Travis Preston is Artistic Director of the CalArts Center for New Performance (CNP) and Dean of the CalArts School of Theater. He directs theater and opera throughout the world, and was awarded Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French Minister of Culture for "contributions to the arts in France and throughout the world." He directed the world premiere of Fant?mas: Revenge of the Image at the Wuzhen Theatre Festival in China, as well as Sam Shepard 's Buried Child for the 40th anniversary season of the Hong K ong Repertory Theater.
For CNP he directed the critically acclaimed Prometheus Bound at the Getty Villa, Gertrude Stein 's Brewsie and Willie , and the acclaimed production of Macbeth at REDCAT, which toured to the Almeida Theatre, London, and then Sydney and Adelaide.He has been Resident Director at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge and Associate Artist at the Yale Repertory Theatre and Center Stage, and Associate Director of the American Ibsen Theater. He is also a noted theatre educator, having taught at Yale, Harvard, Columbia, NYU, the National Theater School of Denmark, Indiana University, and Hong Kong Academy for the Performing Arts.
Kris Yao, Hon. FAIA
Founder/ Architect, KRIS YAO | ARTECH
Kris Yao, Hon. FAIA, founded KRIS YAO | ARTECH in Taipei in 1985 and established a Shanghai office in 2001. The firm currently employs more than 160 professionals, and is one of the most important architecture practices in the Asia-Pacific region.
Throughout his 30 years of practice, Mr. Yao has received numerous awards and recognitions, including the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the College of Environmental Design at the University of California at Berkeley in 2005, the “National Award for Arts” in 2007, and the Honorary Fellowship from the American Institute of Architects in 2014. Mr. Yao’s works have been widely published in international magazines, architectural journals, and many of his monographs, including the most recently published three-volume monograph KRIS YAO | ARTECH selected works 30x30 by UED, Beijing.
Mr. Yao’s portfolio demonstrates years of practices in commercial, hospitality, civic, transportation, spiritual, and educational design. His architecture integrates function with culture and history, presenting a unique approach that celebrates the spirit of the locality. The AIA recognize him as an architect who “demonstrates his humanity with the development of physical elements that hold true to human emotion and conditions, cultural and historical context, and a sense of scale and place. His architecture has a poetic nature, using his native eastern aesthetic and spirituality with a sense of natural light, interplay of surfaces and forms and executing all with a high level of innovation and professionalism.”