James DePreist Visiting Professor

Dr. Kiara Hill

James DePreist Visiting Professor | 

Kiara Hill earned her B.A. at Sacramento State University, her M.A. at the University of Alabama, and recently completed her Ph.D. in Afro-American Studies at the University of Massachusetts. Her research interests include the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s and 1970s with an emphasis on Black women visual artists, Black Feminist Art, and Black Contemporary Art. Kiara is also a curator of Black visual art.

Ralph Pugay

James DePreist Visiting Professor | 2016–2021

Ralph Pugay was born in Cavite, Philippines, and has lived in Portland, Oregon, for most of his adult life. His work conjures imaginative, thought-provoking tableaux that challenge viewers to reconsider the boundaries of cultural norms, identity, and social perception.

Pugay’s paintings thrive on tension—transforming the everyday through a blend of humor, absurdity, and unease that renders the familiar uncanny. Drawing from religious iconography, non-Western pictorial traditions, and the frenetic visual language of internet culture, comics, and video games, he creates brightly colored, playful scenes that fracture and reframe contemporary life.

Informed by his experiences as an immigrant and queer artist, Pugay merges daydreams with incisive social observation. His work uses wit and wonder to question systems of belonging and normativity, inviting viewers into spaces where laughter and discomfort coexist in illuminating ways.

worldofralph.com
Instagram @ralphpugay

Sabina Haque

James DePreist Visiting Professor | 

Sabina Haque combines oral histories, performance, and hand-drawn animation to examine transformations of place and identity. Raised in Karachi by American and Pakistani parents, she has spent half her life in the United States—a cross-cultural experience that deeply informs her conceptual approach. Through her work, Haque uses art as a means of uncovering and reimagining site-specific histories and personal narratives.

sabinahaque.com
Instagram @sabina_z_haque

Lisa Jarrett

James DePreist Visiting Professor | 

Lisa Jarrett is an artist whose work moves fluidly between social and visual forms. Her intersectional practice explores the politics of difference across varied contexts—including schools, landscapes, fictions, racial imaginaries, studios, communities, museums, galleries, walls, mountains, mirrors, floors, rivers, and prisms. Recently, she has come to recognize that her primary medium is questions—the most urgent of which remains: What will set you free?

Jarrett is the co-founder and director of several collaborative projects, including KSMoCA (Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. School Museum of Contemporary Art); the Harriet Tubman Middle School Center for Expanded Curatorial Practice in Northeast Portland, Oregon; and the collective Art 25: Art in the 25th Century.

Existing and creating within the African Diaspora, Jarrett’s work engages deeply with community, collaboration, and the lived experience of Blackness. Based in Portland, Oregon, she co-authors socially engaged projects and continues her ongoing, 17+ year investigation into Black hair and its care in multiple forms. She is currently Professor of Community and Context Arts at Portland State University’s Schnitzer School of Art + Art History + Design, where she leads the Art + Social Practice MFA program.

lisajarrett.com

Jen de los Reyes

James DePreist Visiting Professor |

Jen de los Reyes is an artist, educator, and writer born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Her creative foundations were shaped by the local music scene, where she first learned through experience as a show organizer, listener, zine maker, and band member. These formative years continue to inform her work, which is rooted in collaboration, community, and sustainability within the field of Art and Social Practice.

De los Reyes’ practice bridges institutions and artist-led initiatives, supporting the development of sustainable creative cultures. She is the founder and former director of Open Engagement (2007–2019), an international annual conference dedicated to socially engaged art. She also served as Associate Director of the School of Art & Art History at the University of Illinois Chicago (2015–2022) and is currently an Associate Professor of Art at Cornell University.

jendelosreyes.com
Instagram @jendelosreyes
 

Isaka Shamsud-Din (1940-2025)

James DePreist Visiting Professor |

Isaka Shamsud-Din was an artist, educator, and activist whose work illuminated the lives, histories, and cultures of African American and African diaspora communities. Through his vivid paintings, drawings, murals, teachings, and community projects, he celebrated resilience, identity, and collective memory.

Rooted in his experiences growing up and living in Portland, Oregon, Shamsud-Din’s intensely colorful compositions draw on both personal narrative and extensive research into African American history. He created murals and large-scale paintings centered on African American experiences, with a particular focus on the Pacific Northwest. Among his most notable projects was the Albina Mural Project (1978–1983), a collaboration with five other artists that adorned the exterior of the Albina Human Resources Center in Northeast Portland. His more intimate portraits and everyday scenes reflect the same commitment—to honor the richness, beauty, and diversity of African American life.

Shamsud-din | Portland Art Museum Online Collections