Staff

Sam is the Art and Art Education Program Manager. Prior to joining TC in 2017, Sam worked in museum education and administration at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Memorial Art Gallery of Rochester. As a career art educator and arts administrator, Sam has taught studio art and art history courses in museums, classrooms and community settings for over a decade. She holds a B.S. in Art Education and an M.A. in Art History from Columbia University. Sam is also a practicing artist and currently teaches community ceramics classes near her home in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.

Office: MY 444F

Jane Baraz is the Art and Art Education Program Secretary and the voice behind the ArtEd@tc.columbia.edu email account. Jane holds a B.A. in Art History from Purchase College and an M.A. in Fashion and Textile History, Theory, and Museum Practice from the Fashion Institute of Technology. Prior to joining TC, Jane worked with both the public and with the collections at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of the City of New York, and The Jewish Museum. When she is not on campus, Jane works as a freelance textile conservator and volunteers with readers, writers, and English language learners of all ages. Jane is passionate about folk art, material culture, and learning about all forms of creative expression. 

Office: MY 444G

Anna is the Academic Secretary and the voice behind the artofc@tc.columbia.edu email account. She holds a B.A. in Political Science from The University of Arizona and an M.A. in International and Comparative Education from TC.  Anna has been affiliated with the Art and Art Ed Program since January 2020, and she enjoys working and supporting graduate students, instructors, and faculty. Outside of TC, Anna enjoys exploring and visiting local bookstores in NYC and reading thriller novels. A native from Arizona, Anna is happy to also call New York City home.   

Office: MY 444A

Carolina Rojas is a Colombian artist-educator and designer, who has lived and worked between Bogotá and New York. Her art and design work spans 18 years. She served as an Associate Professor (undergraduate and master’s) for nine years in the School of Design at Universidad de Los Andes, Bogotá. Carolina is pursuing an Ed.D.CT. in Art and Art Education at Teachers College, where she teaches and is an Art Education Design Fellow. Carolina is a recipient of the Fulbright Doctoral Fellowship (2019). She previously earned an M.F.A. in Digital Arts from Pratt Institute, New York, and a Specialist Degree in Design and Television Production from Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Bogotá. Carolina has a B.A. with a focus on Electronic Media and Time Arts from Universidad de Los Andes, Bogotá. Carolina’s artwork ranges from analog and digital drawings to sculptural assemblages, and installations. Her artwork focuses on the dichotomy of life and death. Enchanted by Victorian collections of curiosities and the immortality of biological specimens, she developed an interest in working in the fields of nonhuman animals, their mortality, and conservation. Carolina’s current art practice and research connect art, education, and the natural sciences regarding human–nonhuman animal relationships. Her pedagogical and artistic productions have received recognition through collective and individual presentations and exhibitions. Currently, her work is part of Sketch Gallery. In addition, she has developed illustration, editorial, and graphic design projects for local and international agencies and institutions.

Ligel Lambert is a Haïtian-born American interdisciplinary artist, adjunct professor, graphic & web designer, instructional designer, and entrepreneur who has lived and worked in Japan, South Korea, China, and the United States. He primarily works in painting, collage, printmaking, assemblage, and sculpture. He is a web fellow in the Art & Art Education Program and a doctoral student. Ligel is pursuing an Ed.D.CT. in Art & Art Education at Teachers College Columbia University.  

Ligel graduated with a master’s in Fine Art (MFA) in 2013. He earned a second master’s degree in Education focusing on Curriculum & Instruction for Secondary Education with courses in Instructional Design in 2021. He also acquired a Bachelor of Fine Art (BFA) in Graphic Design with courses in Web Design in 2011.

Jennifer is the Macy Gallery Coordinator and Fellow. She came into the Art and Art Education program as a doctoral student after earning her M.A. in Cognitive Science with a concentration in creativity, also from TC. She has a B.A. cum laude in English Literature from Boston University. Her prior professional experience was in publishing and advertising, as an editor and writer, followed by a stint as a freelance illustrator. Growing from her original research during her Masters, Jennifer contributed to several books on creativity scholarship. Her main research interest revolves around the dynamic systems we develop to think and to create – most often concentrating on the engagement between artist and material. Her own private art practice centers around her preferred medium – wool – in various forms. Jennifer’s primary joy has been, along with her husband, raising and knowing their daughter. 

Larry Tung is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, journalist, and media educator in New York City. He teaches courses in media and communication in the Department of Performing and Fine Arts at York College/CUNY. A native of Taiwan, he holds an M.F.A. in Television Production from Brooklyn College and an M.S. in Journalism from Columbia University. His journalism career started in Taiwan where he worked as a political reporter for the English-language Taiwan News. He received several fellowships, including Vanderbilt University Media Fellowship, and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Faculty Fellowship. Tung’s films focus on social justice and human rights issues and have screened in more than 70 film festivals around the world. In his free time, he enjoys movies, tennis, reading newspapers, and exploring new restaurants.

Kelly Cave is a working artist born and raised in Princeton Junction, New Jersey. She received her BFA from Syracuse University with a degree in Fiber and Material Studies with Minors in Sculpture and Visual Culture. She completed her MFA at the University of Cincinnati, in the sculpture department, and then served as Artist in Residence in Sculpture at Northwest Missouri State University. She has attended residencies and created public artworks at Salem Art Works, Franconia Sculpture Park, the Scottish Sculpture Workshop, The Gilbertsville Expressive Movement, and participated in the 2020 Nashua International Sculpture Symposium. In the spring of 2021, she completed a major public artwork in Glenside, PA as part of the Arcadia Public Art Project. These opportunities, in combination with her teaching experience, have been a catalyst for her interest in travel and desire to connect with people. Currently, Cave is a student at Teachers College Columbia University in pursuit of an EdDCT degree in Art and Art Education.

Yihui (Cece) Jiao (she/her) is a multimedia artist and visual designer. She conveys her philosophical and psychological ideas mainly through drawings, animations and installations. She experiments with the combination of new media and traditional crafts. Her artistic practices thematically focus on mental status, self development, human cognition and visual culture.

She is originally from Shanghai, China and has been living in the United States for more than a decade. She has BA degrees in both Psychology and Studio Art from Indiana University Bloomington. She studied animation and received her post-baccalaureate certificate at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and completed her MFA degree in Computer Arts from School of Visual Arts in NYC. 

Presently, she is a doctoral student in Art and Art Education Ed.D.C.T program and hybrid studio fellow at Myers Media Art Studio and Thingspace Studio at Teachers College Columbia University.

Ki Gin Yang was born in South Korea and now lives and works in New York. She is particularly intrigued by microscopic images that imply the growth of nature. Her work is tenacious and meticulous, representing an ongoing investigation of the moment of "growing." Yang's artistic expressions vary from 2-dimensional drawings to 3-dimensional site-specific installations. She received funding from the GyeongGi Cultural Foundation as a rising artist and presented her work at Aram Art Museum in 2018. Additionally, she held her representative solo exhibition, "The Layers of Water," at Emu Art Space in South Korea in 2017. Her work has been featured and exhibited at various prestigious locations, including the Painting Center at Chelsea in New York, the Edward Hopper House Museum, and the Korean Cultural Center in New York.

Neal Flynn is an artist, student, researcher, and art educator. In these integrated roles he is privileged to engage with ideas through inquiry, discourse, and art making in a variety of community contexts. Central to this engagement is his interest in activating creative fields, practices, sites, and tools to prioritize community-identified needs and initiate change. 

Neal’s creative approach often involves looking closely at familiar materials with a goal of better understanding his relationship to the people, places, networks, and histories they are part of. He has participated in group exhibitions in Maryland, New York, and California, and presented his first solo exhibition at the Dougherty Art Center in Austin, TX, in 2023. He is a current doctoral student in the Art & Art Education program at Teachers College, Columbia University. 

Filippa (she/her) is the STUDIO 447 fellow and a doctoral student in Museum Education with a concentration in Art & Art Education. Filippa’s work is situated in museum spaces and with a focus on anti-oppressive praxis and body based pedagogies that disrupt institutional violence.

Filippa is also a performance artist, with an interdisciplinary background and studies in Geology & Environment, a Master’s degree in Science & Technology Education, and diplomas in History of Art, Theatre, Theatre in Education, and Drama & Education.

As a museum educator Filippa has worked in different capacities in cultural institutions in five different countries, including the Saatchi Gallery, London National Maritime Museum, Chicago Art Institute, Whitney Museum, and National Archaeological Museum of Athens.

Filippa is the founder of The Drama Science Lab, a series of evolving projects that use the body as a medium to explore the boundaries between art and science.

Jason Watson is a mixed-media artist and educator, whose studio practice combines interests in the figure, found objects, architecture, and text as visual material that both reveals and obscures elusive layers of meaning. He received an MFA from Purchase College (SUNY) and is currently pursuing a Doctorate in Art Education at TC.

Watson’s exhibits at universities and non-profit galleries and is active in artist residencies, including residencies at the Newark Museum of Art, the Lower East Side Printshop, the Elsewhere Living Museum, and the Ragdale Foundation. He is an alumnus of the Lincoln Center Summer Education Forum and the Goodyear Artist Collaborative.

Watson was awarded the first Wesley Mancini Artist Residency at the McColl Center for Visual Art + Innovation in 2013. He has presented papers and projects at national academic conferences, including “Creating in the Queer Diaspora”, a study of LGBTQ creative production in non-urban areas, and “Exploring Safe/Brave Space through Embodied Inquiry” at the Collaborative World Building Symposium in Vienna. As an art educator, Watson has taught a wide variety of drawing, painting, printmaking, and mixed media classes and workshops over the past two decades at community colleges, universities, K-12 spaces, and arts nonprofits. He served as the Director of Visual Art Programs for Arts+, a non-profit in Charlotte, NC, that provides art education to underserved populations. Watson is the co-editor of the recent publication “Turning Points: Responsive Pedagogies in Studio Art Education” with Dr. Richard Jochum and Dr. Judith M. Burton.