Faculty Biographies
Department Chair
Professor Dave Tosti-Lane
(Sound Design Area Head)
Advanced Sound Design, Basic Sound Engineering, Intermediate Studio, Production Practicum, Professional Internship, Final Project
Dave is a sound designer, technical director, lighting designer and technical consultant, whose recent lighting designs include Ladders on the Pearblossom Highway at the Ned and Kayla Skinner Theater, and a stage production of The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury at the Broadway Performance Hall. His most recent sound designs include productions of Intimate Apparel, Stop Kiss, The Cripple of Inishmaan and Bald Soprano/American Dream at the Poncho Concert Hall; Swan Lake, Remix, at the Ned & Kayla Skinner Theater; Wilder, Wilder, Wilder, a festival of Thornton Wilder One act plays, and the initial presentation of Jose Rivera's The Giants Have Us in Their Books at the Broadway Performance Hall. Dave was the Technical Manager of the Seattle Repertory Theater in 1981 and is one of the original founders of the Performance Production department at Cornish College. An early adopter of computer technology, Dave's use of computer-aided design (CAD) in theatrical applications is noted in the textbook AutoCAD Drafting. He has published numerous reviews of high-tech audio software and hardware in MIX Magazine, and several extended discussions of education for sound designers and the nature of sound design for LiveSound! Magazine. His articles about computer-aided drafting and design have appeared in CADENCE, and Lighting Dimensions magazines, and he has authored several instruction manuals for computer-based digital audio workstations. He has an international reputation as an authority on digital audio engineering and on theatrical sound design. He is active in professional organizations such as the U.S. Institute for Theatre Technology (USITT), where he is a Vice Commissioner for the Sound Commission, and the Associate Editor for Sound for TD&T, the Journal of the USITT; The International Organization of Scenographers, Theatre Architects and Technicians (OISTAT), where he is a member of the Sound Design Working Group; and the Audio Engineering Society (AES), where he serves on standards committees, and has served as Chair of the Pacific Northwest Audio Engineering Society. Dave holds a BS in Management and an MFA in Technical Theater/Lighting Design from Virginia Polytechnic Institute.
Core Faculty
Associate Professor Greg Carter
(Stage Management Area Head)
Fundamentals of Technical Production, Production Lab I & II, Stage Management , Technical Management
Greg Carter is technical director for Book-It-Repertory Theatre and for five years was TD and puppeteer for In the Heart of the Beast Puppet Theatre in Minneapolis. He studied playwriting at Duke University, and earned a Master's in Architecture at the University of Washington in 1998. Greg has taught courses in Drama and Design at the UW School of Architecture, St Olaf College, New Orleans Country Day School and the Seattle Center Academy. He has worked professionally as a designer, stage manager, technician and performer at the Old Globe Theatre, the Guthrie Theater, Penumbra Theatre, Theatre 911, ACT, On The Boards, Theater Schmeater and Seattle Rep.
Professor Ronald Erickson
(Costume Design Area Head)
Advanced Studios, Fundamentals of Technical Production, Intermediate Studio, Introduction to Production Design I & II, Production Lab I & II, Theater Graphics
Ron is a free-lance costume designer who has designed costumes and sets for numerous theaters in the Pacific Northwest, including The Three Sisters and Pygmalion for the Intiman Theatre, Macbeth and Romeo and Juliet for the Idaho Shakespeare Festival, Brighton Beach Memoirs and I Hate Hamlet for Tacoma Actors Guild, and Die Fledermaus and Carmen for Tacoma Opera. Locally he has also designed for Seattle Children's Theatre, Pacific Northwest Ballet, The Empty Space, the Bathhouse Theater, and Northwest Chamber Orchestra. He has studied at the San Francisco Art Institute and holds a BFA in Sculpture from the University of Washington.
Professor Karen Gjelsteen
(Scenic Design Area Head)
Advanced Studios, Intermediate Studio, Introduction to Production Design I & II, Theater Graphics
"Karen is a scenic designer for theaters throughout the Pacific Northwest and the nation. Her Seattle design credits include work for Intiman Theatre Company, A Contemporary Theatre, Seattle Repertory Theatre, and The Empty Space Theatre, where she served as Resident Scenic Designer for four years. Her national credits include productions for the Alaska Repertory Theatre, Anchorage Opera, the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, Portland Center Stage, Portland Repertory Theatre, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Honolulu Theatre for Youth, and the Berkeley Repertory Theatre, where her designs received several awards. She received a National Endowment Teaching Fellowship and an Artist Residency Grant from the Centrum Foundation. In 1989 she was a member of a Seattle/Soviet Arts Exchange Program and participated in designing a production in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Her panel participation credits include panels on discussions on "Women in Theatre" for U.S.I.T.T. and discussions on "Greening Our Theatres." Prior to designing scenery, Karen was Resident Costume Designer for Chimera Theatre in St. Paul, Minn. She earned an MFA graduate cum laude from the University of Minnesota.
Professor Peter Guiles
Production for Actors, Video Production Workshop, Video Techniques
An independent video producer and director, Peter teaches beginning and advanced Video Production, and Technical Production for Actors. He also serves as Studio Coordinator for the Theater department. He has a BA in Film and Video Production from the University of Washington.
Professor Roberta Russell
(Lighting Design Area Head)
Advanced Studios, Intermediate Studio, Lighting Fundamentals, Theater Graphics
Roberta has been designing lighting and scenery in the Pacific Northwest area since 1987. Her recent work includes Dreams of Baby for Jane Doe Theatre, and Mandragola, Hell on Wheels, and The Illuminati for the Empty Space Theatre. Roberta has designed lighting for St. James Cathedral's Great Music for Great Cathedrals for two years, and served as lighting designer/scenic artist/scenic designer for many past Marzena concerts. During the 1990 Goodwill Arts Festival, she served as lighting design interpreter of the Sovremenik Theatre's productions of The Three Sisters at Intiman Theatre and Out of the Whirlwind at the Seattle Repertory Theatre. She holds an MFA in Theater Design from the University of Washington.
Adjunct Faculty
Adjunct Instructor Carl Bronsdon
Costume Technology / Costume Shop Manager
Carl has been busy designing and making costumes and traveling this summer. Shows have included The Mikado for the Seattle Gilbert and Sullivan Society; The Little Mahagonny, co-produced by Cornish and The Seattle Symphony; costumes and scenery for Oliver for Shoreline Community College; and a production of Private Lives for Renton Civic Theatre and Bellevue Civic Theatre. He has designed costumes and scenery for many other Seattle area theatres including—Skagit Opera, Tacoma Actor's Guild, The Bathhouse Theatre and Bellevue Community College. He is an accomplished miniaturist selling at shows both locally and nationally, and was a dealer and instructor at the 2008 NAME National Miniature Convention in Nashua, New Hampshire, with a side trip to Newport Rhode Island for fun. Carl is a 1992 graduate of Cornish with a BFA in Performance Production.
Adjunct Instructor J. Richard Smith
Literature of Theatre / Intermediate Studio-Scenic (Fall 2008) / Department Coordinator
Rick moved to Seattle from Austin, Texas in 2005 where he served as the Producing Artistic Director for Second Youth Family Theatre from 1996-2005. Along with his many hats, Richard works as a freelance scenic and costume designer, director and writer. Seattle credits include directing Two Rooms and Private Eyes for West of Brooklyn Theatre Company; the set designs for the West Coast Premiere of Black Water for Off Center Opera and Stop Kiss for Seattle Public Theatre. His visual dramaturgical illustrations will be featured in Nine Plays by José Cruz González: Magical Realism and Mature Themes in Theatre for Children, edited by Coleman A. Jennings with The University of Texas Press. Richard holds a BFA in Technical Production (Scenic Design) and an MFA in Drama and Theatre for Youth along with a professional certificate in Non-Profit and Philanthropic Studies all from the University of Texas at Austin with a professional gap of fifteen years between degrees.
Adjunct Instructor Jeanmarie Williams
Contemporary Theater Studies
Professor John K. Wilson
Performance Art: History & Theory, Theatre History
An instructor at Cornish for over 10 years, John currently teaches Theater History and The History and Theory of Performance Art. John's plays have been performed at colleges and regional theaters, and he served as co-author and dramaturg on the 1997 Cornish production of Hamlet and Juliet. He received the Seafirst Faculty Excellence Award in 1989 and in 1992 attended a National Endowment for the Humanities Seminar for College Teachers on The American Playwright at Columbia University. John holds a BA in Speech and Drama from LaGrange College and an MFA in Playwriting from the University of Georgia.