2017 saw the hiring of Abby Aresty as Technical Director and Lecturer for the TIMARA department. A renowned sound artist and composer, Aresty’s work explores human relationships to the natural world and built environment through engaging sound experiments which “seek to provoke audience reflection on habitual listening practices in contemporary sonic environments.”
Aresty’s installations have been featured on NPR’s All Things Considered, and praised by news outlets such as the Seattle Times and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. She’s held fellowships at the Studio for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University, Grinnell College, and the Acoustic Ecology Lab at Arizona State University’s Herberger Institute of Design and the Arts.
Her hiring coincided with a major renovation of the TIMARA studios. In her arrival, she’s played an integral role in the reorganization and updating of the studio spaces. The job of Technical Director and Lecturer was previously held by John Talbert, who retired in 2017 after nearly forty years in the role.
Aresty says “I met my first group of TIMARA students by chance at a winter residency at the Banff Center for the Arts in January 2013. They were a great bunch — friendly, funny, creative, supportive and welcoming. When I visited TIMARA last Spring, I found this same wonderful sense of community among the students and the faculty here on campus. It’s a privilege to be a part of such a wonderful creative community and I am grateful for my students and colleagues every single day.” – JA
