John Casey
Professional Title: Professor, Chair of Animation and Motion Media
Areas of Academic Focus and Expertise:
Animation
Area of Work and Concentration at Lesley: Animation Department Chair
Representative List of Recent Courses Taught:
Concept Creation; Animation Projects I/II
Education: PhD, Philosophy, Fordham University (1975); MA, Philosophy, Fordham University (1966); BA, Manhattan College (1964)
Representative List of Recent Publications / Exhibitions:
- American Film Institute Fellowship
- Massachusetts Artists Foundation Fellowship
- New England Regional Fellowship (NEA)
- American Federation of Arts “Synthetic Movements”
- “NH Crossroads” (WNEH, public tv)
Fun Facts: I’m working on a book, a philosophical critique of the major concepts in recent physics; I love hiking in the hills of New Hampshire; I am a retired projectionist, International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and Motion Picture Machine Operators, Local 182; I especially like the later modernist paintings of Frantisek Kupka; all of Wassily Kandinsky and the philosophical writings of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Alfred North Whitehead; Some of my favorite film artists include Charlie Kaufman (“Adaptation”), Oskar Fischinger (“Radio Dynamics”), Peter Greenaway (“Prospero’s Books”), Ernie Gehr (“Serene Velocity”), Andrei Tarkovsky (“Solaris”), Alexsandr Petrov (“The Cow”) and Len Lye (“Trade Tatoo”).
For me, there is no one-size-fits-all in teaching. As a teacher I feel obligated to tune into the many different frequencies and empathize with the many different learning styles of my students. It’s not always easy. The “teacher” is someone who, using any of the myiad of approaches, with drama or stealth, induces the student to learn, to self-teach. Socrates considered himself a “midwife,” not a teacher in the lofty sense of one who dispenses knowledge.
http://aibanimation.typepad.com/