Save Our Block: Public Art/Humanities & Activist Print Culture in Baltimore
This discussion will focus on the collaborative and collective work discussed in the article "Save Our Block: Public Humanities, Zines, and the Connecting the Classroom" in The Routledge Companion to Publicly Engaged Humanities Scholarship (Routledge, 2024)
Markele Cullins is an interdisciplinary artist from Baltimore, MD currently based in Los Angeles, CA. They received their BFA from the University of Maryland Baltimore County and are currently an New Genres MFA candidate at UCLA. They explore and ask questions about the human condition through play, experimentation, and embodied research. Grounded in the Black radical imagination, their practice creates spaces for catharsis and contemplation. Cullins was a founding member of Oak Hill Center for Education and Culture, and co-founded 4C Gallery, an online gallery for artists of color. They also collaborate with communities and students as a designer to create zines preserving Baltimore public history.
Nicole King is a professor in the Department of American Studies and co-director of the Orser Center for Public Humanities at UMBC in Baltimore, MD. Her research focuses on issues of place, power, and the tensions between historic preservation and economic development. She is an editor of the book Baltimore Revisited: Stories of Inequality and Resistance in a U.S. City (Rutgers University Press, 2019 - which features a photo by Cullins on the cover) and co-founder of the Baltimore Traces: Communities in Transition public humanities project. She is currently working on The Ungentrifiable City, a book project focusing on a history of holdouts–the residents and small business owners who challenge extractive development on Baltimore's westside from the 1970s to today.
This event is open for full participation by all individuals regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, or any other protected category under applicable federal law, state law, and the University's nondiscrimination policy.
]]>Save Our Block: Public Art/Humanities & Activist Print Culture in Baltimore
This discussion will focus on the collaborative and collective work discussed in the article "Save Our Block: Public Humanities, Zines, and the Connecting the Classroom" in The Routledge Companion to Publicly Engaged Humanities Scholarship (Routledge, 2024)
Markele Cullins is an interdisciplinary artist from Baltimore, MD currently based in Los Angeles, CA. They received their BFA from the University of Maryland Baltimore County and are currently an New Genres MFA candidate at UCLA. They explore and ask questions about the human condition through play, experimentation, and embodied research. Grounded in the Black radical imagination, their practice creates spaces for catharsis and contemplation. Cullins was a founding member of Oak Hill Center for Education and Culture, and co-founded 4C Gallery, an online gallery for artists of color. They also collaborate with communities and students as a designer to create zines preserving Baltimore public history.
Nicole King is a professor in the Department of American Studies and co-director of the Orser Center for Public Humanities at UMBC in Baltimore, MD. Her research focuses on issues of place, power, and the tensions between historic preservation and economic development. She is an editor of the book Baltimore Revisited: Stories of Inequality and Resistance in a U.S. City (Rutgers University Press, 2019 - which features a photo by Cullins on the cover) and co-founder of the Baltimore Traces: Communities in Transition public humanities project. She is currently working on The Ungentrifiable City, a book project focusing on a history of holdouts–the residents and small business owners who challenge extractive development on Baltimore's westside from the 1970s to today.
This event is open for full participation by all individuals regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, or any other protected category under applicable federal law, state law, and the University's nondiscrimination policy.
When Shaniah Reece ’23, information systems, now a Ph.D. student in computer science at Emory University, was navigating her academic journey at UMBC, there were times she felt like giving up. One evening, around 10 p.m. at night, she was exhausted and considering not submitting an important application. But then Michael Hunt, director of the McNair Scholars Program, with which she was affiliated, gave her a call.
“He said, ‘There are two hours left, and I haven’t seen any indication that you’ve submitted it,’” Reece relates. “I could hear his family and the TV in the background—he was off the clock, at home—but he still made that call. That moment was so impactful because he thought about me, believed in me, and pushed me in a moment when I was too weak to push myself.”
It’s just one example of the many times that Hunt ’06, applied mathematics, Ph.D. ’25, language, literacy, and culture, has shown up for students in just the ways they need. Since 2019, Hunt has directed the federally funded UMBC McNair program with a goal of empowering students from underrepresented segments of society to earn research-based doctoral degrees. Not only does he support the 30 students who enter the full program each year—he’s worked hard to extend opportunities to affiliated students, through a program now called the Retriever Graduate Preparation Network, and to spread the supportive culture of the McNair program across the university as a whole.
On October 29, Hunt’s contributions will be recognized when he receives the 2025 Outstanding Staff award from UMBC’s Alumni Association Board of Directors.
From l-r: McNair Scholar Nogaye Khady Wade, McNair coordinator Antoinette Newsome, McNair Scholar Noor Huma and Michael Hunt at the American Educational Research Association annual meeting in 2023. (Photo courtesy of Hunt)
What makes Hunt such an effective mentor? For one thing, he asks students what they need and makes their voices and experiences a central part of his relationship with them. He strives to support them holistically, including emotional, cultural, and academic support. He wants the mentor-mentee relationship to be reciprocal, to honor the value of the mentee’s contributions, and to extend into a wider network of community support.
The approach, called holistic critical mentoring, has been central to the McNair Scholar’s Program under Hunt’s leadership. Hunt even wrote his Ph.D. dissertation on the subject and his interviews of former McNair scholars showed how much they valued the mentoring philosophy.
“I am one of the many UMBC students whose trajectory was forever changed by Dr. Hunt’s mentorship,” says Ting Huang ’21, psychology, the program coordinator for UMBC McNair Scholars Program and a former scholar herself. “I didn’t know my path until I stumbled onto McNair as an undergraduate. Through the program, I conducted research virtually for the first time during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the remote nature of those years, I had never felt more connected to a community. That sense of belonging was cultivated by Dr. Hunt and his team, showing how intentional leadership can overcome even the most isolating circumstances.”
Hunt says the experience of reaching out to current and former McNair program participants to request their help supplying information for his dissertation research was ultimately very gratifying. He wondered how many would respond, given their busy schedules, but a large number were eager to engage.
“I was genuinely surprised, I didn’t expect that number of responses. But then my mentor pointed out: That’s what happens when you build relationships,” Hunt says.
Michael Hunt with his family at the Black and Latine/x Celebration and Awards in spring 2025. (Brad Zeigler/UMBC)
Hunt says the continued support of program alumni makes him feel like he is making a difference. He’s happy that former participants, some as far away as California, regularly offer to serve as volunteer mentors for current students.
This summer, Hunt had the opportunity to sit in on the dissertation defense of one of the first students to go through the McNair Scholars Program under his watch.
“It’s wonderful to see these alums thriving,” Hunt says. “We are building community. And while we stood on the shoulders of giants, we’re making sure to also be the shoulders that others can stand on next.”
Mark your calendars for the 2025 Alumni Awards on Wednesday, October 29, at 6 p.m., and consider joining the UMBC community at the Chesapeake Employers Insurance Arena to celebrate Michael Hunt and the many remarkable individuals receiving awards. The event will be livestreamed for those unable to join in person. You can learn more at alumni.umbc.edu/alumniawards.
]]>Inside the dark, swirling chaos of a cell, drama unfolds. A viral molecule, rendered in electric blue and menacing curves, attempts its invasion. A therapeutic compound swoops in to intercept it like a fighter jet defending its home from alien forces. This is not science fiction; it is the meticulously crafted vision brought to life by Cameron Slayden '99, interdisciplinary studies, founder, CEO, and creative director at Microverse Studios.
Slayden's team of animators specializes in creating detailed, stunning visuals for biotech, pharmaceutical, and medical device companies, illustrating how their technologies operate at the most granular level—on a cellular and molecular scale. "We never copy other people," says Slayden. Instead, his team embraces metaphor—visualizing neurons as jellyfish tentacles or lightning bolts—and superimpose that artistic aesthetic onto the scientific imagery.
It's not enough for Slayden to just be a 3D animator. He also needs to fully understand the science—satisfying practicing scientists with his two-minute animation while compelling venture capitalists to invest millions. "I have to balance clarity of message to reach multiple levels of audience with enough accuracy so that the underlying message is unimpeachable," says Slayden.
This unique balance of artistic flair and scientific rigor is the direct result of a path galvanized over three decades ago. For his pioneering work in scientific visualization, combining the rigorous inquiry of science with the persuasive power of art, Slayden is being recognized with an Outstanding Alumni award at the 2025 UMBC Alumni Awards on Wednesday, October 29. His career exemplifies the interdisciplinary spirit UMBC fosters, proving that to truly understand the world, one must be able to both analyze it like a scientist and appreciate it like an artist.
Even as a 16-year-old student at Suitland High School in Prince George's County, Maryland, Slayden was already balancing his passion for art with his love of science—but he had yet to discover how the two intertwined. At this time, Slayden had won multiple Gold Key awards, the highest regional prize in the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, a competition for students in grades 7-12, which, he admits, had given him a "hugely inflated ego." Then, during one biology class, inspiration struck while studying chloroplasts, the organelles in plant cells that are responsible for photosynthesis.
"The illustration in the textbook was awful, really ridiculous, extremely simplified," says Slayden.
Next to the illustration, however, was a cross-section of the cell created from a tunneling electron microscope, which creates images at an extremely small scale, down to resolving individual molecules. Immediately, Slayden began to notice differences between the illustration and the tunneling electron micrograph. That's when his pencil got to work. He began to sketch a more detailed illustration of the chloroplast that better represented the intricate details of the organelle.
"When I was done with that drawing, I remember realizing that that illustration had more value than just being pretty," says Slayden. "It carried real information about the world, and it was valuable to humanity in that way. And at that moment, I realized that was the kind of art that I wanted to do."
The rest of Slayden's life would be guided by that moment. From then on, he used every opportunity to hone his craft—to envision how each tiny detail would translate to paper.
"When you're drawing something, you're bringing it through your visual cortex and through all of the processing," explains Slayden. "Your brain is creating a three-dimensional model of the object in your head, and then you're bringing it out through your motor cortex onto the paper. You come away with a much deeper understanding of the thing that you were just drawing."
Around the same time Slayden was looking into colleges, something big was happening at UMBC. Earl and Darielle Linehan, with a deeply held belief in the importance of the arts in society, had recently made a generous gift to the university to establish the Linehan Artist Scholars Program. Slayden applied in the program's inaugural year and was then offered a full ride to UMBC as one of the first cohort of Linehan Artist Scholars.
Slayden seized the opportunity, working with his advisor, Stephen Bradley, to craft an interdisciplinary course load that seamlessly merged UMBC's stellar biology program with the visual arts curriculum. While the science courses provided the foundational accuracy, it was the friction in the art program that proved transformative.
"There was an artistic journey that I had to go through," says Slayden. "UMBC's art program forced me to dig deep and crack open my inner reservoirs of creativity and start to actually explore producing an emotional response in my audience."
Today, that emotional engagement is the key to the success of Microverse Studios, transforming dry scientific information into a memorable, persuasive story. However, the greatest impact UMBC had on Slayden and his career was not a class or a professor, but a fellow student—Olivia Rogers '99, psychology—now Olivia Slayden, his wife.
Following graduation, Slayden got a job doing medical illustrations for legal cases, but found the work to be "too dark and draining." He eventually landed the role of scientific illustrator at Science Magazine, creating medical illustrations for the publication and designing a dozen magazine covers. However, after three years, he realized, "I wasn't at the top of my game." At the same time, Olivia was also unhappy with her job. It was time for a change.
After Slayden received his master's degree in medical illustration from Augusta University in Georgia, he and Olivia founded Microverse Studios in 2005. Cameron serves as CEO and creative director, while Olivia serves as chief commercial officer.
Cameron Slayden '99
"I had no idea what I was doing running a business," says Slayden. "And in the intervening 20 years, I think I've kind of finally figured it out, at least for the most part."
Today, Microverse Studios is a full-service scientific and medical animation studio serving high-profile clients like Pfizer, National Geographic, Bausch + Lomb, and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) as well as notable startups like Elon Musk's Neuralink. Slayden and his team specialize in taking an idea and turning it into a deployment-ready video for a wide range of audiences, from research scientists to investors and venture capitalists, as well as healthcare providers.
Slayden attributes the studio's success to their commitment to staying on top of science and new animation technology. The shift to cloud rendering means complex, high-quality animation that once took a week to output can now be rendered in "literally an hour." Slayden also believes artificial intelligence will continue to play a larger role in the studio's work. Rather than viewing it as a threat, he sees AI as another tool at his disposal—the next evolution in how artists create their work.
Mark your calendars for the 2025 Alumni Awards on Wednesday, October 29, at 6 p.m., and consider joining the UMBC community at the Chesapeake Employers Insurance Arena to celebrate Cameron Slayden and the many remarkable individuals receiving awards. The event will be livestreamed for those unable to join in person. You can learn more at alumni.umbc.edu/alumniawards.
If you were unable to attend our October Assessment 365 event, you can watch the recording here.
This Google Drive folder contains Dr. Laila Shishineh's presentation, and the BCSSE first-year, transfer student, and older student summary reports.
After watching this video, please take our two question, 15 second evaluation, thanks!
Finally, if you are interested in presenting at a future Assessment 365 event, submit this brief form.
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