Arts Research Award

The Arts Research Award is offered by BU Arts Initiative in the Office of the Provost to support a student pursuing the arts as a primary area of inquiry. This would include traditional methods of inquiry in an arts field, as well as practice-based and practice-led research.

“Our mission at the BU Arts Initiative is to ensure the integral role of the arts in the educational experience of every BU student. We support faculty, student, and staff projects, making sure the arts are deeply embedded within the cultural and intellectual fabric of the University.”

Awardees will be selected from the funded UROP applicant pool.

2024 Awardees

Sam Dvorin
Project Title: David’s Harp: Realizing Cultural Interpretations
Mentor: Victor Coelho, CFA Musicology and Ethnomusicology

Levi Leca
Project Title: LiDar Technology: Making Theatre More Efficient and Accurate
Mentor: Jon Savage, CFA Scene Design

Eben Lowenstein
Project Title: Defining the Garden Cemetery: The Importance of Landscape Documentation and Analysis at Mount Auburn
Mentor: Deborah Kahn, CAS History of Art and Architecture

2023 Awardees

Kennedy Harwood
Project Title: Contemporary Observational Painting: Mapping the Relevance of Plein Air in the 21st Century
Mentor: Josephine Halvorson, CFA Painting

Virginia Jansen
Project Title: An Exploration of the Influence of Spirituals on the Music of Florence Price
Mentor: Leland Clark, CFA Musicology and Ethnomusicology

Anna Paradise
Project Title: Unveiling the Mask: An Interdisciplinary Investigation of Women’s Artistic Tradition in Mask-Making
Mentor: Felice Amato, CFA Art Education

2022 Awardees

Spencer Hart-Thompson
Project Title: The Progression of Us: Music Through the Scope of Disability
Mentor: Gareth Smith, CFA Music Education

Delaney Finn
Project Title: Social Empowerment and an Ethic of Care in Music Education
Mentor: Karen Hendricks, CFA Music Education

Angie Ao
Project Title: Radical Characters
Mentor: Mary Yang, CFA Graphic Design

2021 Awardees

Danielle Chang
Project Title: Chinese Typography in Contemporary Culture
Mentor: Mary Yang, CFA Graphic Design

Jayna Mikolaitis
Project Title: Heirlooms as Female Genealogy: An investigation of female labor, life, and legacy through the fiber arts.
Mentor: Felice Amato, CFA Art Education

Gisela Rodriguez
Project Title: ILAT- International Latin American Theatre Conference
Mentor: Kristin Leahy, SFA Theater

2020 Awardees

Nadia Frye Leinhos
Project Title: When the Catalyst “Can Take It”: The Performance of Violence in the Black Female Body
Mentor: Kristin Leahey, CFA Theater

Claire Rich
Project Title: Art Deco and Feminine Classicism: Women Artists in Interwar France, 1918-1939
Mentor: Jonathan Ribner, CAS Art History

Anna Schoff
Project Title: Computational Analysis of Classical Greek Poetic Meter
Mentor: Alexander Nikolaev, CAS Linguistics and Classics

2019 Awardees

Nadine Chen
Project Title: Between the Sacred and Secular: Experiential Religion in Dostoevsky and William James Mentor: Yui Corrigan, CAS World Languages and Literature

Anna Harris
Project Title: The Dangers of Musical Taste
Mentor: Rachana Vajjhala, CFA Musicology & Ethnomusicology

Hannah Hooven
Project Title: Once Lost, Now Found: The Trauma of Displaced Children and Music Education in Rishikesh, India
Mentor: Kinh Vu, CFA Music Education

Sabrina Scotti
Project Title: The Alignment of Video Game Soundtracks with Recommendations for Children’s Music Listening
Mentor: Diana Dansereau, CFA Music Education

2018 Awardees

Madeline Bucci
Project Title: Music Program Curricula and Teaching Practices and the Development of Positive Character Traits
Mentor: Karin Hendricks, CFA Music Education

Yichen Li
Project Title: Model and Sculpture Stability Project
Mentor: Emily Whiting, CAS Computer Science

Anastasia Sangermano
Project Title: Musical Engagement and the Emotional Health of Infants who are Experiencing Homelessness
Mentor: Diana Dansereau, CFA Music Education

2017 Awardees

Xiaoyi Peng
Project Title: Asia at the World’s Fairs (Online Exhibition)
Mentor: Alice Tseng, CAS History of Art & Architecture

Vijay Thakkar
Project Title: DeepNote – Exploring Music Generation and Modification with WaveNet
Mentor: Brian Kulis, ENG ECE

2016 Awardees

David Baylies
Project Title: A More Precise Model of the Trumpet
Mentor: Glynn Holt, ENG Mechanical Engineering

Dominique Bookwalter
Project Title: Mapping Titian
Mentor: Jodi Cranston, CAS History of Art & Architecture

2015 Awardees

Justin Lievano
Project Title: A Mother is one to whom you run when you are Troubled: The Influence of Instructive Texts on the Mothers of 19th Century American Literature
Mentor: Joseph Rezek, CAS English

Nicole Rizzo
Project Title: Research Apprenticeship in Interdisciplinary Modernist Studies
Mentor: Carrie Preston, CAS English

2014 Awardee

Cecilia Weddell
Project title: Intellectuals and the Global Cinematic Imagination of “Mexico in Revolution”
Mentor: Adela Pineda Franco, CAS Romance Studies