Visual Studies Core FAculty
Kevin E. Bassler
An Associate Professor of Physics and a photographer, Prof. Bassler explores the concept of complexity in both his science and his art. His work has been widely published in leading peer reviewed journals, including Nature and Physical Review Letters, and he has received a number of awards for both his research and his teaching, including a prestigious Sloan Research Fellowship. Additionally, he has served as a member of board of directors, and is a past president, of the Houston Center for Photography.
Suzanne Bloom
In addition to teaching studio classes in photography and digital media, Suzanne Bloom, Professor of Art in the School of Art, originated courses both in visual perception and decoding photographs. The recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts Artist's Fellowship Grants, Bloom has collaborated with Ed Hill under the name MANUAL since 1974. Exhibitions including their photographs, digital photo-works, videotapes, computer programs, and installations have been seen in 42 solo and over 250 group shows. Known for their pioneering work in digital media, MANUAL recently created a unique, site specific computer program of 113 animated sequences for the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College. MANUAL has been awarded an NEA/ Rockefeller Interdisciplinary Arts fellowship, an NEA Visual Artists Forum Grant, and an NEA Artists Fellowship in Photography. Their work is in the permanent collections of Los Angeles County Museum, San Francisco Museum of Art, International Museum of Photography, International Center of Photography, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
Carroll Parrott Blue
During 2006–2008 Carroll Parrott Blue is working as a University of Houston Visiting Professor and Visiting Scholar. Blue’s digital media specialties include Locative Media, Website Community Narratives, and Community-Made New Media Applications. She is a Documentary Filmmaker and teaches African American Cinema. Blue is a San Diego State University professor emeritus. Blue is an award-winning filmmaker, multimedia producer, author and public artist who blends text, stills, graphics and moving image in traditional and new media formats. Her experimental memoir, The Dawn at My Back: Memoir of a Black Texas Upbringing, is a combination book, DVD-ROM, and website. In 2004, Dawn was selected by the American Library Association as one of the thirty best American Association of University Press publications and Dawn’s DVD-ROM won the 2004 Sundance Film Festival Jury Award in its first-ever New Forms category.
Ward Booth
Ward Booth is Adjunct Professor of Video Production in the UH School of Communication. He also manages the school’s Media Production Facilities at the School of Communication where he is also an adjunct professor of Video Production. He has 30 years of experience in broadcast, corporate and training video production, including five years in the Middle East. He is currently involved in several major research projects, including “Health and Crisis Communication in the Family” and “Computerized Support Tool For Caregivers of Individuals with Alzheimer’s Disease.”
Bruno Breitmeyer
A professor of Psychology and a member of the University of Houston Center for Neuro-Engineering and Cognitive Science, he is a leading authority on visual perception and the visual arts. His research focuses on visual selective attention, perception of motion, conscious and unconscious form perception, and parallel pathways in visual processing. The author of The Microgenesis and Temporal Dynamics of Unconscious and Conscious Visual Processes and Visual Masking: Time Slices through Conscious and Unconscious Vision, his scholarship has also appeared in American Journal of Psychiatry, Archives of General Psychiatry, Biological Psychiatry, Consciousness and Cognition, Perception & Psychophysics, Psychological Science, and Vision Research.
Jerome Crowder
A visual anthropologist who uses photography and ethnography to study cultural responses to urbanization and migration, especially among Andean peoples. Dr. Crowder is Assistant Research Professor in the University of Houston's Department of Anthropology with joint affiliations with the Texas Learning and Computation Center (TLC2) and the Abramson Center for the Future of Health. His scholarship has appeared in Visual Anthropology, Medical Anthropology Quarterly, American Ethnologist, and Anthropology News. He has also written the section on visual anthropology in the Encyclopedia of Anthropology. His traveling photographic exhibit Sueños Urbanos: Urban Dreams: The Search for a Better Life in Bolivia is based on 10 years of ethnographic research with Aymara migrants in El Alto, Bolivia. It is currently touring museums and libraries across the country.
Craig Crowe
Craig Crowe, a recipient of a Telly Award, worked as a producer in television, a corporate communications specialist, and a news media producer for NASA Johnson Space Center, before joining the faculty of the UH School of Communication, where he teaches Television Production, Electron Field Production, and Nonlinear Editing. He also works with the UH External Communications group, with Distance Education creating, producing, directing, advising, shooting and editing distance educational products for both broadcast and internet. He also provides local non-profits, including TEXANA MHMR, Baylor College of Medline Psychiatry Department, and the Gulf Coast Hospice Organization with visual services.
William Douglas
A professor in the School of Communication, Dr. Douglas works in the areas of relationship development and television and the family. His scholarship on the uses and effects of television of media portrayals of families has appeared in such journals as Human Communication Research, Communication Monographs, Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, Communication Research, and the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships.
Cynthia Freeland
An authority on the philosophy of art and the philosophy of film, she is the author of such books as But Is It Art? (republished as Art Theory) and The Naked and the Undead: Philosophy, Feminism, and the Appeal of Horror, and co-editor of Film and Philosophy. She has been taught or been a visiting scholar at Duke, Mt. Holyoke, Harvard, the Universities of Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, and the Australian National University. She has served as a member of the board of directors of the Houston Center for Photography and the Art League of Houston, and as a trustee of the American Society for Aesthetics.
Sandra Frieden
An expert in German Cinema, Dr. Frieden has taught at the University of Houston for many years. Her course was the first film course approved as a Core course in Performing and Visual Arts Criticism. She has published and presented widely on German film and on autobiography, and has served as president or board member of city, state and national distance learning organizations, as well as Women in German. She has created award-winning multi-university video and online course development programs for the University of Houston System.
Caroline Goeser
An authority on twentieth century American art, Caroline Goeser studies African American art, women artists, and the visual culture of the Harlem Renaissance. She is the author of Making Black Modern in Harlem Renaissance Print Culture. Her research has been supported by a Henry Luce Foundation/American Council of Learned Societies Dissertation Fellowship in American Art, and a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Center for Humanistic Inquiry at Emory University.
Samuel Hanlon
A doctor of optometry and clinical associate professor of optometry, Hanlon is a leader in the uses of new media technologies in the study of vision.
Christine Harden
A Clinical Assistant Professor at the UH College of Optometry, Harden practiced in a variety of settings including the Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center, the Harris County Hospital District, and the Departments of Ophthalmology at Baylor College of Medicine and the University of Texas Health Science Center before joining the UH faculty. Dr. Harden's interests include: ocular manifestations of systemic disease, access & utilization of vision care services in underserved populations, and ophthalmic clinical skills acquisition.
Keith Houk
A Clinical Assistant Professor in the School of Communication, Houk ran an award-winning film and video production company before joining the UH faculty. He conducts a 5 week film and video production workshop for high school students. He has recently been involved in a research study into the pedagogical application of podcasting.
Stephan Hillerbrand
An Assistant Professor of Art and the Area Coordinator for Photography at University of Houston, Professor Hillerbrand has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and Art Matters. Additionally, he has been a MacDowell Colony Fellow as well as a Fulbright Fellow for the German Technology and Education and has been awarded a second Fulbright Fellowship to study at ZKM in Karlsruhe, Germany. Collaborating with Mary Magsamen, their work has been included in group exhibitions and screenings nationally and internationally including solo exhibitions at the Butler Institute of American Art and the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia. Their work has recently been in group exhibitions at LA Freewaves Film and Video Festival, The Center for Photography at Woodstock, the Boston Center for the Arts and the Ann Arbor Film Festival. Additionally, they have been awarded the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Residency in New York City at The Woolworth Building, a residency at the Experimental Television Center and an Ohio Arts Council Individual Creativity Award.
David Jacobs
An expert on digital media and the history of photography, Professor Jacobs taught at the University of Cincinnati, Wayne State University, Arizona State, and the University of Texas at Arlington, and served as Chair of the Department of Art at the University of Houston from 1991 to 1996. The recipient of grants from the NEA and the NEH, his writing has appeared in leading art and scholarly journals, including Afterimage, New Art Examiner, and the Journal of American Culture. For five years he was editor of Exposure, the quarterly journal of the Society for Photographic Education. Dr. Jacobs served as co-curator for a major traveling retrospective of the photographs of Ralph Eugene Meatyard, which was accompanied by a book published by Rizzoli, Ralph Eugene Meatyard: An American Visionary. The recipient of a Fulbright fellowship, he is currently conducting research on Chinese photography.
Anne Jaap Jacobson
Professor of Philosophy and Engineering and Associate Director of the UH Center for Neuro-Engineering and Cognitive Science, she has written extensively on the philosophy of mind and cognitive science. Her scholarship has appeared in such journals as Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences and Philosophical Psychology.
Garth S. Jowett
The author of Film: The Democratic Art, widely acknowledged as a standard social history of movie going in America, and co-author of Movies as Mass Communication, Propaganda and Persuasion, and Children and the Movies: Media Power and the Payne Fund Controversy. He serves as the series editor for the Sage Foundations of Popular Culture Series, as advisory editor for Cambridge University Press's series on the History of Mass Communications, and is also on the editorial boards of several communication and film journals. Dr. Jowett taught previously at Carleton University in Ottawa and the University of Windsor, Ontario, and was Director of Social Research and Policy Development for the Canadian Government Department of Communications.
Tracy Xavia Karner
A visual sociologist who uses visual sources to study the social construction and transformation of self and identity. She has explored these processes on the individual, social-cultural, organizational, and community levels in a variety of contexts, including hospitals, community service agencies, nationalist movements, and the mass media. Much of her research falls within the area of medical sociology, where she focuses specifically on transitions or turning points that occur in the illness experience. Her publications, which deal with gender, mental health, social policy, art aesthetics, ethnicity, and nationalist movements, have appeared in such peer reviewed journals as Symbolic Interactionism, Qualitative Health Research, Ethnic and Racial Studies, Communication and Cognition, American Studies Journal, masculinities, Clinical Sociology Review, Journal of Aging Studies, Journal of Aging and Mental Health, American Sociologist, Journal of Applied Gerontology, and Journal of Aging and Social Policy. The recipient of an award from the American Sociological Association and of over $2.7 million in grants, she is also co-author, with Carol Warren, of Discovering Qualitative Research: Field Methods, Interviews, and Analysis (2005).
Rex Koontz
Professor Koontz is an authority on art, ritual, and performance in the ancient Americas. He is co-author of Mexico (with Michael Coe) and the senior editor for the volume Landscape and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica.
Mary Magsamen
A visual artist, Ms. Magsamen is an adjunct Professor with the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Performing Arts. Her past exhibitions include shows at Momenta Art, Anna Kustera Gallery, Florida Atlantic University, and White Columns. In addition, she has been awarded a residency from the Longwood Cyber Residency Program and a Finishing Fund from the Experimental Television Center. Collaborating with Stephan Hillerbrand, their work has been included in group exhibitions and screenings nationally and internationally including solo exhibitions at the Butler Institute of American Art and the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia. Their work has recently been in group exhibitions at LA Freewaves Film and Video Festival, The Center for Photography at Woodstock, the Boston Center for the Arts and the Ann Arbor Film Festival. Additionally, they have been awarded the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Residency in New York City at The Woolworth Building, a residency at the Experimental Television Center and an Ohio Arts Council Individual Creativity Award.
Shawn McCombs
Shawn McCombs is Clinical Professor of Media Production and Microsystems Analyst for the UH School of Communication. In addition to managing the School of Communication’s Communication Technologies Center, he teaches courses in Internet Technologies and eHealth and Telemedicine at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Before joining the UH School of Communication, he served in Systems Analysis and Design, Desktop Publishing, and Media Services.
Sara McNeil
An authority on the design and development of educational webscapes and the visual representation of information, Professor McNeil teaches courses in the College of Education on instructional technology. She has served as co-editor of Technology and Teacher Education Annual.
Steven Mintz
A pioneer in the application of new technologies to humanities research and teaching, and recipient of awards from the Organization of American History, the Association of American Publishers, and the Texas Institute of Letters, he is the creator of the Digital History website (named one of the Top 5 websites in U.S. History by Best of History websites); a member of the board of Film & History and The History Teacher; the founder of H-Film, the discussion list for the history of film and the scholarly uses of media; the president of H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences Online, the largest provider of scholarly discussion lists in the humanities; and co-editor of Hollywood's America: Twentieth Century U.S. History Through Film.
Delilah Montoya
Professor Montoya is a lens based artists working in both film and digital media. Her work is grounded in the experiences of the Southwest and brings together a multiplicity of syncretic forms and practices from those of Aztec , Mexico and Spain , to cross-border vernacular traditions, all of which are shaded by contemporary American customs and values. In her work she explores the unusual relationships that result from negotiating different strategies of understanding and representing the rich ways of life found in the Southwest.
Beth Olson
The Director of the University of Houston's School of Communication, Professor Olson studies the psychological and sociological effects of media consumption and gender and media. She has published articles in Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, Sex Roles, Mass Comm Review, and Southwestern Mass Communication Journal. She also worked in radio and television news for six years as a reporter, producer, and on-air talent.
Bernard Robin
An authority on information technology, he specializes in the design and development of community-based websites for the arts and educational uses of digital photography and digital storytelling. The founder and executive editor of the Texas Journal of Distance Learning, he is the author of The Educator's Guide to the Web.
Michelangelo Sabatino
Trained as an architect and architectural historian in Venice and Toronto, Dr. Sabatino is currently Assistant Professor at the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture of the University of Houston. His research and teaching interests are focused upon late 19th and 20th century European and North American architecture, urbanism, and design. Sabatino’s publications have appeared in journals such as "Casabella," "Harvard Design Magazine," "Rotunda," “JSSAC,” and "JSAH." He has contributed an essay to Foro Italico (2003) and co-edited Il nuovo e il moderno in architettura (2001). Sabatino has received fellowships and grants from the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in Fine Arts, Georgia O'Keefe Research Museum, the Wolfsonian-FIU, and SSHRC (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada). He has chaired sessions at SAH and CAA annual conferences and has recently organized an international symposium “Viva Italia!” on Italian design at the Institute for Contemporary Design (Canada).
Scott B. Stevenson
An NIH postdoctoral fellow at the University of California Berkeley, Stevenson joined the faculty of the University of Houston in 1995. He investigates the visual processing that controls eye movement, with support from the NIH and the NSF.
Lowell Wood
An Associate Professor of Physics, Wood is an expert on electric field imaging using optical techniques.
Lois Parkinson Zamora
A pioneer in an interartistic approach to Latin American culture, which explores the connections among prehispanic codices, architecture, portraiture, murals, photography, and other art forms, she edited Image and Memory: Photography from Latin America 1866-1994, with Wendy Watriss, which was recognized as the best new art book of 1998 by the Association of American Publishers, and is the author, most recently, of The Inordinate Eye, which traces the relations among Latin American painting, sculpture, architecture, and literature.
George Zouridakis
Professor Zouridakis is the Director of the Biomedical Imaging Lab in the Department of Computer Science. He received a Dr.Ing. degree in Electronics Engineering from the University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 1987, followed by an M.S. in Biomedical Engineering in 1990 and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering in 1994, both from the University of Houston. Before returning to UH, George Zouridakis was on the faculty of The University of Texas-Houston Medical School from 1994 to 2001, where his clinical activities included Intraoperative Monitoring, Functional Brain Mapping, and Deep Brain Stimulation. His current research interests are in the areas of Biomedical Imaging, Computational Biomedicine, Functional Brain Mapping, and Biosignal Analysis and Modeling. He is the main author of a book on Intraoperative Monitoring, CRC Press, 2001, and the Co-Editor-in-Chief of the "Handbook of Biomedical Technology and Devices", CRC Press, 2003. He has developed courses, given lectures, organized sessions at national and international conferences on Medical Imaging and Brain Mapping, and has published more than 160 referred papers and abstracts. He is an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering and is also listed on Who’s Who in America.
