Honoring Accomplished Alumni Artists With the 2025 MCW Medals of Arts

We are thrilled to announce the 2025 recipients of the Mary C. Wheeler Medal of Arts: Judith Salomon ’71, a celebrated ceramic artist and educator; award-winning documentary filmmaker and humanitarian Ellen Bruno ’75; Brent Lang ’00, the executive editor of “Variety,” the multi-platform entertainment news brand; and renowned pianist and composer Julian Shore ’05.

Established in 2023, the Mary C. Wheeler Medal of Arts recognizes alumni who have made exceptional contributions to the literary, visual, or performing arts at Wheeler and beyond. Through their creative work and concrete impact, this year’s honorees exemplify the vision and spirit of our founder, the pioneering artist and educator Mary C. Wheeler.

Judith Salomon is professor emeritus at the Cleveland Institute of Art, where she taught Ceramics from 1977-2016. She received her B.F.A from The School for American Crafts at the Rochester Institute of Technology and was later awarded her M.F.A from The New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University. Judith has since exhibited in museums and galleries all over the world, with her works in the collections of the Cleveland Museum of Art, Los Angeles Museum of Art, Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, Manchester City Art Galleries in England, The National Museum of History in Taiwan, Mint Museum of Art, The Racine Art Museum, and numerous private collections. Her work is also featured in numerous books on ceramics, and she has received two Ohio Arts Council Artist Fellowships, been honored by the National Endowment for the Arts, and received the Victor Scheckengost Teaching Award from the Cleveland Institute of Art.

Ellen Bruno’s documentary films center on human rights and are rooted in years of international relief work in support of refugee communities on the Thai-Cambodian border, in Vietnamese boat camps in Thailand, and in remote villages in southern Mexico. She teaches film at the Yangon Film School in Myanmar and in the Myanmar refugee community in Mae Sot, Thailand, and she serves on the boards of the Buddhist Film Festival, the Pacific Pioneer Fund, and EthicalTraveler.org. She is also a voting member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, where she serves on the committee for the Student Academy Awards. In addition to her creative work, she mentors fellow artists through Creative Capital’s Professional Development Workshops, and she is the mother of two young adults whose school vacations were often spent in refugee camps and remote field settings – experiences that fostered a deep sense of curiosity and resilience.

As executive editor of Variety, Brent Lang helps oversee all editorial operations and leads the publication’s film and media coverage. He joined Variety in 2014 as a senior reporter and prior to his current role, went on to serve as Variety’s executive editor for film & media and as New York bureau chief. Over his tenure, he has written about corporate mergers and bankruptcies, criminal trials and legal battles, blockbuster hits and chaotic productions, and covered film festivals such as Cannes and Sundance, and he has profiled many accomplished directors and actors, including Christopher Nolan, Michael J. Fox, Mindy Kaling, Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Sacha Baron Cohen, Kevin Hart, Paul Thomas Anderson, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Michelle Williams, among others. In 2024, Brett was named Entertainment Journalist of the Year by the Los Angeles Press Club. He is also a member of the Wheeler Leadership Council and serves on the Brown Alumni Magazine’s board of editors and on the board of the Brown University Friends of the Library.

Pianist Julian Shore is known for his “deep maturity as a composer and bandleader” (DownBeat), and he’s been called one of the “leaders of the young jazz piano scene” (JazzTimes). He has played both in the U.S. and abroad with artists as varied as John Patitucci, George Garzone, Dayna Stephens, Gretchen Parlato, Theo Bleckman, Chico Pinheiro, Chris Speed, Caroline Davis, Noah Preminger, and Don Braden, among many others, and appeared at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, Blue Note, Jazz at Lincoln Center, and other major venues and festivals worldwide. As an educator, Julian served as an artistic consultant for Herbie Hancock’s Master Class for masterclass.com, he teaches privately at The New School through New York Jazz Academy, and presented workshops and masterclasses at universities and performance venues across the globe.

Julian, Judith, Brent, and Ellen will each receive the MCW Medal of Arts at the Oct. 18 Alumni Awards Celebration in the Gilder Center for the Arts on Wheeler’s Providence campus. The special ceremony is part of this year’s Homecoming and Reunion festivities. You can register on the Wheeler alumni community website, The Wheel.