List of Bennington College people

Architecture

David Choi ’96: principal, CHOIDESIGN + Partners; winner of Coptic Church International Design Contest, Edge as Center Competition

Arjun Desai ’88: founder and partner, Desai/Chia Architecture (rated among the top 100 design firms by House Beautiful); winner of 2004 AIA/NY Design Award and 2005 American Architecture Award for their Cooper Square project

Kevin Alter ’85: associate dean for graduate programs, Sid W. Richardson Centennial Professor of Architecture; director of the Summer Academy in Architecture; and associate director of the Center for American Architecture and Design at The University of Texas at Austin

John Diebboll ’78: principal, Michael Graves & Associates, NYC; author of The Art of the Piano

Judith DiMaio ’72: dean, New York Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Design Architecture; winner of Rome Prize in architecture

Patricia Johanson '62: designer of Fair Park Lagoon, Dallas; pioneer in the incorporation of art and ecology with infrastructure

Judith Munk, artist and designer associated with Scripps Institution of Oceanography

Art administration

Lindsey Howard

Matthew Marks ’85: founder and owner, Matthew Marks Gallery

Brooke Davis Anderson '84: deputy director of Curatorial Programming, Los Angeles County Museum of Art; author of two books on the life and work of artist Martín Ramírez, and Darger: The Henry Darger Collection at the American Folk Art Museum

Dan Cameron ’79: former director, visual arts, Contemporary Arts Center (New Orleans), Chief Curator of the Orange County Museum of Art

George King ’77: director, Georgia O'Keeffe Museum

James Levin ’76: founder, Cleveland Public Theatre

Virlana Tkacz '74; founding director of Yara Arts Group

Peter Barnet '73: curator, Medieval Art and The Cloisters, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Sharon Ott ’72: former artistic director, Seattle Repertory Theater; Tony and Obie Awards; faculty, Savannah College of Art & Design; executive board member, Stage Directors and Choreographers Society

Kathy Halbreich ’71: associate director, The Museum of Modern Art (New York)

Deborah Borda ’71: president and CEO, the Los Angeles Philharmonic; former president and CEO of the New York Philharmonic

Maren Hassinger ’69: director, the Rinehart School of Graduate Sculpture at the Maryland Institute College of Art

Anne Waldman ’66: director and cofounder, Jack Kerouac School, The Naropa Institute; the Dylan Thomas Memorial Prize and NEA fellowships

Harvey Lichtenstein ’53: chair, Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) Local Development Corporation; former executive director and president emeritus of the Board of Trustees, Brooklyn Academy of Music

Business

Andrea Fiuczynski ’85: Executive Vice President, Chairman, Americas at Sotheby's

Jim Weinstock ’78: senior vice president for investments at Beringer Weinstock Group

Glenn Horowitz ’77: rare book dealer/owner, Glenn Horowitz Bookseller, Inc.

Brad Jacobs ’77: former chairman and CEO, United Rentals, Inc.

John Sheldon ’77: managing director, Lazard

Nicholas Stephens ’77: partner, Edgewood Management Company; registered investment adviser

Andrew Langerman ’74: former managing director at Deutsche Bank Securities; former managing director at Fortis Bank; on the forefront of innovation in CDOs, derivatives and structured finance

Bruce Berman ’74: chairman and CEO, Village Roadshow Pictures; executive producer, The Matrix, Ocean's Eleven, Analyze This, Mystic River, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Ruth Elias Rogers ’70: chef/owner, River Café, London; co-author, Italian Country Cookbook

Kathryn Talalay ’71: project editor, W.W. Norton & Co.; author of Composition in Black and White: The Life of Philippa Schuyler

Ellen Beskind Safir ’66: founder/CEO, New Century Advisers

Pamela deWindt Burke ’64: first vice president, McDonald & Co. Securities

Priscilla Alexander ’58: founder and president, ProTravel International

Corinne Silverman Kyle ’50: research director, Gallup International Institute

Judith Jones ’45: vice president and senior editor, Knopf; author of The Tenth Muse: My Life with Food, and The Pleasures of Cooking for One

Dance/choreography

Sara Rudner MFA ’99: director of dance, Sarah Lawrence College; former principal dancer, Twyla Tharp Dance; recipient of Bessie Award and Guggenheim grant

Myrna Packer ’74: award-winning choreographer/dancer, co-artistic director of Bridgman/Packer Dance; recipient of grants and fellowships from The National Endowment for the Arts, New England Foundation for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, and the John Simon Memorial Guggenheim Foundation

Lisa Nelson ’71: choreographer; former editor, Contact Quarterly; director of Videoda

Penny Campbell ’70: lecturer of dance, Middlebury College

Liz Lerman ’69: choreographer, founder/director, Liz Lerman Dance Exchange; 2002 MacArthur "Genius" Award winner

Julie Arenal Primus ’60: choreographer for original and revival Broadway productions of Hair

Carla Maxwell ’67: artistic director, José Limón Dance Company; Bessie Award winner

Aileen Passloff ’53: chair, dance department, Bard College

Education

Emanuelle A. Kihm ’93: founder, The Open Classroom Collaborative, NYC arts education organization

Jeanne M. Poduska ’85: deputy director and principal research scientist, American Institutes for Research, Center for Integrating Education and Prevention Research in School; associate faculty, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Douglas Biow ’79: professor of Italian and comparative literature, University of Austin; 2006 Guggenheim fellow

Judith Butler ’78: professor and chair of comparative literature and rhetoric, University of California, Berkeley; author, Gender Trouble

Susan Forbes-Luxton '72: co-founder and associate director of Educational Solution Group

Ellen McCulloch-Lovell ’69: president, Marlboro College; former deputy assistant to President Clinton

Ellen Taussig ’66: cofounder, The Northwest School, Seattle, WA; head of school since 1992

Uliana Fischbein Gabara ’61: dean of international education, University of Richmond (VA)

Joan Hutton Landis ’51: former chair of liberal arts, Curtis Institute of Music, Philadelphia; author of That Blue Repair

Sally Liberman Smith ’50: founder/director, Lab School, Washington, DC

Film/theater/television

Rider Strong: '09: Bennington MFA alum- screenwriter, director, producer: Irish Twins; actor, Boy Meets World

John Boyd: '03: actor, Bones

Justin Theroux ’93: actor; film credits include Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, Duplex, Mulholland Drive, American Psycho, Tropic of Thunder: Rain of Madness; TV credits include Alias, Sex and the City, Six Feet Under, John Adams

Spencer Cox (did not graduate): HIV/AIDS activist

Peter Dinklage ’91: actor; film credits include Living in Oblivion, The Station Agent, Elf, Death at a Funeral, Saint John of Las Vegas, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, X-Men: Days of Future Past; TV credits include Nip/Tuck, 30 Rock, Game of Thrones

Chris Bowen ’88: senior performing director, Blue Man Group; Obie and Drama Desk Awards

Melissa Rosenberg ’86: writer/producer; TV credits include The Agency, Boston Public, Dexter; film credits include Step Up, Twilight, New Moon

Liz Glotzer ’83: president of production, Castle Rock Pictures; executive producer, The Shawshank Redemption, The Majestic, The Mist

Tim Daly ’79: actor,Diner, Made in Heaven; TV credits include Witness to the Execution, Wings, The Fugitive, The Sopranos, Private Practice, "Madam Secretary"; Theatre World and Dramalogue awards

Mitch Markowitz ’75: screenwriter, Good Morning Vietnam, Crazy People; TV credits include M*A*S*H, Too Close for Comfort, Monk

Virlana Tkacz '74: theater director

Mitchell Kriegman '74: Emmy award winning director and writer, The Book of Pooh, Bear in the Big Blue House, Clarissa Explains It All

Alley Mills ’73: actress, The Wonder Years, The Bold and the Beautiful (Emmy and Golden Globe Award)

Holland Taylor ’64: actress; film credits include To Die For, The Truman Show, One Fine Day; TV credits include Bosom Buddies, The Practice (Emmy Award), Two and a Half Men

Barry Primus '60: actor/director/writer, Cagney & Lacey, The X-Files, LA Law; film credits include The Rose, American Hustle, Mistress, Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death

Suzanne Shepherd ’56: actress; film credits include Working Girl, Goodfellas; TV credits include Law & Order, The Sopranos

Alan Arkin ’55: actor, director, composer, author; film credits include Catch-22, The Russians Are Coming, Glengarry Glen Ross, Grosse Pointe Blank, The In-Laws, Little Miss Sunshine (Golden Globe and Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor), Get Smart

Carol Channing ’42: Broadway and film actress; Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and Hello, Dolly!; Golden Globe Award, Academy Award nomination

Government/public service

Aliza Akhtar ’03: assistant to the general counsel, the Association of the Bar of the City of New York

Aaron Scholer ’97, MLAS ’98: Director of National Security Policy for progressive political strategy and legislative advocacy group; Visiting Scholar, Georgetown University, Department of Government

Eric Ramirez-Ferrero ’85: former University of Michigan Population Fellow; chief of party, EngenderHealth, Tanzania

Princess Yasmin Aga Khan ’73: vice chairman of Alzheimer's and Related Disorders Association; president of Alzheimer's Disease International

Gay Johnson McDougall ’69: first UN Independent Expert on Minority Issues; executive director of International Human Rights Law Group; 1999 MacArthur "Genius" Award winner

Jerri Perloff ’65: program director, National Institutes of Health

Elinor Bacon ’63: former CEO, National Capital Revitalization Corporation; former deputy assistant secretary, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development; citizen member of the District of Columbia Office of Planning; president of E.R. Bacon Development

Elizabeth Raspolic ’60: former Ambassador to Gabon and Sao Tome & Principe, and later Chargé d'Affaires, ad interim, to Guinea

Kay Crawford Murray ’56: pioneer for the advancement of women attorneys; former chair of the Committee on Women in the Law of the New York State Bar Association; former general counsel to the New York City Department of Juvenile Justice; inaugural recipient of the New York State Bar Association's Kay Crawford Murray Award

Elizabeth Pfister ’43: awarded the Congressional Gold Medal for her work in the Women Airforce Service Pilots, the first women in history to fly America's military aircraft, during World War II; founder of the Ninety-Nines: The International Organization of Women Pilots; inductee in the Colorado Aviation Hall of Fame

Journalism/broadcasting

James Geary ’85: former deputy editor of TIME magazine, Europe, Middle East, and Africa

Raphael Rubinstein ’79: senior editor, Art in America magazine

Roger Kimball '75: art critic and conservative social commentator; editor and publisher of New Criterion

Thomas Matthews ’75: executive editor, Wine Spectator

Carl Navarre ’74: former publisher and editor-in-chief, Atlantic Monthly Press; CEO, MyPublisher, Inc.

Alec Wilkinson ’74: staff writer, The New Yorker; author of eight nonfiction books; Robert F. Kennedy Book Award

Ted Mooney ’73: senior editor, Art in America magazine

Francesca Lyman ’72: environmental writer for The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and Sierra magazine; “Your Environment" column for MSNBC

Wendy Perron ’69: editor-in-chief, Dance Magazine

Elizabeth Richter Zimmer ’66: former dance editor, The Village Voice

Joyce Sunila '65: film commentator, lifestyle columnist for The Los Angeles Times

Gail Hirschhorn Evans ’63: former executive vice president, CNN Newsgroup; author of Play Like a Man, Win Like a Woman

Pam Abel Hill ’60: broadcast journalist; two-time Emmy Award winner

Music

Will Stratton '10: singer/songwriter

Amelia Meath '09: member of the band Sylvan Esso and Mountain Man

Mountain Man (group): indie folk singing trio

Alex Bleeker '08: member of the band Real Estate and Alex Bleeker and the Freaks

Chris Barron ’90: lead singer, Spin Doctors

Anthony Wilson ’90: composer/arranger, guitarist; toured with Diana Krall

Christopher P. Lombardi ’90: co-founder, Matador Records

Ahrin Mishan ’86: composer, TV credits include Ed, The Whoopi Goldberg Show; film credits include End of Magic, Birds of America

Susannah Waters ’86: soprano, profiled in Opera News; NYC Opera debut 1997 in Handel's Xerxes

Michael Starobin ’79: orchestrator on Broadway for Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Falsettos, Guys and Dolls, King Lear, Visiting Mr. Green, Next to Normal

Lisa Sokolov ’76: jazz vocalist, improviser and composer; originator, Embodied VoiceWork; director, The Institute for Embodied VoiceWork in New York; associate professor, NYU's Tisch School of the Arts

Elizabeth Swados ’73: composer, writer, director; three-time Obie winner

Joan Tower ’61: composer; Asher Edelman Professor of Music, Bard College; Grammy Award recipient

James Tenney ’58: experimental composer; Roy E. Disney Family Chair in Musical Composition, CalArts

Science/medicine

Kristina Stinson ’92: population ecologist/staff scientist, Harvard Forest, Harvard University

Michael Coady ’89: assistant professor, department of surgery, Yale University School of Medicine

Jennifer Mieres ’82: director, nuclear cardiology; associate professor, New York University School of Medicine

Andrew Vershon ’79: professor, molecular biology and biochemistry, Waksman Institute, Rutgers University

Stephen Pratt ’77: senior chemist, Argonne National Laboratory

Peter S. White ’71: professor of ecology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; director, North Carolina Botanical Garden

Patricia Cronin Adams ’64: former president, New England Pediatric Society

Judith Schneider Bond ’61: chair, biochemistry and molecular biology, Penn State University; former president, American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

Barrie Cassileth ’59: Laurance S. Rockefeller Chair in Integrative Medicine, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center

Visual arts

Matt Connors: Painter

Anna Gaskell ’92: photographer; named as one of three Best and Brightest art photographers in America by Esquire magazine

Tom Sachs ’89: installation artist; work appeared in New York Times Magazine, Elle Décor magazine, The New York Post, GQ

Ralph Alswang ’87: official White House photographer, Clinton administration

Sally Mann ’73: photographer; named one of "America's best photographers" by TIME magazine, author, Deep South, Proud Flesh

Maren Hassinger '69: Installation, sculpture, performance artist also working in video. Director of the Rinehart School of Sculpture at the Maryland Institute College of Art.

Susan Crile ’65: painter; faculty, Hunter College

Marian Zazeela '60: light-artist, designer, painter and musician

Helen Frankenthaler ’49: painter; pioneer in abstract expressionism

Writing

Thisuri Wanniarachchi '16: author; books, Colombo Streets, The Terrorist's Daughter

Tod Goldberg '09: author; books, Gangsterland, Living Dead Girl, Other Resort Cities, Burn Notice series

Mohammed Naseehu Ali '95: author; book, The Prophet of Zongo Street

Kiran Desai ’93: author; books, Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard (New York Times Notable Book) and Inheritance of Loss (winner of the 2006 Man Booker Prize for fiction)

Reginald Shepherd '88: poet, books, Some Are Drowning, Wrong, Otherhood

Jonathan Lethem ’86: author; books, You Don't Love Me Yet, The Fortress of Solitude, Motherless Brooklyn (National Book Critics Circle Award), 2005 MacArthur "Genius" Award winner, Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse, Chronic City, appointed Disney professor of creative writing at Pomona College

Donna Tartt ’86: author; 2014 Pulitzer Prize Winner for The Goldfinch; books, The Secret History, The Little Friend

Bret Easton Ellis ’86: author; books, Less Than Zero, The Rules of Attraction, American Psycho, Lunar Park, The Informers

Jill Eisenstadt '85, novelist; books, From Rockaway and Kiss Out

Eva Salzman '82, poet; books, The English Earthquake, Bargain with the Watchman

Susan Wheeler '77, poet; books, Smokes, Bag o' Diamonds, Meme; Norma Farber First Book Award and finalist for National Book Award; Director of Creative Writing at Princeton University

Michael Pollan ’76: author; books, In Defense of Food, The Omnivore's Dilemma, The Botany of Desire (New York Times bestseller), Second Nature: A Gardener's Education, and A Place of My Own: The Education of an Amateur Builder

Mary Ruefle '74: poet and essayist; books, Madness Rock and Honey (National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist), A Little White Shadow, Among the Musk Ox People; recipient of William Carlos Williams Award

Lynn Emanuel ’72: poet; books, Hotel Fiesta, The Dig, Then, Suddenly; National Poetry Series Award, Pushcart Prize, NEA, professor at University of Pittsburgh

Kathleen Norris ’69: author of Dakota: A Spiritual Geography, The Cloister Walk, Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith (New York Times Notable Book), and Acedia & Me: A Marriage, Monks, and a Writer's Life; Guggenheim fellowship

Gretel Ehrlich ’67: author; books, Arctic Heart: A Poem Cycle, Islands, The Universe, Home, This Cold Heaven: Seven Seasons in Greenland, The Future of Ice: A Journey into Cold; Whiting Creative Writing award, Guggenheim fellowship

Elizabeth Frank ’67: author; Pulitzer Prize for Louise Bogan: A Portrait; Cheat and Charmer: A Novel, Joseph E. Harry Chair in Modern Languages and Literature, Bard College

Anne Waldman ’66: poet, books, Marriage: A Sentence, In the Room of Never Grieve, professor at Naropa University

Claire Blatchford '66: author and deafness advocate; book, Turning: Words Heard from Within

Sandra Hochman '57, poet and novelist, books, Manhattan Pastures, Jogging: A Love Story, Playing Tahoe; 1963 Yale Series of Younger Poets Award

Riva Magaril Poor ’56: author; award-winning book, 4 Days, 40 Hours: Reporting a Revolution in Work and Leisure (1970); more than 500 speeches and 200 guest appearances on TV and radio shows, including Today, CBS News, Merv Griffin and Phil Donahue

Cynthia Macdonald '50: poet; books, Amputations, (W)holes, I Can't Remember

Miriam Marx Allen ’49: author; book, Love, Groucho: Letters from Groucho Marx to His Daughter Miriam

Carolyn Cassady ’44: author; book, Off the Road: My Years with Cassady, Kerouac, and Ginsberg

Barbara Howes '37: poet; wife of William Jay Smith

Notable current faculty

Benjamin Anastas

April Bernard

Sven Birkerts

Kitty Brazelton

Susan Cheever

Ronald L. Cohen

Bernard Cooper

Annabel Davis-Goff

Michael Dumanis

Mansour Farhang

Marguerite Feitlowitz

David Gates

Amy Gerstler

Milford Graves

Donald Hall

Amy Hempel

Major Jackson

Bret Anthony Johnston

Dinah Lenney

Timothy Liu

Phillip Lopate

Mary Lum

Mac Maharaj

Honor Moore

Wyatt Mason

Brian Morton

Ed Ochester

Laura Parnes

Ben Paul

Ann Pibal

Lynne Sharon Schwartz

Allen Shawn

Bruce Williamson

Mark Wunderlich

Paul Yoon

Notable former faculty

W. H. Auden, gave a series of lectures on Shakespeare in the spring of 1946; resided in the Leigh house faculty apartment

Steven Bach

Ben Belitt, poet and language professor

Eric Bentley

Henry Brant, composer

Kenneth Burke, critic

Louis Calabro, composer

Sir Anthony Caro, British sculptor

Tony Carruthers, theater designer

Nicholas Delbanco, novelist and director of the Bennington Writers' Workshop

Bill Dixon, musician

Peter Drucker, management guru and writer

Paul Feeley, American painter

Francis Fergusson, French scholar and translator

Vivian Fine, composer

Claude Fredericks, poet

Buckminster Fuller

John Gardner, novelist

Martha Graham, dancer

Lucy Grealy, poet and writer

Clement Greenberg, art critic and historian

Richard Haas, artist

Edward Hoagland, writer

Stanley Edgar Hyman, literary critic (whose wife Shirley Jackson used settings in and around Bennington College in her famous short story "The Lottery")

Lyman Kipp, sculptor

Stanley Kunitz, poet

Ronnie Landfield, painter, (guest instructor) 1968

Bernard Malamud, novelist

Harry Mathews, poet, novelist, essayist

Donald McKayle, dancer and choreographer

Roland Merullo, author

Howard Nemerov, poet

Kenneth Noland, painter

Jules Olitski, painter

Mary Oliver, poet

Camille Paglia

Wendy Perron, dancer/choreographer

John Plumb, painter

Mark Poirier, novelist and short story writer

Jackson Pollock, painter; his first retrospective was held at Bennington in 1952

Larry Poons, painter

Theodore Roethke

Joel Shapiro, New York sculptor

Barbara Herrnstein Smith, professor and author

David Smith, sculptor

Michael Todd, sculptor

Glen Van Brummelen, historian of mathematics, former president of Canadian Society for History and Philosophy of Mathematics, founding faculty member of Quest University

Isaac Witkin, sculptor

Robert Woodworth, botanist and pioneer of time-lapse photography