2008 Career Night Participants

Visual

Susan Breen ‘91
Painter

 

Susan Breen is a painter, represented by Woodward Gallery in New York City, and is Art Editor of Post Road Magazine, which is currently being published by the Department of English at Boston College. Susan’s paintings have been exhibited in numerous venues including Woodward Gallery, the Islip Museum, P.T. Barnum Museum, Housatonic Museum of Art, Cahoon Museum of American Art, ArtSpace New Haven, Black Rock Art Center, City Lights Gallery, Aljira Center for Contemporary Art, Gallery at Classic Stage Company, Gale Gates Gallery, Reggio Gallery, Gallery at Roundabout, and the Huntsville Museum of Art. Susan was co-recipient of International Performing Arts’ 2006 Arts Leadership Award, and her artist bibliography includes reviews/articles published in Artnews, Art Knowledge News, the New York Times, and Paper Magazine, among others. “Remedy,” a solo exhibition of Susan’s paintings closed on November 1st at Woodward Gallery. Susan’s paintings can be viewed online at www.susanbreen.net.

 

 

Bill Chisholm ‘87

Painter

 

Bill Chisholm majored in theater and worked as a freelance photographer from 1985-2003. His primary photography work was with models and actors for advertising clients. He furthered his fine art studies at the Museum of Fine Arts School, Montserrat College of Art and various other private art instruction. He is now working as a full time oil painter specializing in still life and portraiture. He exhibits in Boston at Jule's Place Gallery and various other galleries throughout the country.

 

 

David Eberts ‘98

Filmmaker

David Eberts began his career in film as a child actor, starring in the 1988 period drama, Burning Secret, alongside Faye Dunaway and Klaus Maria Brandauer.  10 years later, he entered the world of documentary film, working as a camera assistant on several films directed by Dr. John Michalczyk for PBS.  After moving to Los Angeles in 1999 he joined Original Productions, a company newly formed by producer Thom Beers. Over a four year period at Original Productions, David worked on more than 18 documentaries produced for The Discovery Channel, serving as Director of Photography, Assistant Editor and Co-Producer.  In 2001, David was hired by acclaimed documentary directors, Malcolm Clarke and Stuart Sender, to Co-Produce Prisoner of Paradise. It was nominated for Best Documentary Film at the 2003 Academy Awards and won Best Documentary at the prestigious Grierson Awards in the same year.  David has also served as editor and co-editor on five projects for Montreal based Philms, Inc. including the feature films Hatley High, and Prom Wars.  He recently directed his first feature documentary film, Where the Water Meets the Sky, narrated by Academy Award winning actor Morgan Freeman.

Donnamarie Floyd ‘88

Creative Director

 

Tired of the long commute on the Mass Pike and the hours it took away from her three young sons, Donnamarie Floyd left her position as one of New England’s top digital effects Flame artists – and the world of BDA award winning projects from the likes of ESPN, Discovery Channel, HGTV, History Channel, TLC and Animal Planet – almost seven years ago, to form her own corporate and executive presentations company called ThelmaWorld.

 

Today, along with her writer-producer husband Jim, Donnamarie creates large scale presentations that play on stages in corporate destinations like Las Vegas, Chicago and Orlando, while also handling production and post-production on videos designed for internal communications, new product introductions and corporate training. Her client list includes some of New England’s better known companies – John Hancock, Teradyne, Staples and Kronos – as well as up-and comers like Insulet Corporation and other mid-market size corporations.

 

 

Kurt Hakansson '84

Interior Designer

 

Kurt is a principal of Haddad Hakansson, LLC providing full-service interior design to clients throughout New England and New York City.  With over 20 years of combined experience in the design field, partners Mark Haddad (’87) and Kurt Hakansson’s (’84) expertise complement a vast array of projects including space and color development, kitchen and bath design, furniture and fabric selection, custom window treatments, and the implementation and management of major remodeling and building projects.  Skilled coordination with architects, builders, and craftsmen assures attention to every detail of design. 

 

A Massachusetts native, Kurt received his B.A. in Business Management from BC in 1984.  Prior to beginning his own business in 2001, Kurt worked in banking and finance as well as designing and selling custom furniture at the Boston Design Center.  Having a combined financial / managerial and design background has uniquely prepared Kurt for the many challenges of being both a designer and an effective project manager and business owner.  Kurt is a classical flute player and is actively involved in arts education in the City of Boston where he serves on the Board of Directors for The Community Music Center of Boston.

 

Eric Luden ‘88

Photographer / Founder Digital Silver Imaging

 

Eric Luden recently founded Digital Silver Imaging, a dedicated black and white photo lab producing true black and white photos from digital files on silver gelatin papers.  Eric was former executive at Ilford Photo and a noted commercial and fine art photographer.  In the 1980s, he worked with a variety of clients and exhibited his black and white photographs throughout New England.  During the 90s, he served as a consultant with Eastman Kodak’s black and white division before joining Ilford, where he worked for over 12 years.  In 2006, he became the VP of North American Marketing for Ilford’s parent company, HARMAN technology.  He brings decades of print experience to Digital Silver Imaging, having worked with leading inkjet companies and traditional photo manufactures.  What’s more, he has worked closely with photographers, educators, and photo labs throughout his career.  Through Eric’s knowledge of silver gelatin papers, digital laser technology, and black and white printing, DSI is positioned to become the region’s premier digital black and white lab, serving photographers throughout New England and beyond.

 

Michele Meek ‘84

Filmmaker / Writer

 

Michele Meek pioneered the development of NewEnglandFilm.com, the premiere magazine and resource for indie filmmaking in the northeast in 1997.  She also founded Little Plum Pictures and directed several films including Red Sneakers, which is currently on the festival circuit, The Missing Flinck, a Boston 48 Hour Film Project; and the first in a series on women and sexuality, Conversations with Women.  Over the years, her expertise has spanned the film, publishing and web industries. Currently she is publisher and board member of the nonprofit Independent Media Publications which has re-launched AIVF's The Independent film magazine.  Respected as a young entrepreneur and champion of independent film, she received the 2005 Baldwin Award for Alumni Recognition in Film & Video by Boston College and the 2000 Image Award for Vision and Excellence by Women in Film & Video New England.

 

 

Michael Rossi ‘98

Filmmaker

 

Michael Rossi is a freelance filmmaker in Boston who has spent the last eight years working in public television. His career at PBS began in the Educational Programming department at WGBH Boston and he has done a variety of freelance production work on documentaries, feature films, television shows, music videos, and commercials in the Boston area.  His production credits for American Experience include: Building the Alaska Highway, The Gold Rush (winner of the 2007 Erik Barnouw Prize), and We Shall Remain, a five-part television series and multimedia project on Native American history set for broadcast in April 2009.  He also worked on The War That Made America, a four-hour PBS series about the French and Indian War.  Michael completed the B.A./M.A. program in U.S. History at Boston College, where he has guest lectured for the Black Studies course Eyes on the Prize.  Currently, Michael works on the Emmy and Peabody Award-winning television series Design Squad, an engineering competition show produced by the Children’s Programming Department at WGBH.

 

 

Bill Sterling ‘65

Architect

 

Bill Sterling graduated from Boston College in 1965 with a B.A. in economics, and Yale University in 1973 with a Master of Architecture degree.  Bill founded Cambridge based Sterling Associates Incorporated, Architects in 1980.  Sterling Associates is an architectural and interior design firm offering broad professional experience in a wide variety of building types, including institutional, educational, and residential use.  He has been designing and site supervising his own architectural design work since 1980 and has provided the design and project management of over 2,000,000 square feet of construction in both new and renovated facilities.

 

 

Literary

Erin Dionne '97
Creative Writer

Erin Dionne was an English and Communications major at BC, where she took creative writing from Elizabeth Graver and credits Prof. Bonnie Rudner's children's lit course with rekindling her love of those books. Erin Dionne's first novel for tweens, Models Don’t Eat Chocolate Cookies, will be released by Penguin's Dial Books for Young Readers on February 5, 2009. Pre-publication, the book has been chosen as a featured title for the spring 2009 Scholastic Book Fairs in both the United States and Canada. Erin has also written short stories--one of which, New Rollerskates, has been anthologized and will be featured on a new National Public Radio Program, DimeStories. When she's not writing, Erin is an Assistant Professor at Montserrat College of Art in Beverly, MA, where she teaches English and comp classes.

 

 

Maureen Dezell ‘75

Independent Writer / Editor

 

A veteran journalist and author, Maureen Dezell was managing editor of The Heights and editor of Stylus at Boston College. She has covered arts and culture for the Boston Globe, politics and women's issues for the Boston Phoenix and health care for Boston Business Journal. Author of the critically acclaimed Irish America: Coming Into Clover, she has contributed articles to WBUR-FM, ARTNews, The New York Times and The New Republic, among others. She teaches journalism at Emerson College.

 

 

Chuck Hogan ‘89

Author / Screenwriter

 

Chuck Hogan graduated with degrees in English and Film.  He sold his first novel at age 26, while working at a Boston video store.  Prince of Thieves, a novel about armored car robbers from Charlestown, was awarded the Hammett Prize for "literary excellence in the field of crime writing."  A film version is currently in production, to be directed by and star Ben Affleck.  In a departure from his crime novels, he is the co-author of The Strain, the first of a trilogy of horror novels due next summer, the result of collaboration with Guillermo del Toro, the Oscar-winning director of Pan's Labyrinth and the Hellboy movies.  His fifth crime novel, Sugar Bandits, will be published next fall.

Peter Keough '79
Film Critic, The Boston Phoenix

Peter Keough received his Masters in English from the University of Illinois Chicago(1985) and had previously graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts from Boston College in 1979. He is a noted film critic for The Boston Phoenix, WFNX, and The Chicago Tribune. Peter has also written for the Chicago Sun Times, Chicago Magazine, and the Chicago Reader. He has been the Film Editor of the Phoenix since 1989. He has received numerous awards, and is an elected member of the National Society of Film Critics, and the Boston Society of Film Critics. In 1996 he was awarded first prize for film criticism by the Association of Alternative Newspapers. He won first prize for entertainment reporting from the New England Press Association in 1993 and 2001, and a grant from the Massachusetts Artists Council for fiction in 1990. As a member of FIPRESCI, or the International Society of Film Critics, he has appeared on numerous film festival juries including Amsterdam, Istanbul, Toronto, Karlovy Vary, Thessaloniki, Stockholm and Turin, serving as president on many of these. He was the editor of the book Flesh and Blood: the National Society of Film Critics on Sex, Violence and Censorship, published by Mercury House Press in 1995. His writings have appeared in numerous anthologies, and he currently fulminates regularly on his blog on the Boston Phoenix website called Outside the Frame.

 

 

Tim Lemire ‘89

Writer

 

Tim Lemire is currently the Manager of Sales Force Communications at PartyLite, a direct sales company in Plymouth, MA. Over the past 20 years, Tim has been a newspaper editor, an English teacher, a freelance editor, and a Communications Specialist for Fidelity Investments. He has also written speeches for the president of Brown University and creative copy for Hasbro, the toy and game company. He has his MFA in creative writing from the University of Michigan, and in 2006, Writer's Digest Books published his career guide "I'm An English Major -- Now What: How English Majors Can Find Happiness, Success, and a Real Job," a book that grew out of his continuing work with Career Night and the Arts!

 

Performing

Laura Carlo '80
Morning Program Host, WCRB

Laura Carlo is WCRB's Morning Program Host, a job she has cherished for almost 13 years. "I love this music and even more, I love this job because I'm helping people make the connection of classical to their own life experiences. In these troubled times it is my privilege to remind folks of some of what people have created that is good and fine in this world." Before being named Host the Boston native and graduate of Boston College was WCRB's News Director and morning news anchor for which she won numerous awards for the station in several categories including Best News, Best Business Feature, Best Documentary, and Best Public Affairs Show. Ms.Carlo enjoys playing the piano, archery, cooking gourmet Italian and French and traveling with her husband and 7-year old son, the love of their life!

 

Chirs Cavalier ‘87
Theater Director

Way back in 1985, Chris founded The Contemporary Theater of Boston College. During his junior and senior years at BC, the student-run company staged 12 plays that stood in stark contrast to the social conservatism of the time, including David Rabe's Sticks and Bones, David Mamet's Sexual Perversity in Chicago, William Mastrosimone's Extremities and Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber's Jesus Christ Superstar. From 1987 until 2002, Chris produced, directed and wrote for the New York stage with the Zoo Theater Company and The Starving Class Theater. In 2004, he returned to his college stomping grounds to form the not-so-coincidentally named Contemporary Theatre of Boston. He launched the company with a unique production of Jean Genet's The Maids with performances in the salons of historic homes in Wellesley and Gloucester. In 1999, Chris also established a production company, Clockwork Films, and directed a period film adaptation of Nathaniel Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown.

 

Jere Shea '87
Actor / Acting Coach / Fundraiser

Jere Shea is a Senior Fundraiser for the MFA Boston having assisted in raising $504 million for the Museum’s recently completed capital campaign. Jere has also worked as a consultant in Boston College’s Advancement Office focusing on donor communications and administrative strategy. A classically trained professional actor, Jere has coached actors at every level for over a decade. He has served on the faculties of Emerson College and the College of the Holy Cross, and has lectured at Boston College. Shea has starred in Broadway productions including Guys and Dolls, Damn Yankees and Stephen Sondheim’s Passion (Theater World Award, Tony Award Nomination, Drama Desk Nomination). Film and TV credits include Passion (PBS), Path to Paradise (HBO), Law and Order, Bill Cosby’s Cosby Mysteries (NBC) and A Season in Purgatory (CBS miniseries) with Patrick Dempsey. Shea also starred with Donnie Wahlburg in the Boston based feature film SOUTHIE (Seattle Film Festival’s Best Film, 1998), and has narrated Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address with Keith Lockhart and the Boston Pops Orchestra. He also appeared in the Nova/PBS 2004 documentary film The Most Dangerous Woman In America.

 

 

 

Arts Administration

 

 

Erin Haran MaCurtain '01
Marketing Manager, From the Top

After graduating from BC in 2001 with a degree in English, Erin held positions in communications at the Massachusetts Cultural Council and in alumni relations at New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. Currently, she is the Marketing Manager at From the Top, a non-profit organization that showcases extraordinary young classical musicians through its NPR and PBS series. While at BC, Erin was a member of the BC Dance Ensemble and the University Chorale. One of the highlights of Erin's BC experience was spending a semester studying in London, where she interned at the Royal Opera House.

 

Michael Botte 
CFO of Celebrity Series in Boston 

The Celebrity Series is in its seventh decade of presenting the best in music, dance and the performing arts from around the world to culturally diverse audiences. Many internationally known artists have made their Boston debuts, and often their American debuts, through the Celebrity Series, including the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Yo-Yo Ma, Denyce Graves, Emanuel Ax, Cecilia Bartoli, Wynton Marsalis, and Luciano Pavarotti.  As New England’s premiere presenting organization, the Celebrity Series presents a broad range of multi-cultural and international artists and ensembles such as: Bernadette Peters, Patti Lu Pone, Audra McDonald, The American Ballet, The Bolshoi Ballet, The Kirov Ballet, The Berlin Philharmonic, The Vienna Philharmonic, and Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra to audiences in the greater Boston area.  Similar organizations to the Celebrity Series are Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Carnegie Hall and The Kennedy Center. His responsibilities include development and administration of all fiscal activities relating to the 40-50 events and the Series’ $6 million annual budget.  Michael also acts and was seen last season as The King in the The King and I at the Turtlelane Playhouse. Michael graduated Boston College with a BA in Economics & Political Science in 1984.  

Maureen Donovan '78

Museum Administrator/Curator

Maureen Donovan graduated from Boston College in 1978, majoring in Art History and English. A senior-year internship in the Department of European Paintings at the Museum of Fine Arts focusing on exhibition planning and management peaked her interest in museum work and in having direct experience with works of art. After graduation, she began working in the Registrar’s Office at the Fogg Art Museum as a brief respite before applying to graduate school for an advanced degree in art history. Quickly realizing she had found her niche, she has spent the last twenty-nine years at the Harvard University Art Museums and today heads the division of Collection Management. She is responsible for managing the acquisitions, loans, exhibitions, inventory, exhibition design and installation, collections care and art handling of over 250,000 works of art.

 

Andrew Russell '00
Manager of Corporate Sponsorships, Boston Symphony Orchestra

Andrew graduated from BC in 2000 with a degree in Theatre Arts and English.  During his undergrad, Andrew was a member of the Dramatics Society Board, University Chorale, worked in the scene shop, and acted in many Robsham Theatre Productions.  He also completed the Abbey Theatre Workshop, studying with Tomas MacAnna in Dublin. After graduation, Andrew moved to New York and worked at ABC Television as a member of their Integrated Marketing department, helping pioneer the art of product placement across multiple daytime, news and primetime series.  After moving back to Boston, he worked in the marketing department at WGBH, and helped with the national launch of the Curious George television series. Currently, he is the Senior Manager of Corporate Sponsorships at the Boston Symphony Orchestra, helping to sell and manage branded corporate relationships for the largest orchestral institution in the world.

 

 

 

Past Participants:

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

Career Night