Professor of Acting David Bassuk of Purchase College in New York has received a Fulbright U.S. Program award as announced by the U.S. Department of State and the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, to spend the 2023-2024 academic year at Fachhochschule (FH) Salzburg in Salzburg, Austria. He will focus on a project titled Immersive Storytelling Futures: Theater, Virtual and Alternative Realities. His goals are to integrate the study of immersive theater with technology, address a lack of media literacy regarding Alternative Reality Games (ARGs), and explore the art of immersive theater in Salzburg in the home of Austrian director, Max Reinhardt.
Following his work in Salzburg, Bassuk plans to complete a book about the boundaries between performance and media. He will also further his work to inspire students to create
audience-centered stories that he believes “can seize the public”™s imagination and build meaningful, perhaps even transformational, work that allows people to participate actively in their narratives and societies.”
Purchase College President Dr. Milagros Peña, a past Fulbright recipient herself, said, “I”™m proud to welcome Professor Bassuk to the ranks of Fulbright awardees at Purchase College. His work represents the future of interdisciplinary artists and scholars who are drawing important connections between media, technology, storytelling, and the arts. I look forward to following his progress.”
Fulbrighters engage in cutting-edge research and expand their professional networks, often continuing research collaborations started abroad and laying the groundwork for forging future partnerships between institutions.
Purchase College, part of the State University of New York (SUNY) network of 64 universities and colleges, was founded in 1967 by Governor Nelson Rockefeller. His aspiration for Purchase was to create a dynamic campus that combined conservatory training in the visual and performing arts with programs in the liberal arts and sciences, in order to inspire an appreciation for both intellectual and artistic talents in all students.
