Month: February 2026

School of Art alumna Chelsea Farrar has been appointed permanent director of the University of Arizona Museum of Art.

Farrar, who had been interim director for the past four months, received her BFA and MA in Art & Visual Culture Education from the University of Arizona in 2004 and 2013, respectively. As a graduate student, she taught classes for the School of Art. At UAMA, she helped mentor School of Art students through internships and workshops as curator of community engagement and assistant curator of education.

“Chelsea held a steadfast commitment to making UAMA a place where everyone is welcome and feels like they belong,” said Carissa DiCindio, associate professor and chair of the school’s Art & Visual Culture Education program. “For AVCE students, her educational programs and community-based exhibitions are models for what a university art museum can achieve, as both a site for learning and a bridge between the university and the broader Tucson community.

“I am thrilled that she is going to lead UAMA as director and excited to see this next chapter for the museum.”

Farrar’s work with community engagement has included programs such as Art Sprouts, a story time and art-making event for children ages 3 to 5; and Mapping Q, an art-making workshop series that invites youth ages 14-24 to explore topics centered on the LGBTQIA+ experience — including self-care, community building and harm reduction. She also has curated community-based exhibitions in UAMA’s Our Stories gallery, working with faculty, artist and local groups to amplify underserved artistic voices.

“I am truly honored to step into the role of director at UAMA, a place that has been my home for the past 10 years in academic and community engagement,” Farrar said. “I am excited to continue fostering connections through art and to explore new opportunities for growth, innovation and creative belonging.”

Arizona Arts Dean Hasan Elahi, in announcing Farrar’s promotion, called her “an accomplished arts leader whose extensive experience, institutional knowledge and deep ties to both the university and the broader community make her exceptionally well-suited for this role.”

“Chelsea brings a clear understanding of UAMA’s significance as a resource for interdisciplinary teaching, student engagement and research,” Elahi said. “Her background will further strengthen the connections between the museum and the School of Art.”

Under Farrar’s direction, UAMA reopened to the public on Jan. 17 after with free admission for all. The policy change came after the museum completed installation of a new, state-of-the-art HVAC system.

“This new approach reinforces UAMA’s commitment to accessibility and public service,” Elahi said. “While campus visitors have long enjoyed free entry, extending this privilege to the wider community removes financial barriers and ensures that UAMA can inspire, educate, and connect people from diverse backgrounds. This shift strengthens the museum’s role in the vibrant cultural landscape of Tucson and Southern Arizona, aligning closely with the university’s land-grant mission.”

During her tenure as interim director, Farrar secured multiple gifts totaling over $500,000 in new philanthropic support for UAMA. “Her ability to build authentic, clear, and caring relationships with donors shows her operational fluency and readiness to guide the museum at scale,” Elahi said.

 “Chelsea’s leadership is characterized by integrity, collaboration, and a genuine care for people,” Elahi said. “She has earned the full endorsement of the UAMA staff and has fostered trust across teams through mentorship, accountability and a thoughtful, steady approach to decision-making. Her clear vision for UAMA’s future builds upon existing strengths, positioning the museum for long-term growth and impact.”

Prior to joining UAMA, Farrar taught visual art, art history and theater arts at Amphitheater High School.

Arizona Arts and the University of Arizona Museum of Art contributed to this story.

Austin Caswell, a recent University of Arizona School of Art MFA graduate, has landed a studio technician position in digital fabrication at the prestigious Anderson Ranch Arts Center near Aspen, Colorado.

Starting Feb. 16, Caswell will support, maintain and help run the digital fabrication studio, working with workshop participants, artists in residence, and visiting artists and instructors.

Anderson Ranch, established in 1966 in Snowmass Village, Colorado, brings together aspiring and internationally renowned artists to its campus nestled among the Rocky Mountains. Caswell knows the area well. He grew up and attended college in Colorado and still has family there, including his mom in Denver, where he was born.

“I’m thrilled for the opportunity to support such an amazing and storied art center and its participants,” Caswell said. “They just shared their workshop lineup for the summer, and it looks awesome. I’m really fortunate to be in a place where I can come into contact with such a vast array of ideas and processes. The location definitely isn’t bad, either.”

Caswell received both a BA in Integrated Visual Studies and a BA in History from Colorado State University before earning his Studio Art MFA in 3D and Extended Media at Arizona in May 2025. He then taught at the School of Art as an adjunct during the fall 2025 semester — drawing on his experience as a graduate teaching assistant.

“I loved my experience teaching at the School of Art,” Caswell said. “Working with students in 3DXM courses and being there to witness their discoveries and successes was really rewarding.”

He also enjoyed his time as a student, including being featured in the 2024 Arizona Biennial at the Tucson Museum of Art, where his installation “The Finder” was a speculative, future archaeological site that used lifespans of plastics to seek meaning and knowledge within lost contexts, including playground slides found around Tucson. The installation won the Biennial’s Pat Mutterer Sculpture and Architecture Award.

“My MFA gave me the time, feedback and additional resources to develop a stronger foundation in navigating between material processes and conceptual inquiry,” Caswell said, “which I think translates well to supporting artists in a studio environment where they’re working through both technical and creative challenges.”

Calling him “a model student,” Professor Gary Setzer worked closely with Caswell and chaired his MFA thesis exhibition committee.

“Austin has a tireless work ethic and a sharp intellect with a distinctive command of metaphor,” said Setzer, associate director of the School of Art. “His layered and sophisticated approach to content in his artwork stems from his developed scholarly curiosity. And while studio art and history are separate fields, his practice appears to be a unique hybrid that employs strategies from both.”

Caswell’s thesis installation, “The Fault, the Raft, and the Current,” presented a landscape of human stewardship and consumption.

“Austin’s installations address the quandary of human ‘progress,’ and they do so through a nuanced approach that grapples with consumerism — highlighting its necessary evils, its glory, and its long-term impact on our planet,” Setzer said. “Never shying away from the true complexity of what is at hand, Austin’s artworks are as frank as they are guised in a thick and wonderfully bewildering poetry.”

Added Setzer: “Lensed through a distanced and futuristic anthropological look at humanity and our shortsightedness, Austin creates installation-landscapes riddled with the detritus of a people long gone. A future that’s not necessarily apocalyptic — but definitely bleak. A future that’s not necessarily beautiful — but seemingly romantic, nonetheless.

“Austin is a young Caspar David Friedrich for the Anthropocene,” said Setzer, referring to the famous 19^th century German Romantic landscape painter.

​Caswell has exhibited across the United States in venues such as the parkeralemán-El Paso Community Foundation in Texas, the Museum of Art- Fort Collins in Colorado and 311 Gallery in Raleigh, North Carolina. He also holds professional experience as a studio instructor, carpenter, landscape designer and fabricator.

While at Arizona, Caswell was awarded a summer residency at the Haystack Mountain School of Craft in Maine and was a resident at the School of Art’s Lionel Rombach Gallery. He also received the school’s coveted Helen Gross Award, which provided generous funding for his thesis project, and a Medici Scholar travel grant to support his research.

In Caswell’s new role at Anderson Ranch, Setzer said the artist’s supportive teaching methods will help him excel.

“Austin meets people where they are, builds trust, and leads them to new things,” Setzer said. “Wherever there are complications, he sees possibility and problem-solving.”

• Artist’s website: austincaswell.com
• On Instagram: @austinmcaswell