Our Fellows

The fellowship program began in 1985. Since that time NIAUSI has funded the creative explorations of local Northwest designers and artists on an annual basis. Below is a lineage of this work, documenting the breadth of the program and the variety of inspiration and discovery offered in this cultural exchange. Please return soon to find archived materials documenting the successes of the past 20 years! Please also find links above for this year's application and the opportunity to donate funds to NIAUSI. These are both essential elements to the continuation of NIAUSI's mission.

2007

Bill Hook

Bill Hook has been one of the foremost architectural illustrators in the Northwest for over 20 years. While in Civita, he is planning on experimenting in different ways of observing and communicating the built environment, and of conveying a sense of place, through mixed media drawings done on-site in this remarkable Italian Hilltown.  website 

Kristian Kofoed

Kristian Kofoed is an urban planner, attorney, photographer and art critic. While in Civita, Kristian will be exploring and documenting transitional edges - the interfaces between the historic built environment and recent building, between inhabited space and uninhabited space, as well as the physical edge conditions at Civita itself and their implications for the town and its future.   

Ann Hirschi

Anne Hirschi is a graduate of UW's Architecture in Rome and Hilltown programs and has been working as an arborist in the Seattle area, with a particular interest in implementing community garden programs. She intends to study the ancient Chestnut grove in the valley adjacent to Civita, looking at its history, its meaning to the residents, and how community stewardship of the grove has evolved over time. The Chestnut grove in the valley below Civita has been owned and harvested collectively by the citizens of Civita since medieval times.  website 

2006

Miriam Ginsberg

Miriam Ginsberg was selected as a NIAUSI fellow in 2006. She is a graduate of SCI-Arc in Los Angeles. Miriam is currently working as an architectural designer for the Clark Design Group and has experience in both carpentry and design. Miriam is “intrigued by the way buildings remember their occupants.” Through a series of journal entries, letters, and drawings (including the creation of a remarkable 20 foot scroll) Miriam documented various aspects of life, death and rebirth that take place in Civita.   

Alan Maskin

Alan Maskin is a principal architect at Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects where he has worked for 15 years. Alan has also taught architectural design at Syracuse University and the University of Washington. His primary work has been museum and exhibition projects, including the Frye Art Museum in Seattle, designed with Rick Sundberg. Alan studied with Astra Zarina in U.W's Architecture In Rome Program in 1986 and returned to Italy with a NIAUSI fellowship in 2006. Alan’s trip to Civita provided a chance to pick up threads of work and thought that he had started 20 years ago in his student work – but this time returning as a professional - analyzing historical layers, spaces and architectural relationships through pencil, ink and mixed media, including PowerPoint manipulations.   

Dan Corson

Dan Corson is a visual artist working in the public realm. His public artworks can be found in State Capital buildings, city parks, light rail stations, city halls, as well as the more intimate settings of interpretive centers and meditation chambers. His passion is creating immersive environments that viscerally effect the viewer; which clearly led to his interest in exploring constrained spaces. While in Civita, he explored and documented the caves, cisterns, grottos and other subterranean spaces in and around Civita. Through a series of stop action movies, photographic light boxes, he hopes to share his understanding of these haunting spaces.  website 

2005

James Harrison

As an artist James investigated the types of masonry based on the actions of making: stacking, spanning, turning, rebuilding, filling, etc.   

2004

Mary Ann Peters

Mary Ann was a resident fellow and is an artist who explored the ways that imagery is integrated into architecture, particularly within the fresco tradition, and to compared these observations to similar examples in non-Western cultures.  website 

2003

M. J. Anderson

M J is an artist who researched the placement of the architectural niche as it provides intimate emotional content to the fabric of village life.  website 

Cory Crocker

Cory was a resident fellow who analyzed factors that have contributed to Civita's timeless inhabitability: local climate, integration of building and site, regional materials, vernacular technologies, and formal qualities. He is an architectural designer and sustainability consultant.  website 

2000

Jeff Joslin

A planner, Jeff studied urban environments in Florence and Tuscany; explored the interweaving of human activity and the built environment in a comparative context with cities of the Pacific Northwest.   

1997

Valerio Cruciani

Valerio was an Italian scholar.   

1996

Sue Partridge

Sue is an architect who investigated the historical context and contemporary uses of public and government buildings in Rome.   

Iole Alessandrini

Born and raised in Italy, Iole is an artist who has been living in Seattle since 1994. She received her diploma in Fine Arts from the First State School of Fine Arts in Rome and earned two master's degrees in Architecture: one from the University of La Sapienza in Rome and the other from the University of Washington in Seattle. It is the intersection between these two creative expressions "art and architecture" through which her work moves.  website 

1995

Kenichi Nakano

A landscape architect, Kenichi studied and recorded the quality of streetscape and open space connections in Rome. Observations to be incorporated in a Seattle case study using the Pine Street Corridor.   

1994

Judy Anderson

Judy is an artist who, with the architect Philip Helms Cook, planned to design and produce a published work which expresses the vitality of particular urban spaces in historic Rome and how it translates to Seattle.   

Lisa Ronchi

Lisa is an artist & architect who presented an historic overview of Women in Architecture in Italy, with focus on projects from her own practice and others from renowned architectural offices in Europe.   

1993

Joan Stuart Ross

Joan, formerly Joan Ross Bloedel, is an artist who created new art works using the unique inspiration of color, light and layered texture of the Roman environment; displayed these works and shared what she has learned with architects, urban designers and students.  website 

1992

Carolyn Geise

Carolyn is an architect who studied densely populated neighborhoods - how people live, with emphasis on how they use open spaces as a social environment.   

Ellen Sollod

Ellen is an artist who studied and recorded the relationship of the built and natural environments and the activities which take place in them.   

1991

Tony Mazzella

Tony is a planner who studied the community planning process and its relationship to the development and protection of the built environment on the island of Procida in the Bay of Naples.   

1990

Denise Johnson Hunt

Denise was an architect who explored multi-family housing patterns in the neighborhoods surrounding Rome's historic core.   

Don Brubeck

Don is an architect who looked at design ideas with special focus on the technical, aesthetic and philosophical challenges of remodeling existing historic structures.   

Lynn Shimamoto

Lynn is an architect who looked at design ideas with special focus on the technical, aesthetic and philosophical challenges of remodeling existing historic structures.   

1989

Beliz Brother

Beliz is a conceptual artist and set designer who studied current theater design in the European tradition of the 'theater of images' as abstract expressions of emotion and narrative ideas.   

Nancy Hammer

Nancy is a landscape architect and public artist investigated the integration of architecture, landscape form, and sculpture; concentrated on the relationship between buildings, people and art and the places they inhabit.   

1988

Catherine Barrett

Catherine is an architect who studied street vistas of Rome, including monuments and portals; planned to publish a book of drawings as a record of her study.   

Rysia Suchecka

Rysia is an interior designer who studied how old Roman interiors are transformed to fit modern needs, including technical and aesthetic aspects; shared her findings through teaching, lectures, and articles in professional journals.   

1987

Richard Unterman

Richard is a landscape architect who conducted a comparative study of old and new mixed-use housing in Rome and its environs, expanding on Gordon Cullen's book, TOWNSCAPE; incorporated their conclusions into the UW Urban Design Program and in professional journals.   

Gail Elnicky

Gail is a landscape architect who conducted a comparative study of old and new mixed-use housing in Rome and its environs, expanding on Gordon Cullen's book, TOWNSCAPE; incorporated their conclusions into the UW Urban Design Program and in professional journals.   

Ellen Ziegler

Ellen is an artist and graphic designer who focused on the role of water features and fountains and the lives of Roman citizens; used her observations in her work in the Pacific Northwest, a region with strong ties to water.   

1986

Diana Painter

Diana is a transit planner who studied how various Roman streets and public spaces have been adapted to changing uses over time; published results of this work in ARCADE magazine and at a national transportation symposium.   

Robert Wagoner

Robert is an architect who studied the adaptation of older buildings for new commercial uses; produced an illustrated resource book for designers working in the Pacific Northwest.   

Arne Bystrom

Arne is an architect who studied the uses of wood in Roman construction to enrich the Northwest's architectural heritage of wood.   

1985

David Hoedemaker

David is an architect who explored Italy's lessons in urbanism as a model for the Pacific Northwest.   

Rebecca Barnes

Rebecca is an urban designer who studied the role of public open space in Rome; edited an issue of ARCADE based on this research.   

Stuart Silk

Stuart is an architect who studied the idea of procession in architecture; recorded impressions in a series of paintings.