Staff + Faculty

Johannes Goebel, Director

Johannes Goebel joined Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute as director of the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) in July 2002. He holds a tenured position as professor in the Arts Department and in the School of Architecture.

Goebel is the founding director of the Institute for Music and Acoustics at the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie (ZKM) in Karlsruhe, Germany. The ZKM is a center for art and media and a forum for international exchange that combines art with research in engineering, science and art. Johannes Goebel brings to EMPAC his experience as composer, producer, and mentor of intermedia art and interdisciplinary research.

As EMPAC's director, Goebel worked closely with the building designers to shape the final stages of the buildings design; and conceives, implements, and manages its artistic programming.

Goebel relates advanced technology to the arts, works with Rensselaer’s artists in electronic media, and with researchers in traditional academic disciplines who are interested in research and scholarly collaborations with artists.

S. Argeo Ascani, Associate Curator, Music

S. Argeo Ascani is a musician, educator, and curator dedicated to exploring the sonic unknown in all its forms. He has been active creator of new works, engaging in every step from conception and development to presentation and documentation. Prior to joining EMPAC, he could be found performing internationally as both a soloist and as a chamber musician. Argeo has lectured at conservatories and universities on topics such as experimental compositional techniques and new music performance practice. In 2006, he joined the Music History department at the Manhattan School of Music and in 2008 joined the Contemporary Performance Program. Argeo holds a master’s degree in music from the Manhattan School of Music.

Victoria Brooks, Curator, Time-Based Visual Arts

Victoria Brooks is a curator and producer working primarily with artists’ moving image and multidisciplinary performance. Prior to joining EMPAC in 2013, Brooks was a London-based independent curator, co-founding the itinerant curatorial platform The Island, co-curating Serpentine Galleryʼs artist-cinema program (2009-13), and producing Canary Wharf Screen (2011-13) for Art on the Underground. She was also adjunct curator for ARTonAIR.org in New York, and in 2011 initiated a yearly series of performance, film, and music events for the Calder Foundation.

Recent projects include Stages in the Revolution, Whitstable Biennale, Kent; 19 Minutes and Cellophane, Calder Foundation, New York; Martin Creed, Sketch, London; Studio Sessions: Haroon Mirza and Hannah Sawtell, ARTonAIR and Clocktower Gallery, New York; Interpretation: Lili Reynaud-Dewar, Performa 11, New York; CINACT, Serpentine Cinema (including Laure Prouvost, Dara Birnbaum, Agnes Varda, Ben Rivers, Clio Barnard, and Redmond Entwistle, among others) London; Studio Dispatches, Art Dubai Projects, UAE and International Project Space, Birmingham; and Taverna Especial, 3rd Marrakech Biennale, Morocco.

Ash Bulayev, Curator, Dance + Theater

Ash Bulayev is a curator and producer who for the past 10 years has worked with a broad range of European institutions at the cross-section of performing arts, new media and research in collaborative processes.

From 2002-11, he was the Artistic Director of amorphy.org, a collaborative umbrella for experiments in the fusion of performing arts and old/new media. In 2006-07, he was the project initiator and research director for the EU Culture 2000 funded project i-MAP (Integration of Media and Performance) in collaboration with leading media arts organizations in the Netherlands, Germany, Greece and Bulgaria. In 2009-10 he co-commissioned a UK Arts Council funded CO-OS Platform, a global network of alternative financial models for creative and artistic production. In 2007-08, he was the programming consultant for PALLAS, one of the largest performing arts venues in Greece, programming artists such as Diamanda Galas, Hotel Pro Forma and Jan Fabre. Outside the arts sector, he was a project-based Creative Director for a wide spectrum of advertising and design firms in Europe and the US. He holds an MA in theater from DasArts, an internationally acclaimed graduate program from the Amsterdam School of the Arts.

Emily Zimmerman, Assistant Curator

As assistant curator at EMPAC, Emily Zimmerman has spearheaded commissions, curated exhibitions such as Uncertain Spectator and Slow Wave: Seeing Sleep, and organized EMPAC’s film series, Cinematic Chimera and The Eternal Return, as well as its ongoing lecture series, Observer Effects: Conversations in Art and Science. Prior to joining EMPAC in 2008, Zimmerman performed various roles for adventurous nonprofit arts organizations in New York City and Philadelphia, including Location One, Creative Time, Eyebeam, InLiquid, and the Institute of Contemporary Art. While living in Philadelphia, she curated several exhibitions and wrote for Art Matters. She holds a BA from New York University’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study, and an MA from the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College. Zimmerman was voted best emerging curator by Metroland in 2010, and was recently named a Loris Ledis Curatorial Fellow by BRIC Contemporary Arts. She blogs at http://www.museumofmonday.com/.

Founding Curatorial Team

Kathleen Forde,

Curator, Time-Based Arts

Hélène Lesterlin,

Curator, Dance

Micah Silver,

Curator, Music

Geoff Abbas,

Director for Stage Technologies

Eric Ameres,

Senior Research Engineer

Dave Bebb,

Senior System Administrator, Network

Peter Bellamy,

Senior Systems Programmer

Mick Bello,

Video Engineer

Eric Brucker,

Lead Video Engineer

John Cook,

Box Office Manager

David DeLaRosa,

Production Technician

Zhenelle Falk,

Artist Services Coordinator

William Fritz,

Master Carpenter

Kimberly Gardner,

Manager, Administrative Operations

Michele Genovesi,

Guest Services Coordinator

Laura Gypson,

Production Administrative Coordinator

Ian Hamelin,

Project Manager

Ryan Jenkins,

Event Technician

Shannon Johnson,

Design Director

Pamela Keenan,

Production Technician

CathyJo Kile,

Business Manager

Carl Lewandowski,

Production Technician

Eric Chi-Yeh Lin,

Lead Stage Technician

Stephen McLaughlin,

Event Technician

Jason Steven Murphy,

Communications Specialist

Candice Sherman,

Business Coordinator

Avery Stempel,

Front of House Manager

Jeff Svatek,

Audio Engineer

Dan Swalec,

Master Electrician

Stephanie Tribu-Cromme,

Event Technician

Todd Vos,

Lead Audio Engineer

Peter Wargo,

Manager of Information Systems

Michael Wells,

Production Technician