Based on the notes you took during class, write a brief description and response to each of the Alumni presentations.

Nick Swift 

Nick graduated from St. Edward’s as an art major, and now owns his own business, Swift Single Malt, with his wife Amanda. He suggested networking at the university will help you later when beginning your career. As a small business with a new product on the market, he used connections at St. Ed’s to get a PR firm to get the word out about his whiskey. He’s also done research on his product by checking out the top-selling whiskey brands at Whole Foods. He also suggested fully researching the history of your product–which you can also do at the St. Ed’s library, as he did. This way, when you are with industry professionals, you can speak intelligently and get a foot in the door. His brand is run by a team of people–designers, concept developers, food photographers, web designers, event planners, etc. He stressed the critical importance of creatives to a business. And be patient. It will take a while to build up your name.

This was a surprise to me. As an art major, I would never have imagined that an art major from my school could develop and run a successful small business. This has definitely expanded my idea of how my degree will translate to the “real world.” I’ve begun realizing the possibilities of opening a pop-up shop after I graduate.

Rebecca Marino

Rebecca graduated from St. Edward’s in 2010 as a photocommunications major, and now serves as gallery director at Pump Project. She works in gallery–curating, collaborating with artists. She also does lots of grant-writing, event-planning, and meeting with new artists. She’s currently working on starting an artist residency program at Pump Project, with the ultimate goal of providing free studio space for artists. She wears many hats working at a nonprofit. She suggested dipping feet in different things to learn everything you don’t want to do. In addition to Pump Project, she also is an artist and photographer herself, and recently did a photo project at NASA. She also co-edits the online publication, Conflict of Interest.com, an ATX-based art/culture magazine.

I most related to Rebecca. This is my ideal job — running a gallery area with a lot of creative control, as well as multiple rotating side projects to continue working on and producing my own body of work.

Alex Roka

Alex is a graphic design alum from St. Edward’s who now works as a designer for Preacher, a creative agency in Austin, TX. He got his start at advertising agency GSD&M, as a paid intern his senior year. He learned lettering on the job there and began making simple marks and logos, badges, patches for major companies. He explained the importance of having a range of styles to be able to work for wide variety of companies. His most recent work was in redesigning SMASHPOP’s packaging.

The most valuable advice (for me) came from Alex’s presentation. Being flexible and working with others to produce an efficient design is a bit of a struggle for me. Relinquishing some of that control in order to be more successful and more effective on projects is a skill I am trying to develop now.

Taylor Browning

Taylor was an art major at St. Edward’s, and is now the assistant curator of education at ArtPace in San Antonio. She wears many hats in this role: media rep, studio tech, writer, curator, and educator. Her study abroad experience at St. Ed’s helped her in expanding her understanding of art and its role in culture. She stressed the importance of being dedicated to your major–coming in on Fridays, utilizing the studios. She had post-grad studio space at UP Collective and went to grad school at UT.