University of Texas at Arlington

Dr. August Jordan Davis is an art historian, curator, tenured Associate Professor, Director of The Gallery at UTA, and Chair of the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Texas at Arlington. Originally from Dallas, Dr. Davis has a BFA in Art History from UNT, with her graduate degrees from the UK: MA in Visual Arts in Contemporary Culture (Distinction), Keele University, and PhD in Art History from University of Liverpool. Dr. Davis was on faculty at universities in England from 2000 until 2019, when she moved to join the Maverick Community here at UTA. Her research specialisms include the art of North America and Western Europe of the 20th and 21st centuries, especially focused upon the convergence of art and politics, activist art, and feminist art and theory. Her doctoral research examined the photomontage projects of American artist Martha Rosler from 1965 – 2010. Dr. Davis has published in Third Text, including co-editing a special issue of the journal in 2015. She is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Visual Art Practice (Taylor & Francis) and is researching and writing about Contemporary Artists in the Age of Conflicts.

Julienne A. Greer is an Associate Chair of The Department of Theatre Arts and Dance, an Associate Professor of Theatre Arts and Dance; Social Robotics and Performance and BA Area Head, and director of the Emotional Robotics Living Lab with the Department of Theatre Arts and Dance, College of Liberal Arts at the University of Texas at Arlington. She earned a BFA in Drama from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and an MA in Media Arts from Texas Christian University’s Bob Schieffer’s College of Communication (formerly College of Communication). Dr. Greer earned a PhD in Humanities at the University of Texas at Dallas School of Arts and Humanities. She is Director of UTA’s Emotional Robotics Living Lab. Greer is a multi-disciplinary scholar + artist who conducts research, produces, directs, performs and writes for theatre and robotics disciplines. She brings a performance expertise based in method technique and multi-modal sensory data to interdisciplinary collaborations. Dr. Greer has presented and/or published papers at robotics conferences in Australia, United Kingdom, Portugal, and India She is co-author in the prestigious journals Aging and Mental Health, Assistive Technology and Liminalities. Dr. Greer was awarded a 2019 Outstanding Teacher Award from the College of Liberal Arts (CoLA). She is a recipient of the CoLA faculty award granting the purchase of “Pepper,” the emotional robot, for use in her interdisciplinary course at UTA, “Robots, Digital Humanities, and Theatre.” Dr. Greer is a Co-PI on a multi-year study with UTA’s School of Social Work and Georgia Technical University utilizing the social robots of her ERLL lab for positive health outcomes for young adults with developmental disabilities. Greer is a Co-PI for the NSF Research Experiences for Undergraduates grant collaborating with Disability Studies, Engineering and CoLA. She is the PI for an Interdisciplinary Research Program (IRP) grant titled “Using Arts and Social Sciences to Enhance Social Companion Robots’ Adaptive Abilities to Improve Health Outcomes.” The is Dr. Greer’s second IRP award, the first was awarded for a study titled: “Shakespeare and Robots: Examining the impact of a theatre intervention on psychological well-being in older adults”.

A new works dramaturg in dance and theatre, Jeanmarie’s current focus is in community-based devising as the dramaturg for the national #HereToo Project, which amplifies the voices of youth activists through performance. She publishes widely on the intersection of theory and practice, including essays about her studio work with dance trio AGA Collaborative, Children’s Theatre of Charlotte, and the Martha Graham Dance Company. Jeanmarie’s scholarly research addresses domestic space in contemporary performance. She is the editor of Teaching Critical Performance Theory in Today’s Theatre Classroom, Studio, and Communities (Routledge 2020), and co-editor of Teaching Performance Practices in Remote and Hybrid Spaces (Routledge 2022) with somatics practitioner Elisha Clark Halpin, and Teaching Writing in Theatre and Performance Studies: an Instructor’s Guide (Palgrave, forthcoming) with disabilities scholar Samuel Yates.

Jeanmarie embraces a team-based approach to scholarship, studio work, and teaching, and is most energized when co-creating. In 2020 she co-founded Prompt: a journal of theatre theory, practice, and teaching with two Penn State design grads; she edits the drama section of the International Journal of Education and the Arts; and before joining UT-Arlington in 2023, Jeanmarie developed team-based dramaturgy programs at Penn State and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Jeanmarie taught playwriting, critical theory, and post-colonial studies at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle where she was resident dramaturg for new works. Recent new works dramaturgy projects include Heather Raffo’s Tomorrow wIll Be Sunday, Steve Broadnax’s Bayard Rustin: Inside Ashland for People’s Light, and Steven Dietz’s Second Story Project for Children’s Theatre of Charlotte.

Dr. Martha Walvoord is an active performer and educator. Described by American Record Guide as “an enthusiastic and expressive player”, performances have taken Walvoord to China, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Spain, England, Costa Rica, and across the US. Her performance of the Beethoven Violin Concerto with the Qingdao Symphony Orchestra was described by the Qingdao Evening News as “very elegant, expressing well the music-king’s style.” Currently, Walvoord performs with the Dallas Chamber Symphony and has appeared with Texas Camerata and the Spectrum Chamber Music Series. Walvoord’s album, American Perspectives, is featured on Centaur records. Her latest album, The Diaries of Adam and Eve, a collection of duos for violin and double bass, was released on Albany Records in 2019 and features the works of Michael Daugherty, Tom Knific, Andrea Clearfield, Daniel M. Cavanagh, and George Chave.

In 2019, Walvoord received the President’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. Her former students hold teaching and orchestral positions across the US. In 2015, Walvoord was awarded a Faculty Development Leave to study baroque violin.

Originally from Michigan, Walvoord was the Concertmaster of the West Shore Symphony Orchestra in Muskegon, MI and held the position of Artist-in-Residence at Hope College in Holland, MI. At UT Arlington, Walvoord is Professor of Violin and Chair of the Music Department at UT Arlington.