A renovated building at California State University, Bakersfield will now house the art and communications departments, potentially creating collaborative opportunities for their students.
CSUB hosted its grand opening of the Media Arts Center on Nov. 6. after a $7.5 million renovation to the former Performing Arts building. According to Robert Frakes, dean of the School of Arts and Humanities, the building would provide hands-on learning opportunities to art and communications majors, including The Runner staff.
“This building comes with cutting-edge technology. Our field, media and communications, is an ever-changing field, and our students need to know about the developments, and they need to be introduced to the technology, so they are up to date,” said Md. Abu Naser, the communications department chair.
The building, measuring over 11,000 gross square feet, includes exhibition spaces for art students to display their work and rooms for printing and photography.
“We were able to make some interesting steps forward without losing our historical focus on material and media,” said Jesse Sugarmann, the art department chair. “We have a digital output room for the first time, which is a room dedicated to digital printing, right next to a reconditioned dark room. It’s very historical ways of working with photographic media housed next to sort of contemporary ways of approaching it, and we really haven’t had that combination in the past.”
Sugarmann and members of the communications department say that the most exciting part about the new building is the possibility for exchanges between the art and communications programs.
“There’s a lot of opportunity for this building, the collaboration. As you see, we have art people here, too. Art is another inspiration source for us, and I’m sure they get inspired from us too,” said Joe Ren, associate professor of communications.
Jennifer Serrano Ramirez, the digital editor-in-chief for The Runner, said she looks forward to connecting with the art students, along with producing the Runner News Network and filming video podcasts rather than just audio. The building features two sound booth rooms and a Media Lab with a green screen for these purposes.
“We’ve never had a room that’s dedicated just to media production, so I’m excited for that,” said Serrano Ramirez.
Prior to the renovation, which began in July 2021 through funding for infrastructure and capital improvements funding, the communications department did not have a designated space on campus. Instead, communications courses were held in different buildings, such as the Business Development Center and the library.
Communication courses in the building will primarily take place in the Media Group Room and Computer Lab. Whereas traditional classrooms are set up with rows of seats, the classrooms in the building are arranged for students to discuss and work face-to-face.
“We can sit around, ask questions, share thoughts. In design, it’s really important to see each other’s work and talk to each other to get inspiration, not just sitting there listening to instruction,” said Ren, who teaches Design for Print and Online Media. “That’s the type of environment we want to create for students.”
There are also 14 offices in the building for full-time and part-time faculty, which Naser says is important since many communications courses are taught by adjunct faculty.
“My office was in the Business Development Center, and then our adjuncts were in DDH [Dorothy Donahoe Hall]. Now, we have an area where one of my colleagues is right across from me, and our adjuncts are right next to us,” said communications lecturer Bianca Moreno. “So, this gives us kind of a home where we can collaborate and also just feel more unity and more community as we’re in here.”
