Class of 2021
Betsy Chester
Betsy is an NYC-based freelance lighting designer, endlessly fascinated by the ways in which color and shadow can shape a story. She found her passion for lighting after registering for the wrong class and has been enchanted by its magic ever since. Betsy is passionate about creating work that sparks meaningful conversation. She finds inspiration in the way her collaborators experience the story. Having finished three years of grad school without a single cup of coffee, she finds that the energy of a rehearsal room gives her more than caffeine ever could.
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Sarah Thea Craig
Sarah Thea Craig began her career in NYC in 2009.
As Resident Costume Designer with New Chamber Ballet since 2013, her designs with the company have played on stages around the US as well as Germany, Italy, Guatemala, and Costa Rica. She has designed for Clubbed Thumb, The New Ohio, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Urban Stages, Gibney Dance, American Dance Festival, Lake Tahoe Dance Collective and the American Academy in Rome, Italy. Her passion for education led her to design and mentor students at Columbia University, Marymount Manhattan College, Stella Adler Studio of Acting, Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, The New School, and AMDA College and Conservatory. ST was honored to serve as a Teaching Artist with Roundabout Theatre Co. from 2016-2020.
ST is continually humbled by the power of the human form, especially in opera and dance. Dramaturgy, sunlight and sculptural explorations feed her soul and she is obsessed with hair as a marker of passing time.
Emmanuel Delgado
Emmanuel Delgado is a lighting designer based in New York City. He was born and raised in Puerto Rico. Emmanuel thrives in collaborative spaces and uses artistic expression to tell stories that inspire and connect audiences. He is excited to get more involved in Latino theater in NYC and beyond. Emmanuel has a passion for illuminating real stories that empower communities. He seeks opportunities to work in theater, musical theater, dance, opera and film. Emmanuel wants to explore new relationships within this field and take on new projects for artistic and personal growth.
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Camilla Dely
Camilla Dely is a costume designer and visual artist born and raised in South Africa. She came to theater through the scrappy, experimental performance world of Philadelphia, where she fell in love with movement improvisation and made original performance with wild, multidisciplinary collaborators. She is equally fueled by poetic texts and devised processes, and is interested in stories that concern the limits of our humanity, questions of violence + justice, and the stunning messiness of human beings. True loves include: charcoal, glitter, the floor, and the quirky, idiosyncratic stories we carry in our clothing.
She received her BA in Theater from Bryn Mawr College, and her MFA in Design for Stage and Film from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. She was a core company member at the Orchard Project in Hunter, NY, and an alum of Headlong Performance Institute in Philadelphia, PA.
Rhea Michelle Dsouza
Rhea D'Souza is a production designer originally from Mumbai, India with an innate desire to birth worlds by balancing the honesty of humanity with the magic of film making. An architect of dreams, she thrives in collaborations with multi-disciplinary artists, always allowing the story to guide her process.
After completing her undergraduate degree, she worked on Bollywood films like Gully Boy, A Death in the Gunj, Tumhari Sulu etc. and on commercials and photoshoots for brands like Nestle, Vogue, United Colors of Benetton etc. Currently based in New York, she has completed her MFA in Production Design from NYU Tisch School of the Arts (2021).
Tatiana Kahvegian
Tatiana is a set designer and visual artist based in Brooklyn, NY. She is originally from São Paulo, Brazil, and am of Armenian descent.
Before coming to New York, she worked as set designer, art director, and assistant art director in films, advertising, and TV series. Before that, she worked as an architect. And way before that, she built maquettes out of paper, scavenged household material, colored pencils, magic tape, and used Lego miniatures as scale figures.
Michael Lewis
Michael Lewis is a scenic designer for theatre, dance, and opera. He earned his Master of Fine Arts from the Department of Design for Stage and Film at New York University/Tisch School of the Arts. Recent productions include set design for Orpheus in the Underworld at Manhattan School of Music, and associate set design for Viktoria und ihr Husar at Stadttheater Bremerhaven in Germany.
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Yi-Hsuan (Ant) Ma
New York based Taiwanese, a scenic and production designer.
A member of Local USA829, IASTE.
Her theatrical installation work "Samuel" has been nominated as NOTABLE EFFECTS SHOW in Hewes Design Awards.
She is interested in exploring the relationship between characters and the environment, involving the audience's participation immersively in storytelling.
Coming from a different culture and background of literature training, her approach to design is interdisciplinary and inclusive.
Ana Novacic
Ana Novačić is a production designer based in New York. Originally from Yugoslavia, Ana has lived in several countries, including China, Cyprus, Sweden, and Ireland. Prior to completing her MFA in Production Design at NYU Tisch School of the Arts, she obtained her BFA in Scenography from the Brera Academy of Fine Arts in Milan, where she also studied painting, sculpture, and art history.
Ana is interested in projects centering on the human condition and the relationship between an individual and society. Her design process is rooted in the value of research, as she believes the aesthetic of any film is a reflection of the characters’ psychological realm, socioeconomic status, and identity.
Ana is a Shubert Scholar, a member of United Scenic Artists, Local USA 829 IATSE, and the Irish Society of Stage & Screen Designers.
Brynne Oster-Bainnson
Brynne Oster-Bainnson is a costume designer originally from Portland, Oregon. She is currently based in NYC.
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Yizhu (Nina) Pan
Yizhu (Nina) Pan is a China-born set and production designer currently based in New York City.
She is curious to challenge the mind beyond the reality and her approach to design is to convey the story and the hidden history through metaphor in order to establish the appropriate context.
Her background in textile design and mixed materials are an essential part of her interdisciplinary skillset, and she appreciates and embraces both risk and collaboration in the design process."
Eszter Retfalvi
Eszter Refalvi is a costume designer for film and live performances from Budapest, Hungary. She is interested in building worlds on the boundaries of our imaginations, and always finds her way back to nature as inspiration for her work. Ink and water color illustrations are a staple of her process. Not only a designer, she is a passionate artisan and fabricator with a special interest in fabric painting and natural dying. Never goes anywhere without a matcha tea.
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K Rudolph
K (she/they) is a freelance lighting designer in New York City and recent graduate of NYU Tisch School of the Arts with a Masters of Fine Arts in Lighting Design. They gravitate toward lighting work that lives in two extremes: she is as enamored with the community and experimentation of devised work and avant-garde theatre as she is with the high-octane rush and scale of industrials, concerts, and commercial theatre. The beauty and magic of light is that there’s no one way to use it to tell a story! K comes to the table full of ideas, lighting-based or otherwise, and is eager for her collaborators to do the same. There’s more excitement in what people of different minds and backgrounds can build together than what they can conjure alone.
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Dan Wang
Dan Wang is an international costume designer for film and stage. A fearless artist originally from China. She is currently working in New York City.Dan is a storyteller in heart, Blending drawing, collage and digital art in her process. She creates beauty from the time torn ordinary using layers and texture. She is never without a cup of coffee and will always find a way to bring the wind into her stories.
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Lukas Wassman
Lukas Wassmann was born in Duisburg, Germany. He finished his training in clothing making in Krefeld in 2010 before he started studying costume design with dramaturgy at the University of applied science in Hamburg in 2013, chair Reinhard von der Thannen, who he assisted several times. Before studying abroad in 2016 at the California State University Long Beach he assisted in Moscow, Hamburg, Berlin, Vienna, Zurich, and Salzburg in opera, musical, and film. He worked as a costume and scenic designer in Luxembourg, Hamburg, Berlin, Chemnitz, Bremerhaven, California and New York. Lukas lives in New York and Berlin.
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Corey Whittemore
Corey Whittemore is a lighting designer based in New York City and recently received his MFA in Lighting Design from New York University. He has always had a love for musical theatre and the fast-paced environment of working on large shows. Similarly, Corey enjoys collaborating on new works. Discovering how to tell a story for the first time while its form may still be shifting is always a thrilling experience. In addition to theatre, Corey enjoys exploring how lighting can be used to reinforce a narrative fueled by movement or music like in dance or opera. In his free time, Corey teaches himself new skills and plays chess.
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Teresa Williams
Teresa is a set and production designer originally from New Orleans, LA and currently based in New York City. Blending her heritage and background in architecture with a passion for storytelling, she loves creating new worlds and experiences that envelop audiences. Her design process always starts with a question: How can the story-spectator relationship be amplified? Teresa thrives in collaborative environments, creating rich, honest work with deep roots. Her hope is to design work that will connect with others on an emotional level while simultaneously providing an outlet for enjoyment. When not working, you can find Teresa catching a musical or on the search for delicious southern cuisine.
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Hsin Ho Yang
Hsin-Ho Yang is a production and scenic designer currently based in New York City, born and raised in Taiwan. Coming from the background of filmmaking, she thrives to work with the collaborators to create worlds by exploring the storytelling , finding the infinite possibility between frames.
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