Theater and opera director Peter Sellars working with students in the Princeton Atelier program, 1996.
The Princeton Atelier program was founded in 1994 by Toni Morrison, Nobel laureate and the Robert F. Goheen Professor in the Humanities Emeritus. The program brings professional artists to campus for intensive collaborative work with students and faculty. Collaborating Atelier artists select a project they want to explore and experiment with in the company of students before developing it for the professional art world.
Sellars said of his experience, “I want the students to see what it’s like to be a working artist. You get up in the morning, and there are no assignments. You’ve got to decide, what am I going to dedicate my life to on this day?”
Photo courtesy of the Lewis Center for the Arts