Fellowships 2020

Aren Davey is a developer, artist, and aspiring graphic designer currently based in Pittsburgh. She is currently an undergraduate student at Carnegie Mellon University, pursuing a Bachelor of Computer Science and Fine Arts. She strives to break the stereotypes of programming by showing that it can be warm, playful, and spontaneous. In her downtime, she likes to steep tea, play video games, and pay homage to hexagons. Aren was mentored by Daniel Shiffman.

Abdellah Iraamane is a Moroccan software engineer and social activist based in Dublin, Ireland. He has been working on youth development projects aiming to enhance and build the capacities of rural and suburban youth, alongside a full-time career as a developer. He likes clean code and pizza, and strives to achieve universal access to quality education. Abdellah was mentored by George Boateng, who was a Fellow in 2018, and served as a mentor for Prince Steven Annor, a 2019 Fellow.

Achim Koh is a programmer, translator, and educator, currently based in Seoul, who works around the techno-politics of machine learning, digital culture, and knowledge production. He is interested in technological literacy that enables social progress and democratization rather than simply reproducing existing power structures. Achim was mentored by Joey Lee.

Emily Martinez is a new media artist, front-end developer, digital strategist, and serial collaborator who believes in the tactical misuse of technology. Her most recent works explore new economies and queer technologies. Off the clock, Emily enjoys plants, dolphins, cafecitos, synths, humidity, heartfulness, and exploring inner space. Some of her lovely collaborators include Queer AI, Anxious to Make, and Color Coded. Emily was mentored by Lydia Jessup.

Michael O’Connell teaches coding and computational thinking to more than 100 students in grades 2–6 each semester via coding clubs and camps. Previously, Michael focused on helping millions of developers and IT professionals as founding Editorial Director of IBM developerWorks and founding Editor in Chief of IDG’s JavaWorld. Michael was mentored by Layla Quinones, who was a Teaching Fellow in Processing Foundation’s 2019 Program.

Bomani Oseni McClendon is an engineer living in Brooklyn. Bomani builds software to support artists, and teaches students grades 2–5 about electronic circuitry through craft activities. Through his creative practice, he studies the ways that Black health outcomes are influenced by a history of scientific racism. Bomani’s Github is here. Bomani will be mentored by Joey Lee.

George Profenza is a London-based, Romanian-born creative technologist, most-of-the-time socially functioning nerd, all-around fix-it code champion, and chaser of rabbit holes. He spends his spare time bringing robots and puppets to life and finding artistic inspiration in paper folding, doodling, and complex geometry. His GitHub is here. George was mentored by Golan Levin.

Andreas Refsgaard is an artist and creative coder based in Copenhagen. He uses algorithms and machine learning to allow people to play music using only eye movement and facial gestures, control games by making silly sounds or transform drawings of musical instruments on paper into real compositions. Andreas was mentored by Yining Shi.

Kalila Shapiro is a researcher, creative technologist, and human-computer interaction designer. She is writing a series of pieces on the ethics of virtual reality for All Tech Is Human, is the Social Media Lead for MedVR, and is the deputy leader of the Application Accessibility group for XR Access. Her GitHub is here. Kalila was mentored by Luis Morales-Navarro, who was a 2018 Fellow, and Claire Kearney-Volpe, a 2016 Fellow and a current member of Processing Foundation’s Board of Advisors.

Inhwa Yeom (left) is a media artist and researcher of AR/VR technology at Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST). Her research interest focuses on how “magical” experiences in the age of technological media can become more accessible in the forms of artistic praxes, including interactive videos and installations, magic and hologram performances, online platforms, workshops, and academic writings. Seonghyeon Kim (right) is a researcher and media artist working with graphics programming technology. Currently, he is a master’s student at KAIST, Visual Media Lab. His research interest is synthesizing facial animation of a virtual character. As an undergraduate student, he established a programming club named “Chocoding” for over 100 designers. Inhwa and Seonghyeon were mentored by Qianqian Ye, who was a Fellow in 2019.