Whitman Stories

Meet Our Whitties is an occasional feature produced by the Office of Communications. It features a Q&A with students from across Whitman College.

With humor and humility, Eddy Vazquez ’15, a visual designer at Amazon, shared his journey with Whitman students. Vasquez’s talk at Fouts Center for Visual Arts was the second installment in the Visiting Alumni Artist Series. He encouraged his fellow Whitties to take advantage of the opportunities they have on campus and in the wider world, to gain experience and to develop a dynamic portfolio.

On a clear October day, students sit scattered across Ankeny Field, cross-legged with sketching notebooks balanced in their laps, using pencils, pens and colored pencils to capture the countless trees surrounding the grassy center of campus. It's a scene typical of any college campus art class. Except these students aren't just artists - they're budding scientists.

Maria Lux teaches courses in beginning, intermediate and advanced drawing in the Art Department at Whitman College. This spring, Lux will be teaching “Animals and Art,” a course that explores relevant issues regarding animals from an interdisciplinary perspective that includes historical and contemporary depictions of animals in art.

Peter Newland ’67 and Robyn Johnson have shared their love of artists’ books for nearly 25 years. Now, they are sharing that love — as well as their collection of dozens of the handcrafted works of art — with the Whitman College community.

When alumna Becca Gotz '14 graduated from Whitman she wanted to do something creative. This creative drive landed her in Seattle, Washington as an editorial stylist for Zulily, a global online retailer.

This spring, the Fouts Center for the Visual Arts is the site of a new arts program bringing bilingual first-graders from Edison Elementary School in Walla Walla to Whitman’s campus.

Art and music came together on Thursday, Feb. 28, 2019 in Chism Recital Hall. Audience members experienced a world of moving sketches and live music exploring anxieties around national security, immigration and ecological crisis, but also sharing messages of hope and resilience.

In February 2019, Whitman College held its first Community Processing Day, celebrating the software that allows anyone to create three-dimensional art using programming language.