reports and other nationally syndicated programs.
His Master's thesis documentary Making Choices: The Dutch Resistance during World War II was picked up for DVD and broadcast distribution and is available on Amazon.com and Netflix.com. John Douglas, Television Critic for The Grand Rapids Press, called the documentary “…wonderful…a quality production whose stories will keep you on the edge of your seat.” Making Choices won the Audience Award at the 2005 Northern Lights Documentary Film Festival in Newburyport, Massachusetts and was an official selection for a number of other film festivals.
Prince’s latest documentary, Finding their own Dance, tells the story of the Alutiiq Natives of Alaska who have begun creating and performing their traditional dances again after centuries of persecution destroyed this key element of their culture. Finding their own Dance won the 2009 Native Sprit award at the Southern Winds Film Festival and was selected for the American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco.
Information on Rob's project on Native Dance can be found atalutiiqdancefilm.org
Learn more about his current projects at alaskafilmaker.com !
Robert Prince
Assistant Professor
(907) 474-6249
rprince6@alaska.edu
Film Faculty through the UAF Theatre Department
Kade Mendelowitz
kade.TheatricalDesign.com/, (Kade@alaska.edu) - Lighting Designer , Technical Director, Professor, Theatre UAF.
Originally from New York, Kade has served as lighting supervisor for The Acting Company's national tour of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and has taught at Smith College in Massachusetts. An award-winning lighting designer, Kade has designed numerous productions for the stage, television news, dance, and the United States Olympic Ice Sculptures trials. He teaches courses in Lighting and Technical Theatre. Hobbies include photography and multimedia presentations - he is the owner of Multimakers Multimedia design company. Kade has completed the second version of his multimedia CD / textbook replacement: Theatrical Lighting Design Interactive which is on sale internationally and on Amazon.com, as well as version 1 of Theatrical Sound Design Interactive; a DVD. In 2009 Kade received an Outstanding Advisor Award at UAF. He was honored to receive a 2004 Aurora Award: Platinum Best of Show 2004: Entertainment for his interactive sci-fi DVD adventure Water Stealers. In 2004 he won the distinguished Usibelli Award for Service - UAF's highest honor.
Maya Salganek
Assistant Professor, Digital Performance Media. Maya has been involved with the UAF theatre department since 2001. Her courses include, "Previsulization and Pre-Production for Film", "Let's Make a Movie", "Fundamentals of Film Directing", "Movies and Film", Advanced Film Directing", and "Cross-Cultural Filmmaking". Feature-Film production credits include co-Producer for Chronic Town (2008) featured at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival, Associate Producer for Dear Lemon Lima (2009), Producer for Alaskaland (2011) and Director of Photography for The Messenger. The publication "Field Techniques for Sea Ice Research" manual and multimedia DVD features the video work of Salganek and her students. She also served as a section editor and contributor for the book North by 2020: Perspectives on Alaska's Changing Social-Ecological Systems.
Maya Salganek
109B Fine Arts - Theatre
PO Box 755700
Fairbanks, AK 99775-5700\
(907) 474-5950
maya@alaska.edu