Stories

Please join the Department of Art and Art History in welcoming Jonathan Calm, our resident artist for the Winter 2026 quarter. Jonathan is the fourth Lucas Artist Fellow of the Montalvo Artist Residency Program, a collaboration between SCU’s Department of Art and Art History and the Montalvo Arts Center in Saratoga. He will share his time between SCU and Montalvo; while on campus, he will be producing work and mentoring students in Professor Moro’s Intermediate Film Photography class as they create original pieces in response to his own gallery installation in the Dowd Building.

We invite you to engage with Jonathan’s residency through several upcoming events. You can stop by the Visiting Artist Studio in Dowd 218 to meet him and see the students' progress during open studio hours on Wednesdays, January 21, January 28, and February 4, from 10:30 AM to 12:00 PM. Additionally, Jonathan will offer an in-depth look at his research and creative practice during an Artist’s Talk on Thursday, February 5. The residency will conclude with a collaborative exhibition and reception in the Art and Art History Gallery on Wednesday, February 18, from 3:00 to 4:30 PM, where the community can view the student responses alongside Jonathan’s work.

Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, Calm was shaped by the density and rhythm of the city. When he joined the faculty at Stanford University in 2015, the vast expanse of the American West with its open skies, mountains, deserts, and long highways was largely unknown to him. Encountering its sublime beauty, he became aware of both the freedom of movement and the fraught legacies that continue to shape who can move freely across this land. His exploration of the West evolved into a personal and historical inquiry, considering what it means to travel through spaces that have offered refuge to some while denying access to others.