URTA announces the re-election of Treasurer Jacob Pinholster, and Directors-at-Large Marissa Chibas and Brackley Frayer. Pinholster is Associate Dean at the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts at Arizona State University. Chibas is on the faculty at California Institute of the Arts where she heads Duende CalArts, and Frayer is Professor of Lighting Design at UNLV, where he was previously Chair of the department and Executive Director of the Nevada Conservatory Theatre.

The URTA Board recently voted to expand the national governing body of URTA to include several newly created director seats, the first of which will be open for the next election, to take place in December of 2019. URTA is eager to continue its work in creating a more diverse board of directors to better serve the mission of the organization, and the needs of its faculty, students, and other constituents.

URTA President Holly Poe Durbin reminded interested parties that, “Board service is open to all faculty of member institutions. You need not be a chair, executive, or student recruiter.”
Persons interested in serving on URTA’s Board of Directors, or nominating someone for service, should contact URTA Executive Director, Tony Hagopian.

Re-elected to terms beginning in May, 2019 are:

Jacob Pinholster, Treasurer

Associate Dean at the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, Arizona State University
Associate Professor in interdisciplinary digital media and performance design.

As a designer, Jake’s efforts have centered on projection and media design and technology for performance. He is an Associate Artist with Les Freres Corbusier, the resident video designer for the David Dorfman Dance Company, and a contributor to Live Design Magazine. His professional media/projection design credits include television, Broadway, and many productions at Off-Broadway, regional, and academic venues. Much of his recent activity has been as a creator/director for immersive performance in unusual venues: site-specific installations, creation of performance in high end 3D planetariums, and the creation of a 360deg immersive performance/media dome. As an educator and administrator, Pinholster has been involved in a number of long-term initiatives that fuse technology, interdisciplinary design, and curricular innovation. He is the Co-Director of the Leadership Institute of the Association for Theatre in Higher Education.

Marissa Chibas, Director

Faculty at the Theater School of CalArts – Head of Duende CalArts; the bi-lingual initiative that collaborates with innovative Latinx and Latin American artists to make adventurous theater works.

Chibas is a recipient of the 2015 TCG Fox Foundation Actor Fellowship in Distinguished Achievement. For Duende, she wrote the play and documentary Shelter about Central American refugee children, performed in Los Angeles in 2016. Her solo show Daughter of a Cuban Revolutionary premiered at REDCAT in Los Angeles and went on to New York City, Miami, Guadalajara, Edinburgh, Encuentro 2015 at the LATC, and at Arts Emerson. For CNP Marissa played Edgar in King Lear and co-adapted the award winning Brewsie and Willie. Her silent film/performance piece, Clara’s Los Angeles was presented at REDCAT’s NOW festival and the San Diego Latino Film Festival.

Marissa played Julie Danton in Robert Wilson’s acclaimed Danton’s Death at the Alley Theater in Houston and was directed by Edward Albee in his Tony award winning play Seascape at the Coconut Grove Playhouse. On Broadway she performed in Abe Lincoln in Illinois and Brighton Beach Memoirs, as well as Off Broadway and at many prominent resident Theater’s across the United States.

Brackley Frayer, Director

Professor of Lighting Design and former Chair at the Department of Theatre at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas.
Former Executive Director of the Nevada Conservatory Theatre.

Frayer has taught at Dartmouth College, West Virginia University, and the University of Florida. Lighting design credits include productions at California Music Circus, the Delphi Theater in Greece for the International Ancient Greek Theater Festival, Nevada Conservatory Theatre, Seven Stages-Atlanta, the Hippodrome Theatre, The Texas Shakespeare Festival, The New York Lyric Opera Company, and the American Girl production of Circle of Friends in Chicago.

Mr. Frayer has been associated with Community Performance International for more than 22 years and has designed lighting for productions in Uptown Chicago, Newport News, VA, Union, SC, Fort Walton Beach, FL, Winona, MS, Sanford FL, Harlan County, KY and the nationally recognized original production of Swamp Gravy in Colquitt, GA, which went on to perform at The Kennedy Center in Washington DC, and the Cultural Olympiad in Atlanta.

He is a member of United Scenic Artists- Local 829. Mr. Frayer earned an MFA from the Yale School of Drama.

Other members currently serving on URTA’s Board include: Holly Poe Durbin, President (UC, Irvine), Brant Pope, Past President (University of Texas, Austin), Robert Ramirez, Vice President (University of Texas, Austin), Directors: Mary Beth Easley (University of Iowa), Deanna Fitzgerald (University of Arizona), Colleen Kelly (University of Virginia), Kristin Sosnowsky (Louisiana State University).