FEATURING WORKS BY

Elizabeth Adams

A composer, teacher, and caregiver who has worked at the intersection of art, education, and organizing for over twenty years. She produces anti-capitalist music concerts, created pop-up political education spaces with Free University NYC, and won historic rent laws with the Crown Heights Tenant Union. She has taught at Columbia University and the School for Designing a Society. See: arttothinkwith.org.

Aaron Ammons

A passionate spoken word artist who uses his artistic gift to spread love and truth. He co-founded CU Citizens for Peace and Justice, and currently serves as Champaign County Clerk.

Amir Ammons

Musician, artist, lover of animals and nature, Amir grew up at the IMC and has contributed their talents to our community throughout their life.

Carol Ammons

Our State Representative for over ten years. She was a founding leader of CU Citizens for Peace and Justice for 14 years, served on the county board and city council, and has worked to dismantle systemic inequalities as an activist and elected official, winning criminal justice reform, environmental protections, greater access to education, and reparatory justice.

Jacob Barton

He composes, improvises, and produces music. A consummate arranger of tonal music, he developed the Udderbot, a new slide wind instrument family. His curiosity for experimental music composition took him to Rice University (2003-2007) and to the School for Designing a Society (2005-2015). He participates as a pollinator in projects like UnTwelve, the Xenharmonic Alliance, and the World Harmony Project.

Roberta Bennett

A public school art teacher from Illinois. She has learned from teaching in various settings that regardless of where one teaches, the performance of teacher is always constrained by the policies of the place.

Herbert Brün

A composer of acoustic music, a pioneer of electronic and computer music, a formulator of algorithms, graphics, and words. A cybernetician and social theorist sympathetic to the Frankfurt School, he taught experimental composition in any media at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign, and was a co-founder of both the Performers’ Workshop Ensemble and the School for Designing a Society.

Arun Chandra

He began working with Susan and Mark (and Sullivan and Daugherty) in 1974. Worked with PWE for some 17 or so years. Helped start SDAS in 1990. Edited and got published a book of articles by Herbert Brun (When Music Resists Meaning). Teach at the Evergreen State College in 1998. Invited SDAS to Evergreen to come and teach. Those folks shaped my life, and I irritated theirs.

Danielle Chynoweth

A media justice and housing rights leader who organizes with impacted residents to build power through strategic interventions that grow healing and hope. She works to end homelessness the elected Township Supervisor. She was the Organizing Director for Media Justice and co-founded the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center. She teaches at the University of Illinois, School for Designing a Society, and internationally.

Carla Cravens

A psychotherapist specializing in Geriatrics and Life Transitions, with a private practice in Savoy. She is loving life in a way she'd never imagined when she was in her fifties. Who, aware of the importance of having curiosity, wants to cultivate compassion and wonder toward herself and others while embracing a sense of worthiness for all beings.

Cope Cumpston

A community member, book and graphic artist, and long-time and grateful student of the School for Designing a Society.

Mark Enslin

A composer, playwright, educator, clown and activist whose compositions highlight social contradictions, ironize power relations, and ignite empathy by putting performers in impossible situations. Co-founder of the School for Designing a Society.

Christopher Evans

An artist, organizer, and Urbana City Council member since 2021. He was a member of IMC for 21 years, CU Citizens for Peace and Justice for 14 years.

Jade Futrelle

I make music, video, code, performances, and live streams. I met Jeff Glassman in 1986 and it led to house theaters, SDaS, and so very very much more. I am currently building a secret undersea lair in which to escape surface hassles and live in luxury in the deep ocean forever.

Jeff Glassman

He obsesses over his homegrown collection of theatrical oddities, all organic, and tries to plant them around the perimeter of artistic space, wherever there's enough dirt.

Ben Grosser

A artist recomposing and reimagining social platforms, AI futures, and interface cultures. He is a Professor of New Media at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a Faculty Associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.

Meadow Jones

Meadow Jones is a social practice artist, an award winning filmmaker and community organizer. Her work has been published in literary journals, peer reviewed scientific journals, poetry collections, books and chapbooks. She has facilitated arts and writing practices for diverse populations including undergraduates, artists, activists, teachers, teenagers, trauma survivors, prisoners, physicians and friends. In addition to offering workshops Meadow provides one on one creative consulting and trauma and recovery coaching. In other parts of her life Meadow is a dharma student at the Ann Arbor Zen Buddhist Temple, a facilitator at the Gesundheit Institute and the School for Designing a Society, a collaborator with The Prop Theatre, and on the board of directors of the Amherst Writers and Artists.

Elvy Kinbell (aka Kim Olsen)

A local childcare provider / play advocate; writer, artist, and former student involved with SDaS from 2008-09 and 2011-2016.

Paul Kotheimer

He participated in SDaS activities including N30 protests in Seattle, Nov.-Dec. 1999; S26 actions including theater on the U of I quad (September 2000); the founding of the Urbana-Champaign IMC (2000-01); the death of Herbert Brün (November 2000); and a caravan to city-wide protests against the FTAA in Quebec City (Spring 2001); the creation of the Anti-War Anti-Racist Action Effort (AWARE), etc.

Kate McDowell

Professor at the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and author of Critical Data Storytelling for Libraries: Crafting Ethical Narratives for Advocacy and Impact.

Keith Moore

Keith Moore composes music rooted in French Spectralism, American Experimentalism, and avant-garde jazz, extended through his own research into acoustics and psychoacoustics. His compositions have been commissioned by Ensemble Modern (Frankfurt), musikFabrik WDR (Cologne), Ensemble de l'Itinéraire (Paris), the PRISM Quartet, and the Athens Biennale, among others. Moore was a fellow of the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, the Fondation Royaumont, and the Alexander S. Onassis Foundation, and an Artist-in-Residence at ZKM | Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe. He holds a D.M.A. from Columbia University and a B.M. from the University of Illinois, where he studied with Salvatore Martirano and Herbert Brün.

Crissy Nelson

A lover of children and carer of people with medical challenges. Fierce advocate for medical care not disease care.

Ella Pepper

A mixed‑media artist who builds fragile, luminous worlds out of ink, paper, and gold leaf. Her pieces often read like small altars: ribs, organs, and silhouettes held together with gold, carrying the weight of deconstruction, disability, and survival without losing their tenderness. As an autistic woman, Pepper’s work is inseparable from her advocacy; she treats each artwork as a form of protest in favor of nuance, autonomy, and being allowed to exist as you are.

Rohn Public Holiday

Since 2013, I've been the live-in caretaker at Channing-Murray, plus other activities. At the IMC, I've had three radio programs on WEFT, a bunch of political organizing out of the Family Room and Sun Room, some awesome SDaS programs. I've had too many awesome experiences on Park Street to count -- thank you Susan.

Susan Parenti

A composer, playwright, activist, performer, and teacher whose work challenges us to examine language in order to reject the premises and logics of violence.

ElizaBeth Simpson

A folk indie jazz singer-songwriter and conflict mediator in Urbana. 

PERFORMERS

Ben Roidl-Ward, bassoon

Named one of 23 artists "changing the sound of classical music" by the Washington Post, Ben Roidl-Ward has been praised for his "dazzling technique" and "breathless virtuosity." He is Assistant Professor of Bassoon at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and Principal Bassoonist of the Chicago Sinfonietta and the Illinois Symphony. A member of Chicago's Ensemble Dal Niente, he served as a Contemporary Leader at the Lucerne Festival Academy from 2021–2025 and has participated in the premieres of over 190 compositions. He has performed with ensembles including the Chicago Symphony and the New York Philharmonic, and his debut solo album Axis Mundi was featured on Bandcamp Daily's Best Contemporary Classical of November 2022.

Emmett Jackson, double bass

Emmett Jackson, born in Chicago in 1996, received his bachelor's degree from Lawrence University and his master's from Northwestern University, where he was also a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago. A graduate of the International Ensemble Modern Academy (IEMA) in Frankfurt, he attended the Lucerne Festival Academy for three summers, premiering works by Thomas Adès and Rebecca Saunders and performing under conductors including Enno Poppe, Susanna Mälkki, Tyshawn Sorey, and Lin Liao. He performs regularly with the Grossman Ensemble at the University of Chicago, has recorded with Chicago's Ensemble Dal Niente, and holds the assistant principal bass chair of the Fox Valley Symphony Orchestra.

Andrew Gaffey, saxophone

Andrew Gaffey is a saxophonist and contemporary music advocate from Pittsburgh, PA. He has performed throughout the United States and toured Colombia with the Blair Big Band, winners of two Downbeat Awards, and has commissioned and premiered works by numerous composers. He founded the Copland Trio, one of the first saxophone-percussion-piano trios of its kind in the US, and currently serves as saxophonist with the Illinois Modern Ensemble. He is pursuing the Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the University of Illinois, where he is a recipient of the University Fellowship. In his free time he can be found drinking coffee or birding, and sometimes both.

Christopher Victor, saxophone

Christopher Victor is a master's student in saxophone performance at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where he performs with the Illinois Wind Symphony, the Saxophone Ensemble, and the Graduate Saxophone Quartet. Originally from Georgia, he graduated from the University of Georgia with degrees in Saxophone Performance and Music Theory. He is a student of Dr. Nicki Roman and previously studied with Dr. Brandon Quarles and Dr. Connie Frigo.

Tania Arazi Coambs, soprano

Born in Cumaná, Venezuela, soprano Tania Arazi Coambs is a performer, stage director, and writer recognized for her "searing and intense acting and singing." She has performed internationally at the Shaw Theatre in London, St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, and the Muson Centre in Lagos, Nigeria, and has appeared with Opera Venezuela, Illinois Opera Theater, and the Danville Symphony Orchestra. As a director, her original play Stoplight was named Best Arts of 2022 by Smile Politely. Her dissertation on Latin/o American representation in opera won the 2018–2020 National Opera Association Biennial Competition. She holds a doctorate in Vocal Performance and Literature from the University of Illinois.

Kerrith Livengood, flute

Composer Kerrith Livengood's music features complex grooves, lyricism, noise, and humor. She has composed works for the JACK Quartet, Third Angle Ensemble, Duo Cortona, Altered Sound Duo, Albatross Duo, soprano Amy Petrongelli, and the h2 Quartet. She is also a flutist, drummer, technologist, and improviser, who has performed many collaborative and experimental works with many different groups. Kerrith is interested in creating music with live processing and interactive scores. She received her doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh, and previously taught at the University of Illinois. Kerrith is also Assistant Director of the New Music On The Point Festival (NMOP).

Miriam Larson, flute

Miriam Larson has served as Executive Director of the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center since January 2020. Over the course of her career she has worked as a labor union organizer, a community technology specialist, an elementary school librarian, a children's book reviewer, and a human statue. She also plays flute with several local and traveling bands, including the contradance folk trio Mean Lids.