Develop and expand as an artist in this transformative program. Join a community of image-makers as you study the discipline and realize your individual artistic vision.
Explore photography in all its forms, from its material possibilities to its role in contemporary culture. Challenge assumptions, experiment with new processes, and develop a practice that is critically aware and personally resonant. We welcome contemporary artists excited by the photographic image, whether your practice is lens-based—from analog cameras to digital sensors—or extends to found imagery, moving pictures, and critical research.
Students and faculty create a tight-knit and supportive community, finding inspiration in each other and developing a shared visual vocabulary. Small class sizes and an intensive studio culture contribute to a rich and challenging learning environment.
State-of-the-Art Facilities and Exhibition Spaces
Students have their own individual studios for both years of the program at Dock 72, our new facility at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, which also features dedicated fabrication shops and a 1,500-square-foot gallery space.
Our main Brooklyn campus offers a full suite of state-of-the-art facilities:
35mm, medium, and large format film cameras
the latest DSLR and mirrorless cameras
medium format digital cameras
lighting equipment, exclusively for graduate student use
dedicated 1,000-square-foot digital photography lab with wide-format printers, film scanners, computers, and industry-standard editing software
black-and-white darkroom
non-silver process studio
1,500-square-foot shooting and lighting studio
Students are always welcome to set up a one-on-one instructional meeting to gain a deeper understanding of our tools and technology.
Photography as a medium inspires critical thinking. Through our Photography Talk Series, Visiting Artist Lecture Series, and individual studio visits with visiting artists, critics, curators, and writers, you will explore the photographic medium within the various disciplines of contemporary art.
“My practice is centered around unanswerable questions. How are our identities formed through visual culture? What do collective cultural traumas and experiences feel like inside other people’s bodies? Alongside obsessive research, I employ strategies of the archive, the re-make, and impersonation, to create images and videos that collapse history with the present and offer possible answers, if only for a fleeting moment.”
The 60-credit curriculum includes a wide variety of core and elective studio courses, along with a complement of liberal arts offerings geared toward artists. The core curriculum, largely shared with the general MFA in Fine Arts, includes required courses in Studio Practice and Theory, Thesis, and Graduate Symposium. For Photography majors, the curriculum includes Acts of Recognition, a seminar that introduces perspectives on art, ethics, visual culture, race, and equity. This required course focuses on photography and lens-based media and the politics of representation through art history, cultural studies, critical race theory, gender studies, and queer studies.
The student’s studio experience is augmented by the Visiting Artists Lecture Series and the Pratt Photography Talks, which together bring approximately 12 relevant artists and scholars to campus per year for talks and studio visits.
In addition, students participate in periodic and constructive interdisciplinary reviews: Survey in their second semester, Public Critique in their third, and Preview in their final semester. During the course of the program, there are robust opportunities for individual studio visits with visiting artists, critics, curators, and writers, as well as exhibition and open studio opportunities here in Brooklyn.
The program culminates in the capstone Thesis, which incorporates both an exhibition and writing representing individual artist’s works.
Expression (Artwork)
Artist conveys meaning based on their research, vision, and craft. That meaning is clear in the relationship of the work to the meta work such as speech or text. The evidence of meaning includes the production of knowledge within their work.
Expansion
Artist is open to a rigorous and evolving exploration of the potential for the work.
Research
Artist engages in an open and experimental approach to visual, textual, contextual, sensory, and material approaches in their work. Artist embraces risks, failure, and digression.
Context
Artist’s statements and artwork express a relationship with an internal (ie. personal history) or an external (ie. social history) space of meaning. This can include synthesis of art history, criticism, and analysis into the studio work.
Connection or Community
Artist and work engender a meaningful relationship with other artists, citizens, and individuals or groups which enhances the meaning of the work and the experience for the audience or public, as defined by the project.
Our Faculty
Our faculty members are distinguished artists and creative professionals who hail from diverse backgrounds, contributing to the expansive nature of our program. They are dedicated to nurturing each student’s creative potential. See all Photography faculty and administrators.
“You’ll be amongst the most intelligent, responsive, caring, and engaged faculty possible. You’ll have access to excellent facilities, and the opportunity to take classes that push you outside of your comfort zone, while still honing your specific processes and craft.”
Nic Anselmo (he/him), MFA Photography ’23
After Graduation
Our alumni are thriving in their careers after graduation. Some have become full-time artists, while others are working in notable organizations across industries.
Where They Work
Photo Editor at New York Magazine
Senior Designer at Scape Landscape Architecture
Studio Manager for Yigal Ozeri
Client Advisor at Tourneau|Bucherer
Senior Production Technician at Aqua Steady
Studio Assistant at Studio RM
Freelance Video Colorist
Studio Coordinator of Long Term Partnerships at Studio in a School NYC
Appraisal Assistant
Creative Director of Pan’s Dance
Photographer at The Korean Cultural Center New York
Social Media Manager at American Lung Association
Director of Photography at Lighthouse Creative Group
Education Director at Moscow Contemporary
Adjunct Professor
Photographer at Bentex Group
Image Specialist at American Gemological Laboratories
Career Support for Life
Students and alumni can schedule one-on-one appointments with career strategists in Pratt’s Center for Career and Professional Development. A career strategist can work with you to develop your job/internship search strategies and life and business plans, as well as review résumés, cover letters, websites, and other marketing materials.
Join us at Pratt. Learn more about admissions requirements, plan your visit, talk to a counselor, and start your application. Apply here.
You’ll find yourself at home at Pratt. Learn more about our student organizations, athletics, gallery exhibitions, events, the amazing City of New York, and our Brooklyn neighborhood communities. More info here.
Join us for events, follow us online, and learn more about Pratt’s impact in the world.
Opening TODAY ✨ the next of our Fall 2025 Open Call Student Exhibition Series, featuring:
Greenpoint, a project by Elijah Meyer
When I’m Gone It’ll be Online, curated by Zoey Knipstein
🗓️ October 6 – October 17
🕙 10AM - 5PM
📍 Pratt Photography Gallery, LL ARC
✨ Opening Reception today at 5PM
We hope to see you there! 👏
@prattinstitute @soartpratt
Today is the LAST day 👏 to catch the second of our fall Open Call series, featuring:
We Buried Them Ourselves by Hayden Holycross, Lewis James, and Serena Booth
ask a punk. by Karly Venn and Bug Vinroe
🕙 10AM - 5PM
📍 Pratt Photography Gallery, LL ARC
@prattinstitute @soartpratt
FALL 2025 PHOTOGRAPHY TALK SERIES ✨
We are very happy announce the schedule for this semester’s Talk Series, featuring: Phil Taylor, Zoe Leonard, and Yuji Agematsu.
All talks are in-person, free, and open to the Pratt community and the public.
We hope to see you there!
@prattinstitute @soartpratt
Students in our MFA Contemporary Photo Seminar were lucky and honored to meet photography legend Sir Don McCullin while visiting his exhibition, A Desecrated Serenity, at Hauser & Wirth Gallery last week! ✨
Class and Photo credit: PHOT-669 with Professor Milagros de la Torre
@prattinstitute @soartpratt @milagrosdelatorre_ @hauserwirth
Opening TODAY ✨ the next of our Fall 2025 Open Call Student Exhibition Series, featuring:
We Buried Them Ourselves by Hayden Holycross, Lewis James, and Serena Booth
ask a punk. by Karly Venn and Bug Vinroe
🗓️ September 22nd – October 3rd
🕙 10AM - 5PM
📍 Pratt Photography Gallery, LL ARC
✨ Opening Reception today at 5PM
We hope to see you there! 👏
@prattinstitute @soartpratt
There are TWO 👏 days left to catch the first of our fall Open Call series, featuring:
Center of the Wheel by Stella Kowalsky
Glimpses of Motherland by Shanna Deneux
Held Close by Norah Aldossary, Nora Gerliczy, and Jordan Anna Torres
🕙 10AM - 5PM, today and tomorrow
📍 Pratt Photography Gallery, LL ARC
@prattinstitute @soartpratt @st3114._.o @shannadeneux @noaaldossary @norassphotos @jordanannatorresphoto
PRATT BERLIN ✨ Join an Info Session this Friday 9/12 @ 12:30PM to learn more!
Applications are OPEN to spend your Spring 2026 Semester in Berlin!
📸 BFA Photo majors and minors in their 2nd or 3rd year are welcome to apply to spend a semester in one of Europe’s most literary and legendary cities.
📚 Pratt Berlin offers a full 16-credit menu of classes, including core photo studios and seminars with brilliant faculty.
👏 As one recent alum wrote: “Studying in Berlin was nothing short of life-altering. Living, writing, and coming of age in Berlin enriched my relationship with myself, my art practice, gifted me with deep, lifelong connections, and offered me the confidence to build my life wherever the wind takes me. Alongside the city of Berlin, my instructors made this one of the most rewarding semesters of my college career. Berlin is full of discovery, surprise, and opportunity for exponential growth.”
📝 Application DEADLINE: Thursday, September 18th
To find out more and to APPLY, please follow the link in our bio, https://www.pratt.edu/academics/study-abroad/
@pratt__berlin @pratt_education_abroad @prattinstitute @soartpratt
Fall 2025 Open Call Student Exhibitions ✨
We are happy to announce the line-up for this season’s Open Call series, including those opening TODAY:
Center of the Wheel by Stella Kowalsky
Glimpses of Motherland by Shanna Deneux
Held Close by Norah Aldossary, Nora Gerliczy, and Jordan Anna Torres
🗓️ September 8th–19th
🕙 Monday–Friday, 10AM–5PM
📍 Pratt Photography Gallery, LL ARC
✨ Opening Reception today, 9/8 from 5-8PM
We hope to see you there! 👏
@prattphotography @soartpratt
PRATT BERLIN ✨ Applications are open to spend your Spring 2026 Semester in Berlin!
📸 BFA Photo majors and minors in their 2nd or 3rd year are welcome to apply to spend a semester in one of Europe’s most literary and legendary cities.
📚 Pratt Berlin offers a full 16-credit menu of classes, including core photo studios and seminars with brilliant faculty.
👏 As one recent alum wrote: “Studying in Berlin was nothing short of life-altering. Living, writing, and coming of age in Berlin enriched my relationship with myself, my art practice, gifted me with deep, lifelong connections, and offered me the confidence to build my life wherever the wind takes me. Alongside the city of Berlin, my instructors made this one of the most rewarding semesters of my college career. Berlin is full of discovery, surprise, and opportunity for exponential growth.”
📝 Application DEADLINE: Thursday, September 18th
To find out more and to APPLY, please follow the link in our bio, https://www.pratt.edu/academics/study-abroad/
@pratt__berlin @pratt_education_abroad @prattinstitute @soartpratt
