David and Judith Brown Endowed Scholarship

David R. Brown (1945-2023) transformed ArtCenter into a pioneer of digital innovation in art and design education.

ArtCenter is deeply grateful to David for his 14-year tenure, from 1985 to 1999, as ArtCenter’s third president, and for his impact on students, faculty, staff and alumni. David established ArtCenter as a leader in the use of digital technology in an art and design education. During his tenure, he helped fundraise $55 million, with up to $40 million invested in scholarships and grants, and significantly increased ArtCenter’s endowment.

“The ArtCenter graduate is what I call the ‘poet of the visual world’—both the form giver and the meaning maker in a world that is increasingly visual rather than verbal,” he told ArtCenter’s Dot magazine in a 1999 interview. “If designers and visual artists were important in the past, and they were, they will become even more so in the future.”

The David and Judith Brown Endowed Scholarship was established in 1988 and is awarded to continuing students in any of ArtCenter’s degree programs, with a preference for those from a diversity of backgrounds and whose perspectives are underrepresented in the field of art and design.