Nancy Kawalek

Nancy Kawalek is an artist and innovator whose distinct research focuses on merging scientific and artistic inquiry. She is the founder and director of STAGE—Scientists, Technologists, and Artists Generating Exploration—a Center in UChicago’s Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering. The Center explores the intersection of science and art through the creation and development of film, games, theatre, exhibits, and other artistic endeavors inspired by science and technology. STAGE harnesses the power of storytelling, emotional engagement, and entertainment to translate complex scientific ideas into relatable human experience, promoting understanding of the sciences in the public arena through new forms of artistic expression.

As a faculty member at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) in Film and Media Studies and Media Arts and Technology, Kawalek first launched STAGE in partnership with UCSB’s California NanoSystems Institute and established the STAGE International Script Competition for the best new play about science and technology. Many of the winning plays have been performed on London’s West End, as well as Off-Broadway and regionally, with others currently under development for film.

Kawalek has over twenty-five years of experience in the professional theatre world as an actor, director, and writer, working on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and in regional theatres across the United States, as well as in film and television.

In 2025, Kawalek was named as one of the Quantum 100, UNESCO’s global initiative recognizing professionals forwarding the field of quantum science.