The CRC Research Spotlight highlights the research journeys of Florida State University faculty whose projects were launched with CRC funding and later expanded through external grants or national and international recognition. These projects illustrate how CRC investments help transform promising ideas into impactful research that advances discovery and raises FSU’s visibility.
January 2026:
Florida State University professor and internationally exhibiting artist Carrie Ann Baade has received major national attention for her long-term creative research project Birthplace: Reimagining Colonial Louisiana Women through Collage Portraits, which was initially supported through FSU’s SRS-COFRS internal funding program.
In 2025, the project received the Halo Fellowship Award ($5,000), a competitive statewide honor supporting visual artists. Baade was also awarded a 2026 Virginia Center for the Creative Arts Summer Residency, where she will continue developing new work from the series.
The most comprehensive version of Birthplace debuted in a January 2025 solo exhibition at LeMieux Galleries in New Orleans, presenting seventy new works across painting and installation. The exhibition was featured nationally in Forbes and republished by Yahoo!, dramatically expanding public visibility. The project also appeared on the cover of Kolaj Magazine, the only international print publication devoted exclusively to contemporary collage, and was accompanied by an article on the exhibit and a public lecture for students at the Kolaj Institute in New Orleans.
Later in 2025, Birthplace was curated into the Delaware Contemporary Art Museum as part of its 25th Anniversary Art + AI Biennial on view September 5, 2025 to January 1, 2026. The museum-wide exhibition featured eleven artists and explored questions of authorship, technology, and historical interpretation.
Baade also authored a 100-page exhibition monograph in conjunction with the LeMieux Galleries presentation and was invited to contribute a chapter to the forthcoming Palgrave volume The Hydra: The Many Approaches to Generative AI in the Art and Design Classroom in 2026.
The trajectory of Birthplace reflects the long-term impact of FSU internal research funding in supporting ambitious creative projects that grow into nationally visible exhibitions, publications, and residencies.
