Faculty

Full-Time Faculty

James MacDevitt is Associate Professor of Art History and Visual & Cultural Studies at Cerritos College, as well as the Director/Curator of the Cerritos College Art Gallery. In addition to co-founding the multi institutional SUR:biennial and initiating the collaborative Art+Tech Artist-in-Residence Program, MacDevitt has curated numerous exhibitions for the Cerritos College Art Gallery, including OVER/FLOW: Horror Vacui in an Age of Information AbundanceObject-Orientation: Bodies and/as ThingsArchitectural Deinforcement: Constructing Disaster and DecayAbstracted Visions: Information Mapping from Mystic Diagrams to Data Visualization, and Geo-Ontological: Artists Contemplating Deep Time. At Cerritos College, MacDevitt serves on the Hiring Standards committee and chairs the Committee on Art in Public Spaces (CAPS). He regularly teaches Art 100: World Art, Art 103: Modern and Contemporary Art), Art 105A: Pre-Columbian Art), Art 105B: Latin American Art), Art 113: Art, Science, and Technology, Photo 160: History of Photography, and he team teaches Art 125: Introduction to Visual & Cultural Studies with Dr. Boutin-Vitela and Professor Trager. MacDevitt has presented his original research at the Computers and the History of Art (CHArt) Conference at Birkbeck College in 2007 and the Just Futures Conference at Oregon State University in 2019. His essay, “The User-Archivist and Collective (In)Voluntary Memory: Read/Writing the Networked Digital Archive,” was included in Revisualizing Visual Culture (2010), and his essay, “The Ties That Un/Bind: On the Enigmatic Appeal of Meta/Data,” was featured in the catalog for MetaDataPhile: The Collapse of Visual Information at Cal State Fullerton’s Begovich Gallery (2012). Later this year (2020), his chapter “Generative Adversarial Networks: Contemporary Art and/as Algorithm” will appear in the academic collection of essays Algorithmic Culture, published by Lexington Books. MacDevitt holds a Masters in the History of Art from UC Riverside, where he previously served as Digital Media Associate at the UCR/California Museum of Photography and Assistant Director of the UCR/Sweeney Art Gallery.

Professors and students at conference

Professors Vitela, MacDevitt, and Trager with students Michelle Steele and Brian Lombera at the College Art Association Conference.

 

 

 

 

 

Julie Trager teaches Visual and Cultural Studies and is a member of the Art and Design, Women’s and Gender Studies, and Black/Africana Studies departments; and is associated with the Scholars Honor Program. She teaches the following courses: Art/Hum 108: Black Images in Popular Culture, Art/Hum 109: Gender and Sexuality in Art, Art 124: Introduction to Media Studies, Art/Hum 125: Introduction to Visual and Cultural Studies, Art/Hum 200: Special Topics in Visual and Cultural Studies, Art/WG S207: Women and Media, Hum 100: Art of Being Human, Hum/WGS 107: Men and Masculinities: Constructing Manhood in America, and WGS 101: Introduction to Women and Gender Studies. She is an UndocuAlly and Safe Zone Ally. She attended Rhode Island School of Design for her BFA and Bard College for her MFA.

Lisa Boutin-Vitela is Professor of Art History and Visual & Cultural Studies. She received her B.A. from Emory University and her M.A. and Ph.D. from UCLA. Her articles have appeared in the journals Word and Image and Women's Studies. Dr. Vitela has presented at many conferences and symposia, including at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Accademia Nazionale Virgiliana in Mantua, Italy, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston. She regularly presents lecture series at local museums including the Bowers Museum and Orange County Museum of Art (OCMA). Dr. Vitela was a co-organizer of the 2019 Cerritos College Florence Summer Study Abroad Program. She teaches Art 100, Art 101, Art 102, Art 107, Art/WGS 118, Art 125 (co-taught with Professors MacDevitt and Trager), and Art/Hum 200.

PART-TIME FACULTY

Karla Blackwood is an adjunct professor of art history, visual and cultural studies courses at Cerritos College and Santa Monica College. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Art and Master of Arts in Art History from California State University, Los Angeles.  A portion of her career was spent working in the education department of the California African American Museum and the Museum of Tolerance developing curriculum and public workshops to enhance the overall visitor experience.  Currently she teaches Art 100, Introduction to World Art and Art/Hum108, Black Images in Popular Culture. 

Angela Lessing is an adjunct instructor at Cerritos College teaching ART 105B: Latin American Art.

Carolyn Robertson, MFA is an adjunct instructor teaching ART 100: Introduction to World Art; ART 101: Art History I: Prehistory to Gothic; ART 102: Art History II: Renaissance to Rococo; ART 104: The Art of Africa; ART 105A: Latin American and Caribbean Art: Pre-Columbian; and, ART 105B: The Arts of Latin American and the Caribbean: Colonial to the Present. She has extensive speaking, writing, and curating experience in the fields of art history, art, and fashion. She conducted workshops with 16 of South Korea’s top fashion designers at the Korea Institute for the Fashion Industry (KRIFI) in Daegu where she presented lectures and workshops on topics related to art and fashion. Recently, she presented a lecture to the docents of the Gamble House in Pasadena on the interrelationship between the artistic and fashion influences of the landmark home during the decades it was occupied by the Gamble family. She earned her BFA at the University of Texas at San Antonio and her MFA at The Claremont Graduate University.

Fabiola Ruiz teaches ART 105A: Latin American and Caribbean Art: Pre-Columbian through the Cerritos College Dual Enrollment Program. She received her B.A. from the University of California, Santa Barbara and her M.A. from California State University, Long Beach. She specializes in Pre-Colonial Latin American art and architecture. Her research interests include semantics, postcolonialism theory, and teaching methods for multilingual learners. She enjoys giving tours at the Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach to audiences with no previous background in art history.