{"id":96750,"date":"2026-01-23T03:45:18","date_gmt":"2026-01-23T07:45:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/?p=96750"},"modified":"2026-01-26T09:55:36","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T13:55:36","slug":"arts-commission-honors-faculty-artist-with-merit-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/01_23_2026\/arts-commission-honors-faculty-artist-with-merit-award","title":{"rendered":"Arts Commission Honors Faculty Artist with Merit Award"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A University of Toledo professor of art is being recognized by the <a href=\"https:\/\/theartscommission.org\/artists\/merit-awards\">Arts Commission with a merit award<\/a> for outstanding accomplishments in multidisciplinary art.<\/p>\n<p>A multimedia artist, designer and musician, Barry Whittaker is a professor in the Department of Art whose work explores themes of mythology, language, miscommunication and cultural hybridization through technology and collaboration.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_96751\" style=\"width: 510px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-96751\" class=\"wp-image-96751\" src=\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Barry-Whitaker-11212025-6771a.jpg\" alt=\"Portrait of Barry Whittaker, a professor in the Department of Art, is a multimedia artist, designer and musician.\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" srcset=\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Barry-Whitaker-11212025-6771a.jpg 748w, https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Barry-Whitaker-11212025-6771a-300x169.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-96751\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Barry Whittaker, a professor in the Department of Art, is a multimedia artist, designer and musician.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m sincerely grateful to the Arts Commission for recognizing my work with the Merit Award,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s an honor to be included among so many talented artists in Toledo. The Arts Commission\u2019s ongoing support for individual artists plays a vital role in making Toledo a place where experimentation, risk-taking and creative growth are possible. I\u2019m deeply appreciative of the dedicated staff, volunteers and jurors whose behind-the-scenes work has a visible and lasting impact on our arts community.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis award will directly support my continued experimentation and the development of new projects, allowing me to push my work in new directions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Whittaker is one of three local artists to receive a merit award from the Arts Commission, with each award-winner receiving $4,000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<a href=\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/01_23_2026\/arts-commission-honors-faculty-artist-with-merit-award\"><img width=\"120\" height=\"120\" src=\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Barry-Whitaker-11212025-6771a-150x150.jpg\" class=\"alignright tfe wp-post-image\" alt=\"Portrait of Barry Whittaker, a professor in the Department of Art, is a multimedia artist, designer and musician.\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/a><p>Barry Whittaker, a professor in the Department of Art, is a multimedia artist, designer and musician.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":878,"featured_media":96751,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,498,1,7],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96750"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/878"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96750"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96750\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":96754,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96750\/revisions\/96754"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96751"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}