Art Area Coordinator, Metals and Jewelry Area Head, Professor of Art
rookermd@jmu.edu
Contact Info

• M.F.A. (Metals), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• M.F.A. (Graphic Design), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• B.F.A. - (Graphic Design), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Rooker is a metalsmith who works in a variety of media to create dynamic, culturally critical and adornment-oriented art through techniques like fabrication, laser and micro-arc welding, die-forming, anodizing, carving, electroforming and enameling, as well as continuing to produce sculptural objects, installations, tableware and mixed-media artist's books. He offers courses in metals at all levels at JMU.

Rooker has been head of the JMU metals program since 2000. He worked professionally as a graphic designer prior to pursuing metals and has created 3D designs in metal for various commissions, including one that will be permanently placed on the Moon’s surface.

Rooker is a member of the Society of North American Goldsmiths and the American Craft Council, and a Visiting Fellow of the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon University.

• CVPA Faculty Research Leave
• Excellence Award, Unfolding exhibition, Kendall College of Art and Design
• Art Jewelry Forum Emerging Artist Award
• Grand Prize, Society of American Silversmiths Student Silversmiths Competition
• Honorable Mention, Celestial Seasonings: A Loose Interpretation III
• Summer Research Grant, James Madison University (multiple)

Rooker has been a part of more than 50 local, national and international exhibitions and is in the permanent collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and The Smithsonian American Art Museum Renwick Gallery of American crafts.

Mark Rooker at laser welder.

Mark Rooker holding maquettes.