Experience the
Art of Change
Welcome to the
Arts Division
The UCSC Arts Division offers students a unique combination of visionary creativity, interdisciplinary collaboration, and a deep commitment to social and environmental justice.
Explore Our Departments
Events
“Cut/Woven/Spoken” Exhibition: Works by UCSC alumni Pilar Agüero-Esparza
“Cut/Woven/Spoken” Exhibition: Works by UCSC alumni Pilar Agüero-Esparza
Like Water: A Participatory Walk from the Edge of the City to the Sea
UCSC News
Art, Arts, Digital Arts & New Media
Art Confronts Climate: A Creative Force in the Environmental Conversation
Groundbreaking art and science collaborations are reimagining how we understand—and survive in—a warming world.
Arts, Film & Digital Media
American Film Institute tapped UC Santa Cruz scholar to determine the top television programs for 2025
Associate Professor of Film and Digital Media L.S. Kim joined critics, actors, producers, and writers on the American Film Institute’s Television Jury to formulate a list of the year’s outstanding television programs
Arts, Performance, Play & Design
Two UC Santa Cruz alumnae make their Off-Broadway debut
Rosie Glen-Lambert (Porter ’14, theater arts) and Hailey McAfee (Rachel Carson ’13, theater arts) make their Off-Broadway debut at Soho Playhouse from January 14 to February 13. The limited Off-Broadway engagement follows a sold-out run at the Hollywood Fringe Festival where the duo’s production received multiple honors.
Featured In The News
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How the Grinch went from a Yuletide bit player to a Christmas A-lister
“The economy is in big trouble, our political situation is chaotic, there’s a lot of hate — it’s no wonder that we would seek to express that through the embodiment of a monster like the Grinch,” said Michael M. Chemers, director of the Center for…
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‘Monster studies’ is a real thing — and it could help you through holiday anxiety
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Pianist Benny Green takes the stage alongside UC Santa Cruz Jazz Big Band on Dec. 7
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‘The SpongeBob Musical’ soars to great heights at UC Santa Cruz’s main stage
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UC Santa Cruz takes audiences under the sea with ‘SpongeBob Musical’
Division News
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Arts Division Welcomes New Faculty Members
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Shaping tomorrow’s visionaries: local high school students experience Art for All at UC Santa Cruz’s Institute of the Arts and Sciences
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These six documentaries are bringing social issues to light
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UC Santa Cruz foundry marks 50 years with bronze pour and celebration of legacy
Featured Faculty
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Arts Division Welcomes New Faculty Members
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UC Santa Cruz Division of Undergraduate Education appoints Soraya Murray as new Provost of Porter College
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John Jota Leaños selected as new Interim Dean of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for the UC Santa Cruz Arts Division
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Campus secures funding for innovative research projects addressing climate action and linguistic diversity
Featured Alumni
Featured Students
Featured Staff
Arts Division Event Highlights
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
We will not experience the full power of the arts unless access to the means of representation is available to all. And we will not realize the full power of the arts if our iconographies and methodologies are dictated by the very few. So, I am driven to expand access so that authorship, critique and the shaping of what we know can be driven by all, and what we take for granted or natural can shift, and to keep our definition of the arts, fervently open.