The fifth class of the Hastings College Fine Arts Hall of Fame features six visionary artists who will be recognized during a reception and ceremony held in conjunction with Hastings College Homecoming on Friday, October 25 at the Jackson Dinsdale Art Center.
Inductees include:
- Stan Wiederspan ‘60 of Lincoln, Nebraska, for art
- Dana Westring ‘75 of Marshall, Virginia, for art
- Dr. Nancy Walker ‘74 of Greensboro, North Carolina, for music
- Brian Uerling ‘79 of Taos, New Mexico, for music
- Mark Lewis ‘92 of Houston, Texas, for theatre
- Deborah (Johnson) Chumley ‘93 of Houston, Texas, for theatre
The Fine Arts Hall of Fame recognizes Hastings College alumni who are making a difference in their communities through their talents in fine arts.
The reception for the inductees begins at 5:30 p.m., with the ceremony beginning at 6:00 p.m. Tickets for the event are $25 per person for adults and $10 for children. They must be purchased in advance at hastings.edu/homecoming.
Biographies of the 2024 Inductees
Stan Wiederspan ‘60, a Nebraska native, received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Hastings College and his Master of Arts and Master of Fine Arts degrees from the School of Art & Art History at the University of Iowa. After teaching high school and pursuing graduate study, he joined the art faculty of Iowa Wesleyan College in Mount Pleasant.
He then accepted a position as director of the Cedar Rapids Art Center, forerunner of the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art. In 1978, and after serving on the board of the Iowa Arts Council, he began his career as a full-time studio artist. In 1991, he opened a gallery in Cedar Rapids, where he showed his work, and that of other regional artists until he closed the gallery in 2016.
Over the years, Wiederspan has produced a number of commissioned projects, which can be seen today in both corporate and municipal settings. Stylistically, his work has varied from photo realism to abstraction and non-objective constructions. After several exhibitions at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, he enjoyed his first solo New York show at OK Harris in 2009.
Wiederspan recently moved to Lincoln, Nebraska, where he is enjoying retirement.
Dana Westring ‘75 graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in studio art from Hastings College and moved to Washington, D.C., where he began working freelance in advertising design and illustration in 1976.
He worked as an art director at an international architectural and interior design firm beginning in 1982. For the following six years, he designed and painted trompe l’oeil murals around the world. The majority of commissions were for the Royal Family in Saudi Arabia and the Royal Household in Jordan, as well as numerous residential and commercial installations in the United States and Europe. That international work led to projects involving the restoration of antique decorative art and murals in theaters, hotels, and other commercial spaces in the United States.
For the last 20 years, he has focused mostly on drawings and watercolors of landscapes — a natural interest because of his work in landscape design. He has designed a number of gardens, and his own garden near Marshall, Virginia, has been published and has been opened to the public for garden tours sponsored by the Garden Club of Virginia and the Garden Club of America. It is part of “Open Days,” a program of sharing great American gardens created by The Garden Conservancy, of which he is a board member emeritus, and is recorded in the Smithsonian Institution’s “Archives of American Gardens.”
Westring has had exhibitions of his paintings and watercolors of the coast of Maine and studies of Cambodian temples at Addison/Ripley Gallery and Susan Calloway Fine Arts in Washington, D.C. His images of sacred sites in India were shown at The Garden Museum and Abbott & Holder, both in London, England. A book of his watercolors and drawings of India, “TIRTHAS – The Thin Places Where Earthly and Divine Meet,” was published in 2022.
Dr. Nancy Walker ‘74, soprano, is professor of voice, emerita at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where she taught for over 30 years. Her education includes a Doctor of Music in Voice from Indiana University, a Master of Music from the University of Colorado in Boulder, and a Bachelor of Music in music education and performance from Hastings College. She taught in the public schools of Nebraska and Colorado. Former college teaching positions include Stephens College (Missouri), and Gustavus Adolphus College (Minnesota). Her students have won awards and participated in numerous programs including Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, Aspen Music Festival and Music Academy of the West.
Former students of Walker’s teach in college and universities and public schools throughout the U.S. Solo recital and oratorio performances have taken her around the country, including Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center. Her international performances include recitals in Italy, Germany and China. She was a regional finalist in the Metropolitan Opera Council auditions and a national finalist in the NATS Artist Awards. An active member in NATS, she has served as district treasurer, regional governor for the Mid-Atlantic region, and was vice president at the national level for NATSAA.
A Fulbright Research Grant took Walker to Munich, Germany, and two subsequent research leaves took her back to Germany to study German vocal pedagogy and the opera system there. She visited voice teachers throughout Germany and in Austria and Slovenia. She has given presentations at National meetings of NATS, MTNA and CMS. She spent four weeks teaching voice in China, where she and her husband, pianist Dr. Tim Lindeman, also performed a recital. As a master class teacher she has given classes in Alabama, Georgia, Nebraska, Minnesota, California and North Carolina. Her international teaching has included master classes in Germany and China. She and Tim are the parents of two daughters, Kelsey and Chloe.
Brian Uerling ‘79 was a public school music teacher for 39 years prior to his retirement in 2021, with 32 of those years in New Mexico. He taught in the Albuquerque, Moriarty and Clovis Public Schools and at the college level for Clovis Community College and Eastern New Mexico University (ENMU), preceded by schools in Nebraska and Missouri. Uerling was the Clovis Municipal Schools Teacher of the Year in 2007, the New Mexico Music Educator Association’s Music Educator of the Year in 2017, and was inducted into its Hall of Fame in 2021.
Uerling’s education includes two bachelor’s degrees from Hastings College: music history and literature and business in 1979, and music education in 1983. His Master of Music Education is from ENMU in 2000, where he also was an instructor at the ENMU Summer Choir Camp for 20 years and was the organist for the ENMU European Choir Tour in 2018, which included organ performances in Notre Dame Cathedral (Paris) and St. Paul’s Cathedral (London).
Uerling’s professional experience also includes being a church choir director and organist, as well as a private piano studio instructor, for 49 years. During his career, he directed 20 Broadway musicals at both the high school and college levels. His years of service to the New Mexico Music Educators Association includes holding offices as district choral vice president, district choral president, state choral vice president, state president/past president and Piano Collaborator for both treble and mixed all-state choirs. NMMEA honors include directing three NMMEA All-State Honor Ensembles: Clovis Ambassador Choir and Clovis High School Chorale.
Uerling and his wife of 45 years, Judy (Redies) Uerling ‘73 live in Taos, New Mexico, where he is the artistic director for the Taos Community Chorus, keyboard specialist for First Presbyterian Church in Taos, pianist for St. James Episcopal Church early worship service and is on the Vestry for the church.
Mark Lewis ‘92 has spent the last 32 years in a variety of different roles in theater. After graduation from Hastings College, he worked for Heartland Scenic Studios in Omaha, Nebraska, in the carpentry and paint departments and honed his design skills with designs for several Omaha theaters. A highlight was the lighting design for the Omaha premiere of “Always, Patsy Cline” in 1993. In 1994, Lewis moved to Houston, Texas, to join the A.D. Players, where he spent eight years as the resident designer and technical director. In 2002, Lewis and his wife, Marci, returned to Omaha, where he spent the next four years working for The Rose Theater as technical director, production manager and resident designer. During that time, he was able to oversee the world premiere productions of “Berenstain Bears on Stage” and “Berenstain Bears Save Christmas” with scenic designs by Stan Berenstain, and served as production manager for “The Nutcracker” with Ballet Omaha.
In 2006, Lewis returned to Houston to re-join the A.D. Players as technical director, production manager and resident designer. He helped with input on the design of the George Theater, which opened in 2017, and designed the scenery for the opening production of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” In 2018, Lewis moved from full-time theatrical production to focus on venue management and joined the Stafford Centre as the theater production manager.
In 2022, he joined Broadway Across America as the regional operations manager for the southwest region. He works with partner venues in Austin, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio, Texas; Omaha; Tempe, Arizona; and Monterrey, Mexico, on each venue’s season of touring Broadway shows. In addition, he still does freelance design and production management for many theaters in Houston. To date, he has designed nearly 300 shows over his career.
Deborah (Johnson) Chumley ‘93 was born and raised in Colorado and began performing at a very young age. She continued nurturing her love of performing through high school and at Hastings College, where she received a Bachelor of Arts in theatre with an emphasis on acting, music and directing. She continued her post graduate studies at Colorado Christian University in English literature.
Chumley has taught and directed for various theatre groups in Colorado, Nebraska and Texas, including SHINE Performing Arts, Young Actors Academy, Cabaret Dinner Theatre, Hastings Community Theatre and Trinity Lutheran, as well as serving as the Children’s academy director for Stageworks Theatre and artistic director for the Rotunda Children’s Theatre and theatre arts academy director for the A.D. Players.
Currently, she is directing Children’s Theatre at Create a Spark Foundation and busy getting “Fiddler on the Roof” and “Bye Bye Birdie” ready for production. Her favorite shows she’s directed include “Guys and Dolls;” “Into the Woods;” “Annie;” “The Drowsy Chaperone;” “Alice in Wonderland;” Disney’s “Frozen,” “Aladdin” and “The Little Mermaid;” “Elf;” “We Will Rock You;” “A Wrinkle in Time;” “Heathers;” “Willy Wonka;” “Sound of Music;” “Beauty and the Beast;” “Shrek;” and “Footloose.”
When she is not teaching or directing, Chumley is busy running her photography business, Echo Creative Photography, and spending time with her husband, Scott, and three grown children, Hannah, Ethan and Hunter.
She loves teaching and working with kids, teens and young adults, and said she believes that theatre should inspire and educate, as well as entertain. She has a strong desire to help kids express themselves as individuals in a creative and safe environment and strives to help students reach their full potential, no matter their age or experience.
Hastings College is a four-year residential college that focuses on student academic and extracurricular achievement. Discover more at hastings.edu.
