THIS ENGINEER-ARTIST OPENS NEW WORLDS FOR STORYTELLERS.
Jeff Burke
Class of 1999, M.S. 2001, M.F.A. 2010
When you鈥檝e created a play called 鈥淗omer in Cyberspace,鈥� received a Google Focused Award on 鈥淭he Future of Storytelling鈥� and taught courses entitled 鈥淏uilding Virtual Worlds鈥� and 鈥淧uppeted Architecture,鈥� you鈥檙e clearly a cutting-edge kind of academic. But although he鈥檒l just tell you that he 鈥渂uilds things,鈥� Jeff Burke, associate dean of technology and innovation at the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, is much more than that. Burke is a true digital trailblazer, traveling along the boundary between entertainment and digital technology 鈥� and shattering it. He has produced, managed, programmed and designed experimental performances, short films and new genre art installations for almost two decades, working with Intel, Cisco, Google and many others. Now, Burke鈥檚 penchant for building things is poised to influence all of cyberspace. He is co-principal investigator for the National Science Foundation鈥檚 Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering, where he will lead a team of UCLA researchers in developing a more robust and efficient Internet for the 21st Century.