Sound Art Student Anthony Sertel Dean Receives The 2022 Campbell Award

Graduating Sound Art student Anthony Sertel Dean ’22 is among the winners of Columbia University’s prestigious Campbell Award. 

The Campbell Award is presented to one graduating student at each School, a student who demonstrates exceptional leadership and Columbia spirit as exemplified by the late Bill Campbell ’62 CC, ’64 TC, Chair Emeritus, University Trustee, and Columbia Alumni Association co-founder.

Sertel Dean is a hyper-collaborative artist, who, during their time at Columbia, has developed works for installation, radio, film, theater, and interactive media, working with collaborators from various programs throughout the University. Their creative interests include telephony, expressions and stories of self, plasticity of voice, interactions of culture and technology, land and space.

“[My] works exist as publicly as radio broadcasts and as privately as personal messages sent through a telephone, but they are all intended to bring listeners together,” Sertel Dean explains on their website: “There is an intention of support throughout my work: to support others, to support joy, support exploration, and revelation. I believe that is a way to form a greater community.”

Sertel Dean served as the 2021-2022 President of the Interdisciplinary Arts Council, a group representing students of all concentrations at the School of the Arts. With the IAC, Sertel Dean organized student events and directed funding toward student projects with the aim of fostering connections between artists across Film, Writing, Theater, Visual and Sound Arts.

Sertel Dean is also the Technical Director of the New York Neo-Futurists, an ensemble of multidisciplinary artists who create original work and artistic experiments fusing poetry, game, and performance art, rooted in their own lived experiences. They created the Neo-Futurists’ podcast ‘Hit Play,' now entering its third season. Each episode of ‘Hit Play’ features a new set of audio experiments, ranging from comedic to political, musical, or abstract. 

Whether within the School of the Arts community, or in the New York art scene at large, Sertel Dean’s collaborative approach to creative pursuits and their focus on projects that bring people closer together make them a unique but exemplary honoree.