Cynthia Vascak

“When we seek for connection, we restore the world to wholeness. Our seemingly separate lives become meaningful as we discover how truly necessary we are to each other.”- Margaret Wheatley

Cynthia Vascak, PHD, is an artist and Faculty Emerita of Art and Art education at Plymouth State University. Her teaching vocation at Plymouth State began in 1991. She served as Professor of Art and Art Education, Chair of the Department of Art, and Coordinator of the BS and MAT in Art Education degree programs, and as Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. She was honored in 2009 as the recipient of the distinguished Teaching Award. Cynthia’s personal and scholarly interests include mindfulness and contemplative practices; interdisciplinarity, action agency and service learning; social justice/diversity/ cultural pluralism; internationalization, peacebuilding, environmental education, special education and inclusion, constructivist and emancipatory pedagogy, and transformational leadership.

As a studio artist, her work encompasses, drawing, printmaking, and egg tempera painting. The foundation of her work is drawing from direct observation. In her words, “ I find that working directly and spontaneously from life is a constant source of spiritual and creative nourishment and inspiration. My works are all created with deep attention and care for the subject, and towards a gestalt of inner rhythms and harmonies. Such attentive looking can inspire us each to stop and re-engage with our world and our relationships with a renewed sense of connection, wonder, compassion, and envisionment. reativity begins with becoming fully present and offers the artist and the beholder the gift of insight and a gateway bridging the rational and the numinous”.

She received her BA in Art and Literature from Pan American University in Brownsville, Texas, her MFA in Art Education at Boston University, and her PHD in Education from the University of New Hampshire. In addition to her formal academic training, Dr. Vascak has studied fine arts at the Boston Museum School, Concordia University in Montreal, the University of Quebec, and the Escuela Belles Artes in San Miguel d’Allende, Mexico.

Since her retirement in July 2019, She has received her Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Teaching Certification with the Brown University Center for Mindulness, her Mindfulness Facilitator Certification from the Copper Beech Institute, and Hospice training with the Pemi Baker Community Health of Plymouth, NH.

She resides in New Hampshire, on former lands of the Abenaki near to the White Mountain National Forest with her two cats, Minout and Zoe.