UCI Arts names Alison O'Daniel as the 2025 Lauds and Laurels recipient

UC Irvine Alumni Association to honor Alison O’Daniel (M.F.A. ’10) with distinguished alumni award

Guggenheim fellow, visual artist, filmmaker and Department of Art alumna Alison O’Daniel has been named the 2025 Lauds & Laurels Distinguished Alumni Award honoree for the Claire Trevor School of the Arts. The award is part of UC Irvine Alumni Association’s longest-running tradition honoring alumni, faculty, staff, students and community leaders for their exceptional contributions in their respective fields.

“I am deeply touched to receive this recognition,” said O’Daniel. “My time at UC Irvine in the studio art program at the Claire Trevor School of the Arts is one of the most impactful, galvanizing and profound experiences in my development as an artist, filmmaker, educator and person. My time in the program was demanding and life-altering. Not only did it bring me to California but also introduced me to mentors and trusted peers and friends whom I've built a deep artistic community with. Because of the financial support in the studio art program and excellent facilities and equipment, I made my first feature film as my final thesis project. The poetic sensibility and theoretical rigor in combination with the thoughtful and sensitive legacy of identity politics within the program were truly unique. I carry forward the values I encountered at UC Irvine and could not be prouder to be an alumna of the program. Go anteaters!”

O’Daniel’s work spans film and visual art, drawing on d/Deaf and Hard of Hearing experiences to explore sound, access and complex embodiment. Her films and installations have been presented at institutions around the world, including the Hammer Museum, Centre Pompidou, Garage Museum of Contemporary Art and Renaissance Society, among others. She is represented by Commonwealth and Council in Los Angeles and currently serves as an Assistant Professor of Film at California College of the Arts. In 2022, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in Film-Video and was recently appointed to an endowed professorship at UC San Diego.

O’Daniel will be honored at the 54th Lauds & Laurels Awards Ceremony and Dinner on Friday, November 7, 2025, at the Hyatt Regency Irvine.

To learn more about Alsion O’Daniel’s work, visit alisonodaniel.com. To learn more about the Department of Art, visit art.arts.uci.edu.