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Designmatters at Art College of Design
For more information, contact:
Vice President and Director, Designmatters Department
Mariana Amatullo founded the college-wide initiative Designmatters at Art Center College of Design, based in Pasadena, California in 2001 with a task force of faculty, chairs, staff and students. In her capacity as the lead of the program, she develops strategic educational partnerships and oversees a portfolio of research collaborations, communication campaigns, exhibitions and publications that enhance Art Center’s commitment to be at the forefront of international design education and contribute solutions to humanitarian issues of critical urgency. Through her leadership, Art Center is the first design institution to be formally affiliated with the Department of Public Information at the United Nations as a non-governmental organization (NGO); and a civil society organization member with the Organization of American States (OAS/OEA). The award-winning and tangible outcomes of the student projects that are developed under the mantle of Designmatters have established the program as an exemplary effort within the landscape of social impact design--uniting educational objectives with highly effective advocacy and action-oriented outcomes. Amatullo serves on a variety of advisory boards and networks engaged in the arts, design education and social activism, including Design 21 (in partnership with UNESCO) and Intelligent Mobility International (IMI); she is a founding member of the University of Southern California International Museum Institute and was part of the editorial committee for Beyond the Turnstile: Making the case for Museums and Sustainable Values (Altamira Press, 2009). Prior to joining Art Center in 2000, Amatullo pursued a variety of research and curatorial projects and held positions at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (1992-1996) and The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (1991). Mariana holds an M.A. in Art History and Museum Studies from the University of Southern California (1994) and a Licence en Lettres Degree from the Sorbonne University, Paris (1989). Her undergraduate studies included two years at l’Ecole du Louvre, Paris. Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and brought up internationally through the Argentine diplomatic corps, Amatullo lives in Pasadena with her husband and two boys.
Producer and Sr. Associate Director, Designmatters Department
Elisa Ruffino is Producer and Senior Associate Director of Designmatters, which partners with every discipline at Art Center to focus on design education with a social impact agenda. In this capacity, Elisa oversees management of Designmatters projects and initiatives—including trademark collaborations with United Nations agencies, international aid organizations, nonprofit businesses, and corporate entities—and is an active liaison among Art Center faculty, students and Designmatters partners to yield the program’s high-impact “real world” outcomes. Before joining Art Center, Elisa was a longtime member of the artist development team at Warner Bros. Records, and a professional landscape designer. Following her studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, she earned the title of Master Gardener from the University of California, Los Angeles.
An avid music and plant lover, Elisa spends her favorite Sundays gardening to vintage records played at high volume. |
