Projects for a New Millennium was established in 1993 by Joy Wulke, environmental artist, as a non-profit corporation to create collaborative events that foster the fusing of art and science as a means of discovery and appreciation of the natural world. Projects for a New Millennium and its collaborators continue to aspire to extend presentations and educational programming illustrating a useful and wondrous philosophy of life, a world view that celebrates our differences while recognizing the importance of our timeless common goals of peace and freedom in an environmentally sound world.

People who have played major role in work:

JOY WULKE - Founding/Creative Director
Is a nationally recognized sculptor whose work bridges the boundary between visual art and architecture. Since receiving her Masters of Environmental Design Degree from Yale in 1974, she has had numerous exhibitions and participated in group exhibitions in the US, Europe, and Japan. She has received numerous awards, including two Connecticut Commission on the Arts Artist Fellowships. Her commissions span the country and include work for the Lincoln Center Film Forum in New York and the Louisiana World's Fair. Her work is featured in New Media in the Late 20th Century Art by Michael Rush as well as numerous international publication. Wulke is a consultant with the Connecticut Commission on the Art in the Art in Public Spaces program. She is founder of Projects for a New Millennium which has initiated collaborative projects in Connecticut, New York, and Montana. www.wulkestudio.com
JAMIE BURNETT
Producer/Lighting Design/Graphic Design
is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University in Theatre Production Design. As former Technical Director and Lighting Designer for the Educational Center for the Arts in New Haven for ten years, he has designed lighting for hundreds of productions in the Arts Hall and the Little Theater. He is also a consultant, designer, special events planner and film/video gaffer as well as a licensed electrical contractor. Lighting designs have included numerous theater and dance companies: The New Haven Ballet, The Paul Hall and Mary Barnett Dance Company's, New England Actors' Theater, Yale Dramat, City Shakespeare Company among others. He was Production Manager/Lighting Designer for the MillerLite Summertime Street Fest in New Haven for four years and for the 1995 Special Olympics special events. Jamie's electrical contracting business specialized in the permanent installation of theater and studio lighting systems.
ISTVAN PETER B'RACZ - Composer/Musical Director
is a graduate of Oberlin, the Franz Liszt Academy of Music, the Yale School of Music and the Hartt School. He was awarded a Fulbright Grant to continue his studies in Budapest, Hungary. At Yale, he participated in the first "Summer Piano Institute" at Yale and received his Master's of Music studying with Boris Bierman. He is currently composing and teaching. Istvan is a faculty member of the Neighborhood Music School and Central Connecticut State University. He has recently served as Music Director and composed music for the New England Actors' Theatre production of Eaglestones, Aberrant Behavior, among others. He has done a film score for Into the Light and sound for King Gordogan with Dan Fine. His works have been performed in New York at PS 122, Steinway Hall at Carnegie, as well as Wesleyan in CT.
GENA RHO-SMITH - Dance and Movement Educational Specialist
Ms. Smith, also of Projects 2k, has an MFA in Dance from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and BS in Special Education from Southern Connecticut State University. She has collaborated with Ms. Wulke on many arts education projects, including those with the Barnard School and the Peabody Museum, and has developed movement, yoga, and dance classes for children aged 2-10.
LOIS RHO - Early Childhood Educational Specialist
Ms. Rho is an expert early childhood educator who will work with Projects 2k artists to ensure that arts activities support known best practices and can be adapted to suit children with a range of special needs. She has an MS in Special Education and a BA in Early Childhood Education from Southern Connecticut State University and over forty years of experience developing and implementing quality early childhood programs.
SUSAN MULCAHEY
Project Coordinator/Events Specialist
believes creating environments where people feel comfortable is a critical component in designing events and is exactly what she strives to accomplish in her work in event production/exhibit management. With planning experience taken from both the corporate and non-profit sectors, she now works independently with clients, assisting them in developing and implementing a variety of tailored events. She attended Quinnipiac University and continues life's learnings through travel and less traditional pursuits that continue to expand her journey into the realm of creative possibilities.
SUSAN MENDELSOHN - Playwright/Dramaturg
holds a MFA in dramaturgy and dramatic criticism from the Yale School of Drama. Dramaturgy experience include the Sundance Playwright's Lab (Utah), New York Stage & Film Company (Vassar College), Oddfellow's Playhouse (CT), Portland Stage (Maine), Voice and Vision Theater Workshop (Smith College) and The Gertrude Stein Repertory Company (NYC). No stranger to the New Haven theater community, Susan has come to life in New England Actors' Theatre productions of Eaglestones (1994) and Elektra (1995) and Raids on the Articulaet (1997). Susan continues to experiment and "explore the ever-changing relationships of art and technology" as she brings the Terra Continuum script to life via the internet from Europe.
TOM BURNETT - Director
Has presented his own performance poetry in many New York venues including Nuyorican Poet's Café and St. Marks Poetry Project. He has also presented works in Chicago, Seattle, and San Francisco. Tom is the founder of the 8th Ave. Session and was featured in a national television campaign sponsored by the Cultural Alliance to Support Arts in America.
JERRY ALLISON Climbing Director / Special effects designer
is an artist who combines his passions for art and rock climbing through his Rock Wall Drawings. Jerry will be creating his Rock Wall Drawings on June 12, 19 and 21st, equal part daring performance art and shamanistic nature worship. Allison feels his ecological concerns and interest in pagan mythologies are complementary. Rock Wall Drawings manage to combine all these and reveal connections to recent art history as well. "There is something very intense about balancing yourself on a ledge the width of a pencil and going up a rock face 6 stories high. You see everything so clearly. I wanted to put that intensity of vision into my work. So I began to draw while I climbed, making rubbings of the rock face on rice paper augmented by a painted line made during the decent. The function as records of the climb and are meant to bring an echo of the natural world into the urban environment. There is poetry in placing an imprint of the organic stone against the textures of man-made masonry, or of bringing the outdoors inside. The painted straight line is a symbol of intellect, as it is our innate character to create order and geometry. We don't have to be destroyers of nature, but must learn to align ourselves with the natural forces." Jerry Allison, June 1999.
JEFF CONE
Laser Specialist
lives in New York and produces laser works of all scales. He has worked with Projects for a New Millennium on the Visualization of Time 1995 and Celebration of Branford Waters in 1997. His laser work incorporates story telling for educational purposes.
MARGARET CARL
Stage Manager
is founding member and Production Stage Manager of Algonkuin Players Theatre Co. For the past thirteen years she has stage managed for a number of theater and dance companies, special events, and festivals in the New Haven area. This is her first production in a quarry, her first speaking part, and the most mosquito bites of any show. She would like to thank the producers for the opportunity to work with old friends and many new ones.

JOYCE DeLAURO
Choreographer
is the founder and artistic director of Starship Dance Theater. She is a dancer, teacher, and choreographer trained in New York City at the American Ballet Center and American Ballet Theater. She has also studied and performed Jazz, Modern and African dance. Joyce has been teaching dance to children, adults and senior citizens for 23 years. In 1993 she was a recipient of the United to Serve America Diamond Award for outstanding community service.

T. CHARLES ERICKSON
photographs theater works all over the world and is responsible for capturing the ephemeral magic of Projects for a New Millennium's works with light. All photographs using light on this site and in our publications are copyright T. Charles Erickson.
REBECCA L. ABBOTT
Video Imaging
is Associate Professor of Communication at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, CT, and an independent film producer, director and editor. Her professional credits include award-winning and Emmy-nominated works for Connecticut Public Television. Her most recent work, the short drama Herbert III, won "Best of Festival" in the Broadcast Educators Association 2003 Faculty Competition among other awards, and has been included at 15 different festivals and screenings in the US and Europe. A Connecticut native, she holds a Bachelor's degree with a major in Visual Studies from Dartmouth College, where she worked primarily as a sculptor. She completed an MFA in filmmaking at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and received an MA in American Studies from Yale University. Abbott's academic career began in 1980 and has included faculty assignments at Bennington College and Sacred Heart University.

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