Justine Richardson

Justine Richardson is project manager for the International Institute for Critical Studies in Improvisation.  She brings experience in project and partnership development with both university research environments and community-based arts and cultural organizations. She came to IICSI from the 2030+ Research Group at the Balsillie School of International Affairs. For many years she worked developing and managing multi-partner humanities research projects at MATRIX: Center for Humane Arts, Letters, and Social Sciences Online at Michigan State University. Her work at Matrix included the Quilt Index, the American Black Journal Online archive, and the Quilt Alliance’s Quilt Treasures video documentaries. She began her work-life at the community-based media-arts centre Appalshop, in the Appalachian mountains of Kentucky, where she directed Girls’ Hoops, a documentary history of girls’ high school basketball. Justine holds a M.A. from Michigan State University in American Studies with a certificate in Humanities Computing and a B.A. from Yale University in History of Art. As an undergraduate she was part of Yale Children’s Theater and the improvisational group, Playscape, so she is especially enthusiastic about bringing her management experience to engage with the IICSI community.