Lubars host Creative Fusion — a creative success!
Event chairs Madeleine and David Lubar hosted 320 guests at the sell-out Creative Fusion, a new, celebratory benefit event held Saturday, May 5, in the energetic and unique atmosphere of Wisconsin’s only independent college of art and design.
Guests enjoyed sensory and visual delights, including the 2007 Senior Exhibition, two silent auctions and a live auction conducted by a Sotheby’s auctioneer of works by nationally and internationally renowned artists and designers.
Among those attending were Governor Jim Doyle and Mayor Tom Barrett. Each received a personal tour of the senior exhibition with Painting major Casey Davidge ’07 and Industrial Design major Natalie Schraufnagel ’08, respectively, before joining exuberant guests in the painting studio turned elegant dining room.
Sharing his and his wife’s commitment to art and education, David Lubar welcomed guests and thanked them for recognizing that “the power of creativity has brought us together…”
“Just as creativity fuels the arts and design, creativity also fuels business, and almost everything that we do in our professional and personal lives,” he said.
“Nowhere is art and education more embraced than at MIAD – a vibrant educational and community resource that touches thousands of people of all ages and backgrounds each year,” said Madeleine Lubar.
Thanking guests “for supporting the college’s unique leadership role in fostering the creativity that transforms our world,” she exuberantly exclaimed to applause and cheers, “We are the Creativity College!”
After thanking the Lubars for their community leadership, Doyle extolled the contributions of the college and its alumni to the state and greater Milwaukee community, particularly the “80% of the college’s 2,300 alumni who live and work in the Wisconsin.”
He then introduced graduating senior Casey Davidge as “an example for her peers [who] continues to embrace MIAD’s spirit of service learning by donating a percentage of the sales of her artwork to Milwaukee’s Hope House [shelter].”
Davidge spoke passionately of the life-changing experience of MIAD’s unique service learning course requirement and the social responsibility of the artist to his or her community. Her thesis work and essay on Milwaukee’s and Chicago’s homeless individuals will appear in a social justice journal next spring. To read Casey’s remarks, click here.
Barrett continued the recognition of MIAD’s contributions to economic and civic vitality. He shared his admiration for Natalie Schraufnagel, who turned down offers to attend other art and design colleges and chose MIAD because of the unique educational opportunities it afforded her for success not only as a student, but in fulfilling her lifelong dream of becoming an industrial designer and owning her own business.
A self-described “inspiring inventor” motivated during a college trip to Italy by the Renaissance talents of Leonardo da Vinci, Schraufnagel described the collaborative effort among the college’s art and design majors that contributed to her recent receipt of an international student design award.
“The Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design is creating leaders with your financial support,” she told the attendees. “We will continue to welcome students with vision and goals, letting them know that MIAD is the college that YOU want to attend.” To read Natalie’s remarks, click here.
Among the many successes of the evening was a surprise auction announced by the Lubars to found the Creative Fusion Scholarship fund, which raised money for some of the 92% of MIAD students who receive financial aid.
