Mark Anderson

Mark Anderson is an Adjunct Professor at the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design (MIAD) since 1999, teaching Introduction to Humanities for first-year students and upper-level Art History electives like What’s Up?. As Artistic co-Director of Theatre Gigante, he creates hybrid theatre productions including Petrushka, The Lears, and The Way Things Go.

Anderson holds an MFA from the University of Michigan School of Art & Design. His interdisciplinary practice explores intersections of philosophy, psychology, sociology, and citizenship through contemporary visual, literary, and performance art. He regularly collaborates with his wife Isabelle Kralj and Milwaukee groups like Present Music and Wild Space Dance Company, performing in over thirty U.S. cities.

His notable monologues Eighty Words for Snow, Manual, and Me, You, Art and Trout use humor and movement to articulate modern anxieties. Theatre Gigante’s work transforms monologues into audience conversations, praised by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel as material this good and delivered this well.

Anderson’s honors include:

• Wisconsin Arts Board Interdisciplinary Arts Fellowship
• Twice selected for Wisconsin Triennial Exhibition

He has received commissions from the John Michael Kohler Art Center and created entertainment for the Pabst Theater Centennial Ball. Theatre Gigante operates as a nonprofit supported by the Wisconsin Arts Board, National Endowment for the Arts, and Milwaukee Arts Board.

At MIAD, Anderson mentors students across academic stages, connecting creativity and collaboration to philosophical and sociological concepts. His site-specific works and hybrid productions establish him as a vital force in Milwaukee’s theater ecosystem.