“It pretty much shows the spectrum of what 91����Ƶ offers in four years,” said Stauffer, who majored in digital media.

Stauffer created the with Adobe After Effects, a software program he learned to use in an intensive course taught by , professor of . The project got off to a promising start during Stauffer’s student internship with , during which he was encouraged to pursue his interest in animation that began in Holsopple’s class. After Stauffer finished his coursework in December, 2012, 91����Ƶ hired him to finish the job.

“I really enjoyed it, despite how long it took. It was a great, great process and I learned a lot,” said Stauffer, who spent so many hours working on the project this winter that he didn’t bother counting them.

Stauffer now works at a hotel in Harrisonburg while juggling a number of freelance design projects. Eventually, he hopes to freelance full-time, putting to use the audio, web design, photography, video and animation skills he developed as a student in 91����Ƶ’s visual and communication arts program.

The department is becoming one of 91����Ƶ’s most popular programs. Enrollment in the four majors offered through by the VaCA department (art, communication, digital media and photography) is more than 100, about double the number enrolled six years ago. One reason for the growth in popularity, Holsopple said, is the fact that very few small Christian universities offer majors in either photography or digital media. VaCA’s synthesis of fine arts and technology education also appeals to prospective students.

“We’re not just teaching you technology, and we’re not just teaching you fine arts,” Holsopple said. “[Students] are going to get a radically better education than if they’re off in one field or the other.”

As the program’s popularity has grown, so has its stature. Increasingly, Holsopple said, prospective students are considering 91����Ƶ’s VaCA program along with highly regarded art and design programs at places like the or the .

The university has also made substantial investment in keeping current with professional-level software and equipment to ensure that graduates take strong technical skills to the job market.

Stauffer expressed appreciation for the way VaCA faculty members help students identify and deepen specific interests – both technically and artistically. Holsopple also credited his colleagues on the VaCA faculty with creating a program that offers students a unique opportunity to develop critical-thinking skills, in addition to technical ones.

“[Our] students have something to say, instead of just being technically astute. I think that some schools are more concerned that they know how to use technology,” Holsopple said. “We are equally or more concerned about how they think about the world.”

Conrad Yutzy and Justin Roth, students in the Visual and Communication Arts (VaCA) students at 91����Ƶ, will open the shows in the Margaret Martin Gehman Art Gallery in University Commons.

Yutzy combines interviews with digital media and stained glass sculpture to provide powerful insight into the nexus of spirituality and sexuality.

Roth’s digital photography and collage on matte paper explores how action impacts identity. “My work visually represents the idea of how our actions form who we are,” says Roth. “Our actions define us, our hands are the tools that create action.”

Admission to the gallery is free.

Full schedule of exhibits

March 17:

Conrad Yutzy,”The Other Side”: Mixed-media installations

Justin Roth, “Formed”: Digitally-collaged portraits

March 24:

Katie Weaver:  Photos under the macro lens

Laney Garcia:  Underwater photography

March 31:

Katie Landis, cinemagraphs

Kayci Detweiler, collaged illustrations

April 14:

Travis Duerksen: Digital media

Chris Stauffer: “Selah”: A digital animation

Corey Martin: Cinemagraphs

Chelsea Kight, Installation with paintings (in the Hartzler Library Gallery)

April 21:

Kelby Miller: The Consu(M3)d Project – photography and digital media

Erica Lehman: The Consu(M3)d Project – paintings

Susan Alexander: The Consu(M3)d Project – animation

In addition, there will be a group installation drawing.