Toots Zynsky is a glass artist whose work has been shown in dozens of museums internationally. Zynsky was born and raised in Massachusetts, and graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1973. There, she studied under Dale Chihuly, who mentored her in glassmaking. With Chihuly, she went on to help found the Pilchuck Glass School at Washington State. Following her graduation, she continued to experiment with glass, including combining it with barbed wire while she was assistant director of the New York Experimental Glass Workshop. In 1982, her first exhibition was shown at Theo Portnoy Gallery in New York. The following year, she went on a vacation in Europe, where she would spend the next 16 years. It was there that she helped develop a glass thread-pulling machine. In 1988, she was awarded the Rakow Commission by the Corning Museum. Since then, her work has been displayed in more than 70 museum collections around the world.
Emily Orr is the Assistant Curator of Modern and Contemporary American Design at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. She received her B.A. in Art History and English from Colgate University in 2006, and went on to receive her M.A. in Visual Culture: Costume Studies in 2008. For her Ph.D., she attended Royal College of Art/Victoria & Albert Museum, History of Design, where she wrote her thesis on the development of department store display. She has since authored publications relating to the design of store display. In addition to her work as curator, she has also been a Research Collaborator for the 100 Hours Project at University College London and a Photographic Rights Assistant forHistory of Design through the Bard Graduate Center.
Kari Herrin is the Executive Director of Museums and Exhibitions at the Savannah College of Art and Design. She received her B.S. in Fashion Merchandising from the University of Georgia in 1997. In 1998, she began working at SCAD as Director of Events and Conferencing. Since then, she has worked as Executive Director of Conferencing and Exhibitions, executive Director of Presidential Initiatives, and VP for Creative Direction. In her current role as Executive Director, Herrin is responsible for overseeing all museum operations, including the selection of exhibits
and educational programs.