Current Positions
Startup Founder and I-Lab Venture Member
november 2023 - Present
Building the startup Recess at I-Lab Venture Incubation Program 2022-2023 select cohort. Successfully launched pilot games of Boston pop-ups in Summer 2023. 2k+ in Cash Prize Grants from Harvard.
-Awarded Harvard Innovation Lab Spark Grant Summer 2023 (Cash Prize)
-Awarded Harvard Innovation Lab Spark Grant Spring 2023 (Cash Prize)
Recess hosts playground style game sessions for adults. "Recess Games" are in-person, 1 hour social fitness sessions, utilizing favorite childhood games. Just like at recess time.
Recess' website slogan is: Hey Siri, How Do I Find Friends After College? Recess is built for adult customers of all ages who want to meet people without being particularly athletic or social. Our unique value proposition is: re-enforcing "play" and play equity for adults. No online matches, no intense crossfit classes, no bars, and alcohol, Recess helps people meet, exercise, and have fun simply through playing: just like when you were at recess time.
artist-in-residence
summer june 2023 - september 2023
community designer for culturehouse & Harvard csfp summer fellow at joint center
SUMMER june 2023 - AUGUST 2023
graduate teaching assistant
fall 2022
Fall 2022: Histories of Landscape Architecture I: Textuality and the Practice of Landscape Architecture (HIS-4141). Graduate-Level Harvard Course for Professor Edward Eigen, Department of Landscape Architecture
Research-based master's degree in Sociology. The Cambridge Department of Sociology is #1 ranked in UK league tables. Postgraduate at Downing College.
Master's Thesis: "The Influence of Social Media on Modern Romantic Relationships" (Supervisor: Dr. Rikke Amundsen)
Honors: The Mr and Mrs Geoffrey Twining Egginton Prize, Downing Graduate Conference (Select Research Presenter), Downing College MCR-SCR Seminar (Select Research Presenter), Downing College Twining Egginton Exhibition (Select Art Exhibitor), Downing College Cedar Tree Exhibition (Select Art Exhibitor), Seton Cavendish Bequest Grant
Activities: Downing College MCR, Cambridge Tap and Jazz Dance Society, Cambridge Technology and New Media Research Cluster, Cambrovision. Initiated the creation of the first-ever art studio for students use at Downing College (first student beta user), and the first student to propose an art residency.
BAchelor's Degree
Bachelor of arts - b.a, VisUal arts and film, MaGna Cum Laude
3.86 GPA, FIRST CLASS
Honors: Magna Cum Laude (High Honors/Great Distinction), Dean's List, Leadership Service Award, Senior Thesis Stipend Award, Senior Thesis Studio, Independent Study: Advanced Video (Department Chair, Matthew Buckingham), Tuition Scholarship, Junior Marshall Selectee, Spectator Senior Profile
Senior Thesis: "Clashings of Art, Culture, and Technology in a Digital Anthropological World" (Advisors: Matthew Buckingham, Nicola Lopez, Serra Victoria Fels)
Activities: Ivy Council National, Ivy Council Steering, First Generation Student Advisory Board, Orientation Leader, Peer Mentor, Ivy Policy Conference, Ivy Leadership Summit, Spring Gala Design Co-Chair, Apollo Society, One For The World, Latin Dance
Courses Taken: Visual Art, Art History, Architectural History, Global History, Literature, Ethnomusicology, and Biological Sciences. Additional courses: Chinese Language and Literature (Chongqing University), and Social and Computer Sciences (Harvard University)
Play Equity - Design Intervention of 'Play" as Initiatives, Benefits, and Playful Space Conditions for Adults
September 2023 - December 2023
Independent Study
HARVARD GRADUATE SCHOOL OF DESIGN
What is Play Equity : Play equity ensures that all individuals, regardless of their background, abilities, or circumstances, have equal access and opportunities to engage in play and recreational activities. It aims to create a fair and inclusive environment that allows everyone to enjoy the benefits of play.
Advisors: Karen Janosky and Belinda Tato, Harvard University
Aug 18 2023 - SEPTEMBER 15 2023
Solo art residency exhibition 2023
Industry lab, Cambridge Massachusetts
"Fluid Memory" emerges as an alchemy of artistic expression curated by Elizabeth Ulanova with the gracious patronage of the Industry Lab. This art exhibition serves as the ecological culmination of Ulanova's growth as an artist morphotically, academically, and deeply within introspection. Fluid Memory stands as a wayfarer to Ulanova's journey of deep love and heartbreaking loss, unrelenting death and small moments of everyday courage - transposing those intangibles, those wistful moments of a surprised laugh or the silent pause of a gazing breath into a tangible artwork. This odyssey became a psychological bridge within the 'play' of art-making, etching the realms of self-discovery, discordantly resonating with the surrounding cosmos, and intricately binding the experienced sensory.
Curated by Justice Mcdaniel, Industry Lab
April 26 2023
Landscape Core II Studio FInal Review presentation
Harvard Graduate School of Design Landscape Architecture
“Where there is life, there is death, but where there is death, there is also life.”
Life does not cease to exist after death, rather, death is a crucial stage of the regenerative life cycle for every life force on our planet. Project Re(Generation) places regenerative ecosystems as the technical foundation for our cemetery by both its novel interring sequence of biodegradable garment body suits (filled with mushroom spores for mycelium production) as green, toxin-neutralizing entombments for those below ground, to the visual, curated experiences of the vegetative canopy above ground as heliophilic biomarkers philosophically nodding to process of decay, decomposition, and ultimately the growth of new life springing from the past life that has passed on. Giving way the keyholders to the next generation of lives to restore, renew, and revitalize the ecosystems that we experience.
Advisors: Craig Douglas, Harvard University
Dec 14 2022
Independent Study FInal Review presentation
HARVARD GRADUATE SCHOOL OF DESIGN
alchemy: a seemingly magical process of transformation, creation, or combination.
Inspired by the traditional craftsmanship of Chinese artistry, “Alchemy: Between the Past and Magic” embeds the ancient philosophies of the intellectual sisters of painting, poetry, and landscape.
Through contemporary compositions between the magical realism of nature and the organic connections of timeless materiality, “Alchemy” probes its own conceptual process through inquisitive methodology and visual abstraction.
Advisors: Ed Eigen, Gary Hilderbrand, Harvard University
"The Influence of Social Media on Modern Romantic Relationships" 2019-2020
GRADUATE SOCIOLOGY RESEARCH THESIS CONDUCTED AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY. SUPERVISOR: DR. RIKKE AMUNDSEN
The role of social media technology has had a profound influence on modern romantic relationships in the past decade. This dissertation critically reviews empirical literature from the field of new media studies (situated within the broader field of media and communications) that focus on the heightened impact of social media usage in the beginning to maintenance stages of romantic relationships. Moreover, gaps in the current literature are explored, such as limitations in the demographics and romantic relationship stages that are analyzed for data collection. For example, the paucity of published literature regarding how social media affects relationships past once users meet their partners is examined. Furthermore, this review questions the scope and focus of existing empirical case studies as well as highlights the importance of literary representation and the cruciality of diversity in this emerging field. It is important to note that this research is focused specifically on social media (such as Facebook), however, this does not exclude dating websites and applications (such as Tinder) that utilize social media profiles within its algorithms. Ultimately, future research must become more invested in inclusivity, namely who and what is represented both topically and empirically, to allow for more insightful exploration into this burgeoning research area regarding the influence of social media on modern romantic relationships.
Advisor: Rikke Amundsen, University of Cambridge
Conference Presentations:
"Clashings of Art, Culture, and Technology in a Digital Anthropological World" 2018
STUDIO-BASED THESIS COMPOSED OF A SERIES OF ORIGINAL SHORT FILMS, KINETIC ART INSTALLATIONS, AND ACADEMIC INQUIRY. CONDUCTED VIA BOTH COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY VISUAL ARTS HONORS SENIOR THESIS I (ADVANCED VIDEO) & SENIOR THESIS II STUDIO AS WELL AS HONORS INDEPENDENT STUDIES. PROJECTS SUPERVISED BY MATTHEW BUCKINGHAM (DEPARTMENT CHAIR), NICOLA LOPEZ (DEPARTMENT DIRECTOR), SERRA VICTORIA BOTHWELL FELS, AND SONDRA PERRY.
For my theses at Columbia University, I created original short films and installations that showcased alternative universes set in the immediate future. These storylines were centered around the modification or mediation of human behavior through fictional technology. For example, “Voices” critiqued the nature of internal transparency and surveillance within society, through the lens of a fictionalized world that mandates its citizens to wear telepathic brain microchips. Likewise, “Remember” focused on the subjective role of memory through the apparatus of glasses that record and playback every one of life’s moments. The goal of these projects was to present the sociological questions that inevitably arise when technology and culture overlap. Hence, I wanted audiences to digest my hypotheses in an engaging, visceral manner (through media) while I visually critiqued our human behavioral and cultural patterns. In my last thesis film “Connection," I focused on social interactivity and the role of self-medication through the framework of bioengineered pills that induce apathy. Live installations that included the utilization of video projection, sculpture, and paintings, such as “Cracked”, “Screens”, and “Body”, were also produced as tangible mixed collages that sought to create said dialogue in the physical sphere. In conclusion, I did not seek to predict the future, but rather to continually analyze and synthesize the influence of technology-inspired-cultures and culture-inspired-technology.
Advisors: Nicola Lopez, Serra Bothwell Fels, Matthew Buckingham, Sondra Perry, Columbia University
Exhibition: Leroy Neiman Gallery, December 2018, Manhattan, New York.
Exhibitions and Presentations
Select Art Exhibitions:
Core MLA studio designs
Original architectural designs in response to studio projects at Harvard Graduate School of Design MLA I.
I. Project Re(Generation): A Cemetery for the Future, Spring 2023
II. Project Synthesis: A Park to Recover, Fall 2021
III. Project PPE: Protest, Protect, Empower: A Plaza for Protestors, Fall 2021
VI. Project Meta-Marble: A Courtyard to Reflect, Fall 2021
V. Project Street Pool: A Street of Access, Summer 2021
Social Media
Academia
Vimeo
Medium
