Notables and Influencers

Advancement of Public Action

Liz Ahn Toupin

Liz Ahn Toupin was one of the country's first Asian American college deans. Her career at Tufts spanned a tumultuous period of societal, educational and institutional upheaval.

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Former deputy assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

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Gale Brewer '73

Borough president of the New York City borough of Manhattan who formerly served as a member of the New York City Council and as director of the Office of Federal Relations in the Dinkins administration, among her other positions in a long career of public service

Image of Judith Butler

Author of Gender Trouble, one of the most important works of philosophy and gender theory of the postmodern era

Image of Spencer Cox
1968-2012

Artist, performer, and AIDS activist whose work helped create the first effective drug protocols to combat the syndrome

Photograph © Walter Kurtz

Image of August de los Reyes
1970-2020

Principal design director for Xbox who is implementing a radical vision for Microsoft

Photograph © Chloe Aftel

Image of Alison Dennis

Leader in the development of sustainable business models, brands, and social movements

Image of Heather Dewey-Hagborg

AI Now Institute Art Fellow whose biotechnology art project, Lovesick, envisions love spread like a virus.

Image of Andrea Dworkin; Photo: John Cavanaugh
1946-2005

Feminist writer whose work was a lightning rod for the debate on pornography and censorship in the United States

 

Photo: John Cavanaugh

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First United Nations Independent Expert on Minority Issues and former executive director of Global Rights

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Princess Yasmin Aga Khan '73

Leading American philanthropist and fierce advocate for research into the causes and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease

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2019 TED Fellow and organizing director of Change.org and Coworker.org, transforming the way workers in today’s economy organize.

Image of Jennifer Mieres

Cardiologist and advocate for women’s health, heart disease prevention, and diversity in healthcare.

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Ahrin Mishan '86

Executive director of The Rita and Alex Hillman Foundation, a philanthropy dedicated to improving the lives of patients and their families through nurse-led innovation, and a member of the board of directors of the Brooklyn Academy of Music

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Oscar-nominated filmmaker whose work fuses social justice activism with virtual reality technology

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1934-2018

Trailblazing attorney who has spent a career working to highlight issues of gender bias in the legal profession.

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Elizabeth Pfister '43

Pilot who learned to fly during her freshman year at Bennington, graduated early to become a WASP in World War II, and was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor in 2010

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Founder of Voices UnBroken, a nonprofit dedicated to giving vulnerable young people opportunity for creative self-expression.

Image of Elizabeth Swados
1951-2016

Composer, writer, and director who fashioned a unique style of socially engaged musical theatre

Photograph © Jack Mitchell (New York Times)

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Ellen Taussig '66

Founder and former head of school of the Northwest School who has been recognized as a Changemaker by Global Washington for her current work as executive director of the International Leadership Academy of Ethiopia

Ujwal Thapa
1976-2021

Founder of Bibeksheel Nepali, a populist political party​ founded in the wake of Nepal’s 2015 earthquake

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A “legal rebel” and one of the architects of the SEC’s Whistleblower Program

Ben Underwood

Co-Founder and President of Resonant Energy, which brings solar energy to underserved communities. Fulbright scholar who studied biogas in China and recipient of Davis Projects for Peace Grant, with which he developed five urban biogas projects in Kathmandu.

Cultural Studies and Languages

Forest Abbott-Lum

Awarded Princeton-in-Asia fellowship to work on legal reform and energy issues in the fight against climate change with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Beijing. She now works for the NYC Compost Project 

Douglas Biow

Guggenheim fellow and professor of Italian and Comparative Literature at University of Texas at Austin

Photo of ​Ann Goldstein, Bennington College class of 1971

New Yorker editor, translator, and the public face of the secretive, critically acclaimed Italian author Elena Ferrante

Photograph © Peter Ross (Wall Street Journal)

Jeff Peer

Fulbright fellow who studies a form of 20th-century Mexican literary journalism, crónica urbana. Ph.D. Candidate in Comparative Literature at The Graduate Center of CUNY.

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Won a Fulbright to bring worldwide audiences face-to-face with current Chinese culture-makers

Ben Underwood

Co-Founder and President of Resonant Energy, which brings solar energy to underserved communities. Fulbright scholar who studied biogas in China and recipient of Davis Projects for Peace Grant, with which he developed five urban biogas projects in Kathmandu.

Dance

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Souleymane Badolo MFA '13

Bessie award-winning choreographer and dancer who, in 1993, founded his own Burkina Faso-based troupe, Kongo Ba Téria, which fuses traditional African dances with Western contemporary dance and is a central figure in the contemporary, emergent, experimental dance scene in Africa

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Patricia Birch Becker '50

Emmy, Tony, and Drama Desk Award-winning choreographer and director of musical theatre, film, and television whose work runs the gamut from performing in West Side Story on Broadway, directing Cindy Lauper and Rolling Stones videos, and choreographing numbers for Saturday Night Live

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Sandra Burton MFA '78

Lipp Family Director of Dance and senior lecturer in dance at Williams College whose choreographic work has been performed at Dance Theater Workshop, the Judson Memorial Church, Theater 4/Negro Ensemble Company, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, the Williamstown Theatre Festival, MASS MoCA, and venues in Nicaragua, Brazil, and the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago

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Improvisational performer, choreographer, and Senior Lecturer Emerita of Dance at Middlebury College 

 

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Hope Clark '87

Former performer and associate artistic director of Elizabeth Streb’s Ringside company, known for its athletic, gravity-defying choreography, whose own Bessie award-winning work has been performed at Danspace, Dance Theater Workshop, and other high-profile venues

Photograph © Lois Greenfield

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Winner of the Guggenheim and Doris Duke Artist Awards for her innovative dance performance and choreography

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1947-1996

Renowned choreographer of works performed by Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and the New York City Ballet

Image of Betty Ford
1918-2011

First Lady of the United States and a pioneering advocate for addiction treatment

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Risa Jaroslow '69

Dancer, choreographer, and founder of Risa Jaroslow & Dancers, who is dedicated to including diverse communities as participants and audiences, developing teaching techniques to engage dancers of all levels and people of all ages and abilities

 

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Eva Karczag MFA '04

Leader in the field of explorative methods of dance-making whose career spans creating original roles for the Trisha Brown Dance Company in the 1980s to recent collaborative, durational performance installations that have been staged in the United States and Europe

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Choreographer and award-winning filmmaker whose works have been shown nationally and internationally

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Jon Kinzel '90

Choreographer and visual artist whose recent show at The Chocolate Factory, Someone Once Called Me a Sound Man (2013), was named a Best of 2013 by Artforum magazine

 

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Curator, producer, poet, choreographer, and performance artist whose works #negrophobia (nominated for a 2016 Bessie Award) and Séancers have toured throughout Europe, appearing in major festivals. Recipient of a NYFA fellowship.

Photograph © Umi Akiyoshi

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Lisa Kraus '75

Dancer who has performed with the Trisha Brown Dance Company, choreographed for her own company and independently, taught at universities and arts centers, and written reviews, features, and essays on dance for a variety of publications

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Choreographer and MacArthur “Genius Grant” recipient with commissions from many prestigious institutions

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1929-2017

Director of the Brooklyn Academy of Music and founder of the Next Wave Festival, which gave artists like Merce Cunningham and Twyla Tharp audiences long before they became American icons

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Katie Martin '04

Choreographer, performer, teacher, and recipient of the national Jacob K. Javits Fellowship in Dance, having trained and performed under the direction of American Ballet Theater principal ballerina Karena Brock Carlyle

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Former principal dancer for the Bill T. Jones / Arnie Zane Dance Company and Bessie award winner

Photograph © Philip Habib

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Former principal dancer and current artistic director of the Limón Dance Company​

Photograph © Martha Swope

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Lisa Nelson '71

Bessie and Alpert award-winning dance-maker, improvisational performer, and collaborative artist who developed an approach to real-time editing, “attentionography,” and performance she calls Tuning Scores

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Co-artistic director of Bridgman | Packer Dance and 2008 Guggenheim Award winner

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Former Chair of Dance at Bard College and choreographer and dancer at the Judson Dance Theatre

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Wendy Perron '69

Member of Trisha Brown Dance Company in the 1970s, choreographer, former editor-in-chief of Dance Magazine, and author of Through the Eyes of a Dancer

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Lionel Popkin MFA '98

Choreographer whose work has been seen at venues including Danspace Project, REDCAT, and The Getty Center and who has danced in the companies of Trisha Brown, Terry Creach, and Stephanie Skura

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Bessie award-winning dancer with the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company

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Guggenheim, Bessie, and Alpert Award-winning choreographer and dancer

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2017 Guggenheim Fellow and creator of dances, video installations, and performance for The Kitchen, the Whitney Museum, and others. Recipient of a NYFA fellowship.

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Daniel Roberts MFA '14

Member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, performing a vast repertory, originating several roles, and appearing in several of Cunningham’s works for camera including Charles Atlas’s film Merce Cunningham: A Lifetime in Dance

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A former principal dancer at Twyla Tharp Dance, choreographer, and Guggenheim winner

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Harry Sheppard '69

Dancer and choreographer who worked with Andy De Groat, Bill T. Jones, David Gordon, and Wendy Perron and whose own choreography was presented at the Dance Theater Workshop and the 14th Street Dance Center in Manhattan

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Cathy Weis '70

Bessie and Guggenheim award-winning dancer, choreographer, and videographer, and the artistic director of Cathy Weis Projects

Photograph © Richard Termine

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Gwen Welliver MFA '09

New York Foundation for the Arts Fellow in Choreography and Bessie Award winning Performer for Sustained Achievement known for her longstanding work with some of the leading names in modern and contemporary dance, whose choreography has been staged at venues including Center for Performance Research, Dance Theater Workshop, La Ma Ma, Movement Research at the Judson Church, Museum of Arts and Design, and New York Live Arts

Drama

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Betty Aberlin '63

Actress, poet, and writer best known for her role as “Lady Aberlin” on the children’s television classic Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood and more recently in movies including Dogma, Jersey Girl, and Red State

Image of Alan Arkin
1934-2023

Award-winning actor who has appeared in some of Hollywood’s most iconic films, including Catch-22, Glengarry Glen Ross, Grosse Pointe Blank, Argo, and Little Miss Sunshine (for which he won a Golden Globe and an Oscar)

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Chairman and CEO of Village Roadshow Pictures who produced The Matrix trilogy and other blockbusters

Photograph © Michael Lewis

Image of Carol Channing
1921-2019

The original Broadway Dolly in Hello, Dolly! and matchless actress, singer, dancer, and comedian with a thousand-watt smile

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1968-2012

Artist, performer, and AIDS activist whose work helped create the first effective drug protocols to combat the syndrome

Photograph © Walter Kurtz

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Ubiquitous stage and screen star who has appeared in everything from the cult classic Diner to the critically acclaimed Sopranos and now stars in the popular CBS drama Madam Secretary

Image of Peter Dinklage

Emmy and Golden Globe-winning actor known best for his role as Tyrion Lannister on the hit series Game of Thrones

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Savannah Dooley '07

Screenwriter and television producer best known as the co-creator of the television series Huge

Image of Joel Marsh Garland

Stage, film, and television actor and director who is best known for his role in the Emmy award-winning Netflix series Orange Is the New Black

Liz Glotzer

President of King Size Productions whose Hollywood producing credits include The Shawshank Redemption

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Mandy Mishell Hackett '92

Associate artistic director of The Public Theatre in New York City, former founder and producer of The Underwood Theatre, which supported new work from emerging playwrights, and former literary manager and resident dramaturg at the New York Theatre Workshop

Lily Houghton

Playwright and member of award-winning Youngblood writers group. Resident writer at the Flea Theater. Recipient of Seattle Repertory Theatre’s emerging playwright commission.

Image of Jaamil Olawale Kosoko

Curator, producer, poet, choreographer, and performance artist whose works #negrophobia (nominated for a 2016 Bessie Award) and Séancers have toured throughout Europe, appearing in major festivals. Recipient of a NYFA fellowship.

Photograph © Umi Akiyoshi

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Founder of the Cleveland Public Theatre and winner of the 2012 Robert Bergman Prize

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Longtime arts advocate and co-founder of The Chocolate Factory, an award-winning incubator of experimental performance in Queens, New York

Photograph © Cassi Alexandra

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Alley Mills '73

Actress best known for her longtime roles on The Wonder Years and The Bold and the Beautiful

Sean-Patrick O'Brien

Theatre instructor at Providence College in Providence, RI. As a playwright, has workshopped at Horizon Theatre Company and The Playwrights' Center. His play ZAMBONI received an Honorable Mention in the American Playwright Foundation’s 2017 Relentless Awards.

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Sharon Ott '72

Leading figure in American theatre, former artistic director of Berkeley Repertory Theatre, and winner of a Tony award for outstanding regional theatre

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Shira Piven '83

Film director, producer, actor, acting teacher, and founder of New York’s Water Theatre Company who has overseen more than 20 stage and film productions

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Choreographer of the original Broadway Hair and countless stage and film productions

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The screenwriting genius behind the adaption of the bestselling Twilight saga and the hit shows Dexter and Jessica Jones

Photograph © Smallz & Raskind (Getty Images)

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Teya Sepinuck '72

Founder and director of the Theatre of Witness, whose performance projects have given voice to prisoners and their families, survivors and perpetrators of abuse and violence, refugees, immigrants, elders, and those who have lived through war

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Suzanne Shepherd '56

Founding member of the Compass Players along with Alan Alda and Alan Arkin ’55 in the 1960s, and actress best known for her roles in Goodfellas and The Sopranos

Image of Elizabeth Swados
1951-2016

Composer, writer, and director who fashioned a unique style of socially engaged musical theatre

Photograph © Jack Mitchell (New York Times)

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Emmy Award-winning actress known for playing strong characters in shows such as Two and a Half Men and in her one-woman play, Ann, based on Texas governor Ann Richards

Image of Justin Theroux

Actor, director, and screenwriter currently starring in the HBO series The Leftovers

Photograph © Smallz & Raskind (Getty Images)

Environment

Forest Abbott-Lum

Awarded Princeton-in-Asia fellowship to work on legal reform and energy issues in the fight against climate change with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Beijing. She now works for the NYC Compost Project 

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Award-winning journalist, United Nations communications consultant, and author of The Oyster War 

Photograph © Patrick O'Connor

Image of Alison Dennis

Leader in the development of sustainable business models, brands, and social movements

Jason Fridley

Named an “exceptional young scientist” for his work on the effect of climate change on invasive plant species

Image of Patricia Johanson

Environmental artist and Guggenheim winner whose work combines art, ecology, landscaping, and infrastructure

Image of Michael Pollan

Journalist and bestselling author who has raised the American consciousness of how food gets to our plates

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Kristina Stinson '92

Professor of environmental conservation at UMass Amherst and senior investigator at Harvard Forest who studies plants’ response to climate change, invasive species, and other ecological threats

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Peter White '71

Professor of ecology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and director of the award-winning North Carolina Botanical Garden

Literature

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Betty Aberlin '63

Actress, poet, and writer best known for her role as “Lady Aberlin” on the children’s television classic Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood and more recently in movies including Dogma, Jersey Girl, and Red State

Myrna Blyth

Former Editor-in-Chief of Ladies' Home Journal and current Senior Vice President of AARP 

Image of Summer Brennan

Award-winning journalist, United Nations communications consultant, and author of The Oyster War 

Photograph © Patrick O'Connor

Image of Judith Butler

Author of Gender Trouble, one of the most important works of philosophy and gender theory of the postmodern era

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Carolyn Cassady '44

Author of Off the Road: My Years with Cassady, Kerouac, and Ginsberg, and model for Camille in Kerouac’s Beat classic

Image of Spencer Cox
1968-2012

Artist, performer, and AIDS activist whose work helped create the first effective drug protocols to combat the syndrome

Photograph © Walter Kurtz

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Winner of the Man Booker Prize and National Book Critics Circle Fiction Award.

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Published his first novel, Less Than Zero, while at Bennington, and went on to critical acclaim for books like American Psycho and The Rules of Attraction

Photograph © Jeff Burton

Gretel Ehrlich, Bennington College class of 1967.

Essayist, poet, novelist, and recipient of the 2010 Henry David Thoreau Prize

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Gail Hirschorn Evans '63

Bestselling author of Play Like a Man, Win Like a Woman, former executive vice president of CNN, and before that a key player in the creation of the Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity and the 1966 Civil Rights Act during the Johnson Administration

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Elizabeth Frank '67

Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer of the poet Louise Bogan and the painters Jackson Pollock and Esteben Vicente whose writings on literature and art have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Art in America, The Nation, and ARTnews

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James Geary '85

Deputy curator of the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University, former editor of the European edition of TIME magazine, and author of I Is an Other: The Secret Life of Metaphor and How it Shapes the Way We See the World

Photo of ​Ann Goldstein, Bennington College class of 1971

New Yorker editor, translator, and the public face of the secretive, critically acclaimed Italian author Elena Ferrante

Photograph © Peter Ross (Wall Street Journal)

Image of Arlene Heyman

Practicing psychiatrist and psychoanalyst and author of the critically acclaimed book of short stories, Scary Old Sex

Photograph © Dan Callister

Glenn Horowitz
Glenn Horowitz '77

Rare-book dealer who brokered the sale of important archives such as the papers of Norman Mailer and Don DeLillo and the Watergate notebooks of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein

Photograph © Mark Mahaney

Image of Judith Jones

Introduced the world to Julia Child, James Beard, and Madhur Jaffrey as senior editor and vice president of Alfred A. Knopf

Photograph © Landon Nordeman

Image of Jaamil Olawale Kosoko

Curator, producer, poet, choreographer, and performance artist whose works #negrophobia (nominated for a 2016 Bessie Award) and Séancers have toured throughout Europe, appearing in major festivals. Recipient of a NYFA fellowship.

Photograph © Umi Akiyoshi

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Joan Hutton Landis '51

Poet, author of That Blue Repair, and chair of the liberal arts department at the Curtis Institute of Music

Image of Jonathan Lethem

Writer whose work in many genres have won him spots on bestseller lists, a National Book Critics Award, and a coveted MacArthur “Genius Grant”

Photograph © Fred Benenson

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Screenwriter whose many credits include Good Morning, Vietnam, M*A*S*H, and Monk

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Scholar, writer, and biographer whose book Margaret Fuller: A New American Life won the 2014 Pulitzer Prize

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Thomas Matthews '75

Executive editor and regular contributor for Wine Spectator magazine

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Investigative reporter, writer, and contributor to The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, and other national outlets

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Kathleen Norris '69

Guggenheim award-winning poet, writer, and author of several New York Times bestsellers, including Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith

Image of Michael Pollan

Journalist and bestselling author who has raised the American consciousness of how food gets to our plates

Image of Roxana Robinson

Award-winning novelist and biographer of Georgia O’Keeffe

Photograph © Christopher Bierlein

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Poet and essayist, and winner of the Guggenheim and a Whiting Writers’ Award

Photograph © Matt Valentine

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Founder of Voices UnBroken, a nonprofit dedicated to giving vulnerable young people opportunity for creative self-expression.

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Suzanne Shepherd '56

Founding member of the Compass Players along with Alan Alda and Alan Arkin ’55 in the 1960s, and actress best known for her roles in Goodfellas and The Sopranos

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Julieanne Smolinski '05

Writer for GQ, McSweeney’s, Jezebel, Vulture, and New York Magazine and the television series Sirens and Gracie and Frankie, who was declared one of the “funniest women on Twitter” by The Huffington Post

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Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Goldfinch and one of TIME’s 100 most influential people of 2014

Photograph © Beowulf Sheehan

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Anne Waldman '66

Acclaimed poet, co-founder with Allen Ginsberg of the celebrated Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, recipient of the American Book Award’s Lifetime Achievement and a Guggenheim fellowship, and chancellor of the Academy of American Poets

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Elizabeth Richter Zimmer '66

Former dance editor of The Village Voice whose writings about dance, theatre, and books have appeared in New York’s Metro and the Philadelphia Inquirer

Music

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Lead singer of the Grammy-nominated Spin Doctors, best known for their album Pocketful of Kryptonite

Photograph © Paul La Raia

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President and CEO of the New York Philharmonic

Photograph © Mathew Imaging

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Joan Hutton Landis '51

Poet, author of That Blue Repair, and chair of the liberal arts department at the Curtis Institute of Music

Chris Lombardi

Cofounder of Matador Records, the indie record label behind Liz Phair, Sleater-Kinney, and other music icons

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Singer-songwriter and YouTube sensation whose “Song a Day” project has made him a media darling

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The performing powerhouse behind Sylvan Esso and the folk trio Mountain Man

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Ahrin Mishan '86

Executive director of The Rita and Alex Hillman Foundation, a philanthropy dedicated to improving the lives of patients and their families through nurse-led innovation, and a member of the board of directors of the Brooklyn Academy of Music

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Lisa Sokolov '76

Jazz vocalist, improviser, composer, and originator of Embodied VoiceWork, a vocal improvisation method of music therapy which she teaches at The Experimental Theater Wing at New York University

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Michael Starobin '79

Tony award-winning orchestrator for some of Broadway’s most innovative musicals, including Assassins and Next to Normal, and for films including The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Tangled, and Chicago

Image of Elizabeth Swados
1951-2016

Composer, writer, and director who fashioned a unique style of socially engaged musical theatre

Photograph © Jack Mitchell (New York Times)

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1934-2006

Experimental composer and influential music theorist

Photograph © Rick McGinnis

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Grammy-winning American composer hailed by The New Yorker as “one of the most successful woman composers of all time”

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Susannah Waters '86

Opera singer who performed principal roles in many of the world’s leading opera houses, award-winning novelist, and producer and director of critically acclaimed theatrical productions

Science and Mathematics

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Patricia Cronin Adams '64

Former president of the New England Pediatric Society, fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, and winner of the 2001 Franklin Rogers Award for her contributions to pediatric causes by the New Hampshire Pediatric Society

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Staff software engineer at Raptive, where he is utilizing AI to build tools to help online creators grow their businesses to the next level. While a student at Bennington College, he won two Vermont Hackathons, developing apps to take on issues of student engagement and food access.

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Judith Schneider Bond '61

Evan Pugh Professor Emeritus and former chair of the department of biochemistry and molecular biology at Penn State University and past president of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology and the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

Image of Barrie Cassileth

Chief of the Integrative Medicine Service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center

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1970-2020

Principal design director for Xbox who is implementing a radical vision for Microsoft

Photograph © Chloe Aftel

Image of Heather Dewey-Hagborg

AI Now Institute Art Fellow whose biotechnology art project, Lovesick, envisions love spread like a virus.

Jason Fridley

Named an “exceptional young scientist” for his work on the effect of climate change on invasive plant species

Image of Devin Gaffney

Developer at Boston-based market intelligence platform Crayon and scholar whose work focuses on behavior adoption— modeling the emergence of opinions with groups of people.

Image of Joan Hinton
1921-2010

Physicist on the Manhattan Project, which developed the atom bomb, and later a committed Maoist

Carlos Mendez-Dorantes

PhD candidate and a Ford Foundation Fellow at the City of Hope, where he studies the formation of cancer-associated genetic abnormalities.

Image of Jennifer Mieres

Cardiologist and advocate for women’s health, heart disease prevention, and diversity in healthcare.

Image of Max Nanis

Computational biologist, artist, and programmer dubbed a “digital rock star” by The New Yorker. CEO and Founder of General Health Inc.

Image of Güvenç Özel

Director of the IDEAS Lab at UCLA and winner of a NASA competition to design habitation on Mars

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Dushyant Pathak '85

Associate vice chancellor for technology management and corporate relations at UC Davis, with a background in Fortune-500, publicly traded, entrepreneurial, and startup companies

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Elizabeth Pfister '43

Pilot who learned to fly during her freshman year at Bennington, graduated early to become a WASP in World War II, and was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor in 2010

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Jeanne Poduska '85

Deputy director and principal research scientist at American Institutes for Research who has worked at the intersection of public health, prevention, and education

Image of Mike Rugnetta

Composer, programmer, and host of the PBS web series Idea Channel

Photograph © Carolyn Cole

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Neurobiologist named one of America’s “Innovative New Scientists” by the National Institute of Mental Health

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Boaz Sender '07

CEO of Bocoup, a company that creates open tools and workflows used in the global marketplace

Society, Culture, Thought

Liz Ahn Toupin

Liz Ahn Toupin was one of the country's first Asian American college deans. Her career at Tufts spanned a tumultuous period of societal, educational and institutional upheaval.

Image of Priscilla Alexander

Founder of Protravel International and Travel Weekly Lifetime Achievement Award recipient

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Christopher Bishop '72

TECxTimesSquare board member and expert on “improvised careers”—nonlinear, multi-modal paths that help people succeed in the global borderless workplace—whose own résumé ranges from session musician to IBM executive

Image of Judith Butler

Author of Gender Trouble, one of the most important works of philosophy and gender theory of the postmodern era

Image of Andrea Dworkin; Photo: John Cavanaugh
1946-2005

Feminist writer whose work was a lightning rod for the debate on pornography and censorship in the United States

 

Photo: John Cavanaugh

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Gail Hirschorn Evans '63

Bestselling author of Play Like a Man, Win Like a Woman, former executive vice president of CNN, and before that a key player in the creation of the Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity and the 1966 Civil Rights Act during the Johnson Administration

Image of Arlene Heyman

Practicing psychiatrist and psychoanalyst and author of the critically acclaimed book of short stories, Scary Old Sex

Photograph © Dan Callister

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Listed among the Best CEOs of the 2016 All-America Executive Team

Image of Gay Johnson McDougall

First United Nations Independent Expert on Minority Issues and former executive director of Global Rights

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Thomas Matthews '75

Executive editor and regular contributor for Wine Spectator magazine

Image of Ellen McCulloch-Lovell

President of Marlboro College and a central figure in the Clinton White House in the 1990s

Image of Kay Crawford Murray
1934-2018

Trailblazing attorney who has spent a career working to highlight issues of gender bias in the legal profession.

Eric Ramirez-Ferrero

Public health activist tackling reproductive health issues in Tanzania and Mozambique for leading NGOs

Image of Victoria Sammartino

Founder of Voices UnBroken, a nonprofit dedicated to giving vulnerable young people opportunity for creative self-expression.

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John Sheldon '77

President of First Beverage Financial and leading investment banker who has honed his expertise in mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, restructurings, and strategic partnerships in top positions at Peter J. Solomon & Company, Lazard, and Goldman Sachs

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Sally Liberman Smith '50

Founder of the Lab School, a groundbreaking program for children with learning disabilities, and a leading expert in special education

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Ellen Taussig '66

Founder and former head of school of the Northwest School who has been recognized as a Changemaker by Global Washington for her current work as executive director of the International Leadership Academy of Ethiopia

Ujwal Thapa
1976-2021

Founder of Bibeksheel Nepali, a populist political party​ founded in the wake of Nepal’s 2015 earthquake

Visual Arts

Image of Ralph Alswang
Ralph Alswang '87

Photographer for Newsweek, Reuters, and, for eight years, at the White House as the President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton’s official documentary photographer

Image of Kevin Alter
Kevin Alter '85

Founder of the award-winning firm Alter Studio architects, and Wm. S. Marvin Hall of Fame for Design Excellence inductee. Leading educator and critic, and associate director of the Center of American Architecture and Design at the University of Texas at Austin

Image of Brooke Davis Anderson
Brooke Davis Anderson '84

Executive director of Prospect New Orleans and former deputy director of curatorial programming at The Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Image of Peter Barnet

Senior Curator, Medieval Art and The Cloisters at The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Image of Holly Block
1958-2017

1958-2017

Executive director of The Bronx Museum of the Arts and co-commissioner of the U.S. Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale

Photograph © Heuichul Kim

Image of Dan Cameron
Dan Cameron '79

Founder and artistic director of Prospect New Orleans, senior curator at the New Museum in New York from 1995 to 2006, and an independent curator whose work has brought to the spotlight some of the most inventive contemporary artists of the 1990s and 2000s

Image of Cora Cohen
1943-2023

Artist whose paintings, drawings, and altered x-rays engage with American and European abstraction

Photograph © Paula Gillen

Image of Susan Crile

Artist whose politically charged works are in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim, and others

Photograph © Constance Kheel

Image of Maj Anya DeBear
Maj Anya DeBear '07

Textile designer and artist who is assistant designer at Mara Hoffman, who has developed textiles for Pierre Frey, Liberty of London, and other brands

Image of Arjun Desai
Arjun Desai '88

Award-winning architect whose firm, Desai Chia Architecture, was rated among the top 100 design firms by House Beautiful

Image of Heather Dewey-Hagborg

AI Now Institute Art Fellow whose biotechnology art project, Lovesick, envisions love spread like a virus.

Image of John Diebboll
John Diebboll '78
1956-2010

Principal designer for renowned architectural firm Michael Graves & Associates whose whimsical designs for fantasy pianos were published as a book, The Art of the Piano, in 2000

Image of Judith DiMaio
Judith DiMaio '72

Dean of the School of Architecture and Design at the New York Institute of Technology, member of the prestigious College of Fellows of the American Institute of Architects, and winner of the Rome Prize in Architecture

Image of Andrea Fiuczynski
Andrea Fiuczynski '85

Executive vice president and chairman of the Americas division of Sotheby’s, an international art auction house, and former president of Christie’s Los Angeles

Image of Helen Frankenthaler
1928-2011

Pioneer of color field painting and one of the most influential artists of the past half-century

Image of Anna Gaskell
Anna Gaskell '92

Photographer named one of the Best and Brightest by Esquire in 2003, whose work is in the collection of MoMA and has appeared in exhibitions at the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao

Photograph © Bernd Arnold

Image of Kathy Halbreich

Associate Director of The Museum of Modern Art and curator of countless groundbreaking shows

Photograph © Peter Ross

Image of Maren Jenkins Hassinger
Maren Jenkins Hassinger '69

Multimedia artist who creates sculpture, installation, performance, and video art that engages questions of race and gender, and director of the Rhinehart School of Sculpture at the Maryland Institute College of Art

Image of Patricia Johanson

Environmental artist and Guggenheim winner whose work combines art, ecology, landscaping, and infrastructure

Image of George King
George King '77

Museum director who has held top positions at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, the Katonah Museum of Art, the American Federation of Arts, and, currently, at the Mystic Arts Center

Image of Sally Mann

Boundary-pushing contemporary photographer and critically acclaimed memoirist

Image of Matthew Marks

Founder of one of the top U.S. art galleries, top-flight contemporary artists from Jasper Johns to Nan Goldin

Image of Margaret Newman
Margaret Newman '74

Architect, urban design champion, and executive director of the citizen’s group, Municipal Art Society of New York City

An image of Jonah Nigro's work.

Visual artist and digital wizard who creates illustration, animation, and interactive design for global brands

Image of Odili Donald Odita

Abstract painter whose work held a prominent position in the 52nd Venice Biennale exhibition

Image of Güvenç Özel

Director of the IDEAS Lab at UCLA and winner of a NASA competition to design habitation on Mars

Image of Raphael Rubinstein
Raphael Rubinstein '79

Poet, art critic, former senior editor at Art in America, and recipient of the Chevalier in the Order of Arts and Letters by the French government

Image of Tom Sachs

Willy Wonka-esque creator of sculptural installations

Photograph © Arrested Motion

Image of Cathy Weis
Cathy Weis '70

Bessie and Guggenheim award-winning dancer, choreographer, and videographer, and the artistic director of Cathy Weis Projects

Photograph © Richard Termine