Otis College Announces Fine Arts Senior evan Fecko as 2026 Valedictorian
Fecko will deliver his Valedictory Address during Commencement on May 17, 2026.
Otis College of Art and Design has announced that evan Fecko (preferred spelling), a Fine Arts major with an emphasis in Sculpture/New Genres, will be Valedictorian of the Class of 2026. Fecko will deliver the Valedictory Address during the Commencement ceremony on Sunday, May 17, 2026, at the Long Beach Terrace Theater.
Commencement concludes the 2026 O-Launch Exhibition Weekend, during which graduating students across the College’s BFA and MFA programs in Animation, Environmental Design, Fashion Design, Fine Arts, Game and Entertainment Design, Graphic Design, Illustration, Product Design, and Toy Design are on hand to discuss their work, which is displayed in galleries, showrooms, interactive displays, and digital presentations across campus.
In addition to Fecko’s speech, Commencement guests will hear remarks from this year’s honorary degree recipient and Board of Trustees Chair Mei-Lee Ney, president of Richard Ney & Associates Asset Management Inc. who, in 2020, contributed $1 million in support of DEI and anti-racism initiatives at the College, including the creation of the Charles White Art and Design Scholarship. In 2021 the main building housing Otis’s Product Design program was renamed the Mei-Lee Ney Design Studio, in recognition of a subsequent $10 million gift from Ney.
Finding a Creative Community
The Valedictory Award is bestowed annually on a senior class member who represents the pinnacle of academic excellence at the College. Fecko was chosen for his continuously stellar academic performance throughout his college career and the exceptional quality of his work.
Originally from Albany, New York, with early training as a martial artist, Fecko came to Otis College in search of a deeply creative environment. “I believe the arts to be much less of an individualistic pursuit than most believe,” he says. “What I gained at Otis was discovered through collaboration, mutual learning, and teamwork. I believe the type of study we engage in only exists within relationships with others, and that any success achieved belongs to the community at large.”
In addition to finding the sense of community he was looking for at Otis, Fecko found the experimental pedagogy of the Fine Arts program to be the perfect, fertile soil for his growth: “I have always been fascinated by objects, materials, thing-power, and the stories and energies that matter can hold. I enjoyed the freedom of working within the expanded field, as well as in the infinite possibility that New Genres allowed.”
As a ceramicist and sculptor, Fecko investigates unconventional material interactions and imposes contemporary systems of control, utilizing processes of accelerated deterioration to reflect on a world in decay that flirts with the dystopic. Through reflection on these relations, Fecko’s hope is to create a site of honesty, discovery, and re-evaluation.
His practice is deeply intertwined with his peers and he co-founded, with Agyei James (’26 Fine Arts), the student-run bobritiGallery, which is located inside locker #419 in the Galef Fine Arts Center on campus. “Though challenging and time consuming, the project encouraged me to reach out to the artists of my community, support the practice of my peers, and made me more confident as a curator,” Fecko says. “It was amazing to work with such talented individuals, create shows for encouraging viewers, and of course, collaborate with the talented Agyei James.”
evan’s practice reflects the athleticism, precision, and discipline of his training, placing him in the lineage of Otis’s great ceramic artists while also pushing beyond it.”
In the words of Fine Arts Chair Meg Cranston, “To be a successful artist, one must have talent, curiosity, daring, an unending capacity for work, and a deep love and respect for artists and for art itself. evan Fecko has all of those qualities. He is profoundly dedicated not only to his own innovative work in ceramics and other media, but also to the work and success of the artists around him. His practice reflects the athleticism, precision, and discipline of his training, placing him in the lineage of Otis’s great ceramic artists—Peter Voulkos, Ralph Bacerra, and Joan Takayama-Ogawa—while also pushing beyond it. evan leaves Otis not only as an outstanding artist, but as a generous leader who has expanded what is possible for those around him.”
After graduation, Fecko hopes to sustain his own art practice, as well as those of other creatives. “I would be blessed to be a part of a caring community, and believe that through such a community our effects on the world at large can be amplified,” he says. “I hope to use my scholarship in the humanities to encourage more equitable ways of coexisting with fellow humans, the world we inhabit, and the matter we coexist with.”
To his fellow members of the Class of 2026, Fecko’s advice is to “keep working, because what we do is important. Keep in touch with the members of your community who have helped you to grow, because they will continue to do so. Remember the smallest actions can have the greatest impacts, and remember our capabilities are limitless. The tools we have learned here can and will be applied to anything and everything we do. Keep them sharp.”
Academic Excellence Awards
In addition to recognizing Fecko as the Class of 2026 Valedictorian, the Commencement ceremony will also highlight this year’s recipients of the Academic Excellence Award, the highest honor given to graduating students in a major program. Selections are made by program leaders and faculty; criteria include a cumulative GPA of 3.5 or higher (for undergraduates), quality of work, personal character, and contributions to Otis College and the larger community.
The 2026 Academic Excellence Award recipients are:
- Aisulu Sadibekova, Animation
- Luke “Aries” Harvey, Environmental Design
- Edward Borba, Fashion Design
- Melanie Garcia, Fine Arts with an emphasis in Painting
- Abi Glowney, Fine Arts with an emphasis in Photography
- evan Fecko, Fine Arts with an emphasis in Sculpture/New Genres
- Karnie Liao, Game and Entertainment Design
- Hannah Whitt, Graphic Design
- Naiobi Benjamin, Illustration
- Lily Nguyen-Wilson, Product Design
- Brooke Lovse, Toy Design
- Eloïse Kabbaz Szabo, MFA Fine Arts
- Tori Watson, MFA Graphic Design
To see more work by Fecko, the Academic Achievement Award recipients, and graduating students across Otis College’s BFA and MFA programs, visit the Virtual Annual Exhibition website.
