Judy Mitoma, Director of the UCLA Center for Intercultural Performance, has received the 2003 John D. Rockefeller 3rd Award for her many outstanding contributions as an educator, artist, scholar, producer, and arts advocate. The award is presented yearly by the Trustees of the Asian Cultural Council to an individual whose work has influenced how Asian performing arts are presented and understood in the United States and worldwide.

Mitoma, who is also Professor of Dance in the UCLA Department of World Arts & Cultures, is a dance ethnologist and dancer by training whose areas of specialization are Java and Bali in Indonesia and Japan. She founded and served as Chair of World Arts & Cultures from 1982-1997, establishing full departmental status for the program in 1995. She worked on the 1984 Olympic Arts Festival and served as a co-curator of the 1990 Los Angeles festival with Peter Sellars. Independently directing several Asian Performing Arts Summer Institutes (APASI) in 1977, 1979, 1981, 1984 and 1988, she has brought many artists from Asia to the UCLA campus.

Mitoma was Director of the World Festival of Sacred Music - Los Angeles in 1999 and 2002. "The Art of Rice Traveling Theatre," a performance work Mitoma recently developed with APPEX artists, toured Hawaii and California in fall 2003. In addition, Mitoma is Editor-in-Chief of a publication/DVD "Envisioning Dance on Film and Video," (2002, Routledge) and ?A href="http://www.wac.ucla.edu/cipPub.php">Narrative/Performance Cross Cultural Encounters at APPEX,?(Regents of the University of California, 2003).

For additional information on Judy Mitoma, see http://www.wac.ucla.edu/cip/JudyMitoma.html.

About the UCLA Center for Intercultural Performance (CIP)

The UCLA Center for Intercultural Performance (CIP) was established by Mitoma in 1995 to support research, creative experimentation, documentation, and public outreach for the UCLA campus. Under her leadership, UCLA/CIP has launched three major initiatives: The Asia Pacific Performance Exchange Program (APPEX), funded by The Ford Foundation; The UCLA National Dance/Media Project, funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts; and a Humanities Residency Fellowship program with the Rockefeller Foundation.

For additional information on the Center for Intercultural Performance (CIP), see http://www.wac.ucla.edu/cip/index.html.

About the Award

The John D. Rockefeller 3rd Award is presented yearly by the Trustees of the the Asian Cultural Council to an individual from Asia or the United States who has made a significant contribution to the international understanding, practice, or study of the visual or performing arts of Asia. This $30,000 award for outstanding professional achievement commemorates the deep and long standing interest of John D. Rockefeller 3rd in Asian art and culture.

Candidates for the John D. Rockefeller 3rd Award must be nominated by artists, scholars, and others professionally involved in Asian art and culture. Recipients are selected by the trustees of the Asian Cultural Council in consultation with various specialists in the candidates' fields as well as with qualified individuals having firsthand knowledge of the nominees' professional activities and accomplishments.

The award enables recipients to pursue work in some aspect of the arts of Asia through international travel and research. Individuals from Asia and the United States who are active in any field of the visual or performing arts of Asia, whether affiliated with an institution or working independently, are eligible for award consideration. Funds for the Award are made possible by an endowment gift to the Asian Cultural Council from The JDR 3rd Fund.

Previous Recipients of the John D. Rockefeller 3rd Award:

  • 1986 John M. Rosenfield
    Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Professor of Fine Arts, Harvard University
  • 1987 Jos?Maceda
    Chairman, Department of Music Research, College of Music, University of the Philippines
  • 1988 James R. Brandon
    Professor, Department of Drama and Theatre, University of Hawai'i at Manoa,
  • 1990 Sherman E. Lee
    Former Director, The Cleveland Museum of Art
  • 1991 Chou Wen-chung
    Director, Center for U.S.-China Arts Exchange, Columbia University
  • 1992 Kapila Vatsyayan
    Director, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi
  • 1993 Donald Richie
    Film critic and writer, Tokyo
  • 1995 Setsu Asakura
    Stage designer, Tokyo
  • 1996 Ma Chengyuan
    Director, Shanghai Museum of Art
  • 1997 Beate Gordon
    Arts consultant and writer
  • 1998 Nguyen Van Huy
    Director, Vietnam Museum of Ethnology, Hanoi
  • 1999 Proeung Chhieng
    Dean, Faculty of Choreographic Arts, Royal University of Fine Arts, Phnom Penh
  • 2000 Ellen Stewart
    Founder and Artistic Director, La MaMa Experimental Theater Club, New York
  • 2002 Yang Meiqi
    Founder, Guangdong Modern Dance Company, Guangzhou

For additional information on the Asian Cultural Council, see http://www.asianculturalcouncil.org/index.html.

Published: Wednesday, February 25, 2004