Through the support of the award, Emmanuel Lugo (BFA ’24) is settling into his home studio in Pittsburgh to explore the intersection of biology, technology, and storytelling.

Emmanuel Lugo, an electronic media and bio-artist from New York City and a 2024 alum of the School of Art, has been named this year’s recipient of the Ken Meyer Professional Studio Development Award. “I feel very honored,” said Lugo, who is currently working as a physical computing intern at the School. “Staying in Pittsburgh is something that I take pride in.” Lugo’s work focuses on the intersection of biology and technology, with a particular interest in relaying stories around death and climate catastrophe. His unique perspective was shaped, in part, by his upbringing — his mother was a funeral director — which became the basis for his senior thesis examining death from the perspective of microorganisms. “How does a microorganism view our death? It might not have the same emotional grievances and weight, but it can be more beautiful and more communal, in a way,” he said.

The Ken Meyer Professional Studio Development Award is an annual honor presented to emerging artists from the School of Art. Named for CMU alumnus Kenneth Meyer (BFA ’75), the award provides financial support for recent graduates or young professionals to enhance their studio practice and further develop their artistic careers. Recipients — including previous graduates Rosabel Rosalind (MFA ’23) and Petra Floyd (MFA ’22) — use the award to invest in spaces, tools, equipment, and other resources that foster creative growth, helping them transition from academic settings to professional art environments. Receiving the award this year, Lugo has been able to invest in his home studio and enhance his workspace, rooting his work for the foreseeable future. “I love being hypermobile as an artist, but now I really want to make my home and my studio so comfortable that I’d rather not leave,” he said.

Part of his focus will be on deepening his technical knowledge and contributing to open-source projects. Lugo initially arrived at the School of Art wanting to pursue 3D animation, but found that new media offered even more ways to express his ideas. “The way I approach a project is that the idea hits me almost absolutely last, and it’s almost all skill building up until then,” he said. His goal is to make his future projects fully accessible online, ensuring that others can learn from his process. “I don’t want to sit on a horde of things that work but aren’t shared,” he explained.

Lugo credits much of that ethos to Professor Golan Levin, one of his mentors during his time at Carnegie Mellon. Levin’s emphasis on interdisciplinary approaches and open-source sharing profoundly influenced Lugo’s own ideas of making art and technology accessible to a wider audience. “Just in terms of the longevity of a piece of art, it makes so much sense to give it away,” Lugo said. “I really want to have a fully transparent workflow with whatever I’m doing.”