Education

• Ph. D., Art Education, Museum Education/Technology, Ohio State University
• M.A., Public Administration/Arts Administration, Southeastern University
• B.S., Early Childhood Education, Fu Jen Catholic University

Biography

Herminia Din is a Full Professor of Art, Art Education. She was the Web producer at the Children's Museum of Indianapolis and education technologist at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. She worked with the University of Alaska Museum of the North in Fairbanks on LearnAlaska project—an educational tool to sort, display and share digital museum objects and historical images selected from the Alaska Digital Archives, and facilitated a docent-training program using Internet2 videoconferencing for a traveling exhibit in Alaska, Light Motifs: American Impressionist Paintings from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She had presented at SIGGRAPH Educator’s Program (2005-2007) on educational gaming for museums and delivered a speech on using animation and interactive virtual technology to enhance museum learning at SIGGRAPH ASIA 2008. She collaborated with colleagues at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, American Museum of Natural History, California Academy of Sciences, and de Young Fine Art Museum to offer teacher professional development programs focusing on art and science integration. She co-edited The Digital Museum: A Think Guide that offers museum professionals an in-depth investigation into how and why museums are experimenting with new technology in 2007. She co-authored Unbound by Place or Time: Museums and Online Learning (2009) and All Together Now: Museums and Online Collaborative Learning (2011), published by the AAM Press, focus on the interactive principles of online learning and the pedagogies. She was on the board of the Media and Technology Committee of American Association of Museums (AAM) for 9 years, and chaired the MUSE Awards for three years. Since 2008, she has been promoting Junk to Funk—a community-based art series focuses on using recycled materials to create beautiful yet finished functional artwork. She received the UAA Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Sustainability (2013 and 2019) for her efforts to raise awareness of the “reduce” and “reuse” methods of dealing with plastic pollution. In 2014, she created the Winter Design Project. This collaborative learning experience encouraged faculty and students to take an in-depth look at “ice” and “snow” from a new perspective and inspire artistic and creative solutions. Presently, her work focuses on plastic pollution in the Arctic using community art as an action for change. Lately, she published Our Plastic Ocean, Our Clean Ocean, a popup book as an action for change in 2019. Grounded in educational theory and practice, she engages students in hands-on learning experiences to address themes of global significance. She holds a doctorate in art education from Ohio State University and presents regularly on museum and technology at national and international conferences.

Teaching Responsibilities

• Art Education
• Art Appreciation
• Senior Seminar

Professional & Department Service

• Chair, BFA Program, UAA Department of Art, 2008-present
• GER, BA and BFA Program Assessment Coordinator, Department of Art, Spring 2018-present
• Senator, CAS Fine Arts, UAA Faculty Senate, 2019-2021
• Member, UAA Honors Program Development Task Force, Fall 2021
• Member, UAA Chancellor’s Faculty Working Group on Climate Change, 2019-2020
• Member, UAA Chancellor’s Faculty Working Group to Address Gender and Violence in Alaska, 2019-2020
• Member, UAA Student Success Academic Pathway Committee, 2018-2019
• Member, Arctic Sustainable Arts and Design (ASAD) Network Member

Publications

Herminia Din, Our Plastic Ocean, Our Clean Ocean: Art as a Catalyst to Build Understanding, Shared Voices Magazine, August 2020, University of the Arctic (UArctic), https://www.uarctic.org/shared-voices/shared-voices-magazine-2020/our-plastic-ocean-our-clean-ocean-art-as-a-catalyst-to-build-understanding/

Timo Jokela, Glen Coutts, Ruth Beer, Herminia Din, Svetlana Usenyuk-Kravchuk, “The Potential of Art and Design for Renewable Economies in the Arctic” in Renewable Economies in the Arctic: A State of Knowledge edited by David Natcher and Timo Koivurova, Routledge Research in Polar Regions Book Series, Fall, 2020.

Herminia Din and Astor Lai, Our Plastic Ocean, Our Clean Ocean, A Popup Book, Nander Butterfly Design: Taiwan, June 2019. [Book]

Herminia Din, “Storytelling Across Time and Place: Sewing Art of the Siberian Yupik on St. Lawrence Island, Alaska” in Arts in the Arctic: Contemporary and Historical Perspectives edited by Tuija Hautala-Hirvioja, Timo Jokela & Maria Huhmarniemi. University of Lapland Press, June 2019. [Book Chapter]

Herminia Din, “Practicing Sustainable Art in the Arctic: Two Case Studies” in Northern Sustainabilities: Understanding and Addressing Change in the Circumpolar World, co-edited by Gail Fondahl and Gary Wilson by Springer Publication, Fall 2016. [Book Chapter]

Herminia Din and Priscilla Lema, Art, Light, Play: Re-imagining the Winter Campus, Bright Ideas Design: Taipei, Taiwan, June 2016. [Book]

Charis Gullickson and Herminia Wei-Hsin Din, “Exchanging Stories: Art and Identity of An Arctic People” in Journal of Nordic Museology (Nordisk Museologi) Special issue, Fall 2015

Herminia Din, “Pedagogy and Practice in Museum Online Learning” in Journal of Museum Education, Special Issue, Going the Distance: Online Learning and the Museum, Summer, issue 40, number 2, p. 102-109, July 2015.

Herminia Din and Steven Wu, Digital Heritage and Culture: Strategy and Implementation, Singapore: World Scientific Publishing Co., October 2014. [Book]

Herminia Din, “Junk to Funk: A Community-Based Practice of Sustainable Art” in COOL – Applied Visual Arts in the North, The Faculty of Art and Design in the University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland, October 2013. https://lauda.ulapland.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/62112/COOL_Applied Visual Arts in the North_verkkoon.pdf?sequence=4[Book Chapter]

Herminia Din, “Will Online Technology Shape Museum Engagement in the Global Community? Opportunities and Challenges” in Museums in a Global Context: National Identity, International Understanding, American Alliance of Museums Press, Washington, DC, May 2013. [Book Chapter]

Elaine Kingeekuk and Herminia Din, Seal, Thimble & Sinew Thread—Sewing Art of the Siberian Yupiks from Savoonga Alaska, Bright Ideas Design: Taipei, Taiwan, June 2012. [Book]

William B. Crow and Herminia Din, All Together Now: Museums and Online Collaborative Learning, American Association of Museums Press, Washington, DC, May 2011. [Book]

William Crow and Herminia Din, Unbound by Place or Time: Museums and Online Learning, American Association of Museums Press, Washington, DC, May 2009. [Book]

Herminia Wei-Hsin Din and Phyllis Hecht, The Digital Museum: A Think Guide, American Association of Museums Press, Washington, DC, November 2007. [Book]

Exhibitions

12^th Biennial Faculty Exhibition, Presence, co-exhibited online, The University of Alaska Anchorage, Department of Art, Anchorage, AK, Fall 2020. https://alaska.digication.com/kimura-gallery/presence

Relate North co-exhibited in Syktyvkar State University Exhibition Hall and the Revölt Center, Syktyvkar, Russia, November 12-December 1, 2019

Our Plastic Ocean, Our Clean Ocean: An Illustrated Popup Book of Art in Action exhibited in the Kimura Gallery, University of Alaska Anchorage, Anchorage, Alaska, September 3-October 4, 2019.

Our Plastic Ocean, Our Clean Ocean, Transactions and Impulsions 2019, Exhibition at the University of Lapland, Faculty of Arts and Design Galleries, 2019 Arctic Art Submit Art Exhibit, Rovaniemi, Finland, June 3-16, 2019.

11^th Biennial Faculty Exhibition, Erudite Antics, co-exhibited in the Kimura Art Gallery, The University of Alaska Anchorage, Department of Art, Anchorage, AK, Fall 2018. https://alaska.digication.com/kimura-gallery/erudite-antics

Relate North co-exhibited in Helgeland Museum Zahl Galleries, Nesna, Norway, November 7-December 1, 2018.

Relate North co-exhibited in University Galleries (Seinä, Kilo, Hämärä, Lyhty and Kajo), at The University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland, November 11-December 1, 2017.

 

Media

“Saving the environment, one pop-up book at a time” by John Novotny featured in the Northern Light, University of Alaska Anchorage, September 30, 2019.   

UAA Amazing Stories: Art professor Herminia Din shares “Our Plastic Ocean, Our Clean Ocean” September 24, 2019.

A pop-up guide to saving the oceans, UAA Amazing Stories, September 24, 2019.

“There’s tons of plastic polluting the ocean. A UAA professor hopes her book can show kids how to fix it” by Wesley Early, AK Public Media, August 28, 2019. 

“How an Alaska professor’s pop-up book aims to spread awareness of marine plastic pollution” by Yereth Rosen, Arctic Today, May 17, 2019. 

“Microplastic is the new plastic” featured in UAA Green and Gold News, February 5, 2019. 

“Professors talk tourism on inaugural “Idita-trip" featured in UAA Green and Gold News, March 29, 2018. 

“Reduce, reuse, recycle: How one UAA professor is educating students on the art of upcycling” featured in UAA Green and Gold News, December 20, 2017.

“Winter Design Project: Let there be puddles” featured in UAA Green and Gold News, February 25, 2015.

“Teaching art classes at the Boys & Girls Clubs” featured in UAA Green and Gold News October 22, 2014.

CAS - FINE ART - Din