Dr. Ilayda Altuntas is an artist, researcher, and educator whose work focuses on sound pedagogy, listening practices, and arts-based research. She is the creator of Sounding Art Practice as Research (SAPAR), a methodology that explores sound as a way of understanding identity, memory, place, and lived experience. 

 

She is Assistant Professor of Art & Visual Culture Education at the University of Arizona, where she teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in teacher education and research methods. Dr. Altuntas currently serves as Chair of the Seminar for Research in Art Education (SRAE) of the National Art Education Association.

 

Her current creative practice and teaching focus on sound-based artmaking, listening, and place-responsive inquiry. This work includes Resonating Histories: A Decolonial Sound Walk in Saguaro National Park West, a project that uses soundwalking, environmental recording, and embodied listening to explore land histories, cultural memory, stewardship, and spatial experience. Another recent project, Resonant Ecologies, examines how listening can become a way of understanding place. Using recordings collected from water, land, and air across Southern Arizona, the project translates environmental sounds and material vibrations into abstract audiovisual works that explore movement, resonance, and ecological relationships.

 

Her scholarship has been published in the International Review of Qualitative Research, the International Journal of Arts-Based Educational Research, and NAEA News.

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Dr. Altuntas earned her Ph.D. in Art Education from Pennsylvania State University and an M.S. in Art and Design Education from Pratt Institute. She also holds a double-major B.F.A., with high honors, in Plastic Arts and Fashion & Textile Design from Yeditepe University in Istanbul, Türkiye. Before entering higher education, she taught visual art and art history in New York City public schools and worked extensively in community-based arts education through programs at Pratt Institute and other educational organizations across New York City.

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Publications

Altuntas Nott, I. (under review). Listening as relational commons in saturday art school. International Journal of Arts-Based Educational Research.

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Altuntas Nott, I. (in print) Sounds of borderlands: Voicing diverse discourses in art education through the sound lab project. Instructional Resources Art Education Journal.

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (in print). The orange table: A conceptual framework at the intersection of sound, space, conversation, and affect in art education. Studies in Art Education.

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (2025). Sounds of borderlands: Podcasting as decolonial pedagogy in art education. Seminar for Research in Art Education (SRAE) Column: Fall 2025, National Art Education Association (NAEA) News.

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (2025). Listening again: Sound, place, and research at the edge of art education. Seminar for Research in Art Education (SRAE) Column: Summer 2025, National Art Education Association (NAEA) News.

 

Altuntas Nott, I. & Shin, R. (2025). Decolonizing art education through sound: Navigating dual identities and pedagogical strategies. In A. Richards & S. Willis (Eds.), Decolonizing the legacy of white supremacy in art education. University of Kentucky Press.

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (2024) Sonic pedagogies at border crossings. International Journal of Arts-Based Educational Research, 2(2), 36–44. https://doi.org/10.17979/ijaber.2024.2.2.11246

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (2024) The auditory weave of saturday art school in three movements. Research Catalogue. https://doi.org/10.22501/rc.2162317

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (2022). Sounding art practice as research: Soundwalking the border. Seminar for Research in Art Education (SRAE) Column: Fall 2022, National Art Education Association (NAEA) News.

 

Powell, K., Altuntas Nott, I., & Bricker, M. (2022). Defamiliarizing a walk. International Review of Qualitative Research, 0(0), 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1177/19408447221090659

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (2021). Pedagogy of sounding: Tuning in art education. [Doctoral Dissertation, Pennsylvania State University]. The Pennyslvania State University Libraries. https://etda.libraries.psu.edu/catalog/22000ixa25

 

Altuntas Nott, I. (2015). Improv, risk and conflict: The experiences of arts facilitators in New York City’s juvenile justice system. [masters thesis]. Pratt Institute Libraries.