Commencement 2025

Commencement Speaker
Doctor of Letters

Claudia Rankine is the author of five books of poetry, including Citizen: An American Lyric and Don’t Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric; three plays, including HELP, which premiered in March 2020 (The Shed, NYC), and The White Card, which premiered in February 2018 (ArtsEmerson/American Repertory Theater) and was published by Graywolf Press in 2019; as well as numerous video collaborations. Her collection of essays, Just Us: An American Conversation, was published by Graywolf Press in 2020, and her most recent project, TRIAGE, is forthcoming with them in 2026. She is also the co-editor of several anthologies, including The Racial Imaginary: Writers on Race in the Life of the Mind. In 2016, Rankine co-founded The Racial Imaginary Institute (TRII). Among her numerous awards and honors, Rankine is the recipient of the Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry, the Poets & Writers’ Jackson Poetry Prize, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, United States Artists, and the National Endowment of the Arts. A former chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, Rankine joined the NYU Creative Writing Program in fall 2021. She lives in New York.

Commencement Honoree
Doctor of Fine Arts

Stefan Sagmeister has designed for clients as diverse as The Rolling Stones, HBO, and the Guggenheim Museum. He’s a two-time Grammy winner and also earned practically every important international design award.

Sagmeister talks about the large subjects of our lives, like happiness or beauty, how they connect to design, and what that actually means to our everyday lives. He spoke five times at the official TED, making him one of the three most frequently invited TED speakers.

His books sell in the hundreds of thousands and his exhibitions have been mounted in museums around the world. His exhibition, The Happy Show, attracted way over half a million visitors worldwide and became the most visited graphic design show in history.

A native of Austria, he received his MFA from the University of Applied Arts in Vienna and, as a Fulbright Scholar, a master’s degree from Pratt Institute in New York.

Commencement Honoree
Doctor of Fine Arts

Annabelle Selldorf is the principal of Selldorf Architects, an internationally renowned 70-person architectural design practice she founded in New York City in 1988. The firm creates public and private spaces that manifest a clear, modern sensibility with enduring impact. Since its inception, the firm’s design ethos has been deeply rooted in the principles of humanism. At every scale and for every condition, Selldorf Architects designs for the individual experience. As a result, its work is brought to life—and made complete—by those who use it.

The practice has particular expertise in the complex requirements of cultural projects, having completed numerous museums, galleries, exhibition spaces, study centers, and artists’ studios. The firm’s clients include The Frick Collection, National Gallery London, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, Art Gallery of Ontario, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Clark Art Institute, and Neue Galerie New York. In addition, the firm has completed galleries for David Zwirner, Hauser & Wirth, and Gladstone Gallery, amongst others, and designed exhibitions for the Whitney Museum of American Art, The Jewish Museum, and Corning Museum of Glass.

Alongside cultural clients, the firm works on major public and civic projects, including Sunset Park Material Recovery Facility on the Brooklyn waterfront, the largest of its kind in the United States, and two wastewater management buildings for the New York City Department of Environmental Protection on the Gowanus Canal.

Born and raised in Cologne, Germany, Selldorf received a Bachelor of Architecture from Pratt Institute and a Master of Architecture from Syracuse University. She is a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects and serves on the board The Chinati Foundation, The Architectural League of New York, the World Monuments Fund, and the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College. Selldorf is also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was the recipient of their prestigious Award in Architecture in 2014. In 2016, she received the AIA New York Medal of Honor.

Pratt Distinguished Teacher 2025–2026
Undergraduate Communications Design

Frank Franca is a photographer, educator, and creative director whose work spans continents, disciplines, and decades. Born in Havana, he grew up and spent formative years in Cuba, Spain, the United States, and the United Kingdom — all of which shaped his global perspective and creative voice.

His photography has been published in Aperture, Artforum, Art in America, BOMB, The New York Times Magazine, Vogue (US & Germany), i-D, Vice, Marie Claire, W, Le Monde, The Guardian, and many others. His work has been exhibited internationally at venues such as Royal Festival Hall (London), Gitterman Gallery (NYC),),Studio Galleria (Budapest), the House of Photography (Hamburg), the Museum of Nonconformist Art (St. Petersburg), the International Center of Photography (ICP, NYC), Chicago Cultural Center, Candice Madey Gallery (New York), Bass Museum of Art (Miami Beach), the Contemporary Art Center (Cincinnati), amongst many others.

In 2022, Franca conceived, curated, and directed Shift, a photographic book project for the International Center of Photography. A personal and editorial vision, Shift reflected global visual dialogues and underscored Franca’s ability to guide compelling visual narratives from concept to completion. It was presented at the Miranda Galerie as part of Les Rencontres de la photographie d’Arles photo festival in France.

Franca’s curatorial work includes the 2017 exhibition New Photography by Young Americans at Fabbrica del Vapore in Milan, presented as a large-scale projection with Fondo Malerba per la Fotografia.

In 2015, he created #helloicp, a street-level public art installation commissioned by the International Center of Photography. Installed across multiple ground-floor vitrine display windows along the Bowery, the project transformed the museum’s façade into a global photo mural. Based on Instagram, #helloicp featured photographers from six continents and hundreds of cultures in an expansive, interactive celebration of image-making.

As a founding member of the Visual AIDS Artists’ Caucus, Franca helped create the Red Ribbon—the now-universal symbol of AIDS awareness—and co-founded Electric Blanket alongside Nan Goldin, Allen Frame, and a few other friends. Conceived as a public street action and large-scale photo-based slideshow, Electric Blanket addressed the AIDS crisis with urgency and visibility. It was projected on building facades in major pedestrian areas and exhibited internationally in museums including MoMA PS1 (NYC), the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the High Museum (Atlanta), and institutions in Japan, Germany, Norway, Russia, and the UK.

His work is cited in Andrew Wilson’s Alexander McQueen: Blood Beneath the Skin and Rudi Bleys’s Images of Ambiente: Homotextuality and Latin American Art, 1810–Today.

Currently on faculty at Pratt Institute and the International Center of Photography, Franca has also taught or lectured at The School of Visual Arts, The Cooper Union, MARCO (Monterrey), Dumb Type (Tokyo & Kyoto), and LCI (Mexico). He was a founding faculty member of ICP @ The Point in the Bronx, a program that received a President’s Committee on the Arts award, presented by First Lady Laura Bush at the White House.

A former London Correspondent for Women’s Wear Daily, Franca holds a BFA in Filmmaking from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. He has worked as a lighting designer and exhibition designer, with creative projects in the US, UK, Spain, Italy, Brazil, Germany, Mexico, Hungary, Argentina, Russia, Norway, and Japan.

Grants and fellowships include support from the Citizen’s Exchange Council, Open Society, ArtsLink, The British Council, PS122 Studio Program, and the Pratt Faculty Development Fund.

Franca Glacier in Antarctica is named after his father, Dr. Fernando E. Franca, an explorer, inventor, pilot, and physician.

He is fluent in English and Spanish.

Undergraduate Student Speaker
BFA Communications Design

Valeria Zhikharevich is graduating with a degree in graphic design. Originally from Russia, she came to Pratt with a love for art and creativity. During her time at Pratt, she discovered a deeper interest in creating interfaces for digital products. Pratt became the place where she could explore, experiment, and ultimately find her direction as a designer. Now, as she graduates, she is excited to continue this journey, using design to make meaningful contributions and shape experiences that connect with people.

Graduate Student Speaker
MA Art and Design Education

Victoria Forbes, a graduating master’s student in Pratt’s five-year Art and Design Education BFA/MA program from Upstate New York, is driven by a dedication to community and personal growth. She draws continual inspiration from her Jamaican mother and her dedication to empowering herself and others. At Pratt, Forbes actively sought out leadership and learning opportunities, including mentoring undergraduates, teaching in Saturday Art School, interning at Pratt’s K–12 Center and at the Bronx Museum, and serving as VP of the Black Student Union. Forbes’s teaching practice focuses on nurturing an inclusive and culturally responsive classroom environment that encourages self-expression for students of all learning styles. Driven by a desire for social equity, Forbes aims to empower students within underserved and overexploited communities by providing access to professional studio practices. Her ongoing research, art practice, and teaching are all fueled by this commitment to personal and collective transformation.

Student Performer
BFA Fine Arts (Painting)

Nina Kulikov has played violin for over ten years and performed with the Kansas City Youth Symphony in her hometown. She will be graduating from Pratt with a major in painting and a minor in sustainability studies. Experienced in both studio and gallery roles, she is excited to continue building her art practice here in Brooklyn, New York. Kulikov would like to thank her father for his love of music that inspired her own, her mother and brother for their unwavering support, as well as all the amazing peers and leaders she has come to know at Pratt.

Student Performer
BFA Fine Arts (Painting)

Tempe Munach is a fine arts student graduating from Pratt Institute with a bachelor’s in painting and a minor in psychology. Munach plans on continuing her studies in Barcelona with her best friend and fellow Pratt graduate, Rowan Woodward. She would like to give a huge thanks to her parents, Rob and Lauren, for the immense support and love throughout these four years, as well as her sister, Beyla, who has continuously been her largest inspiration in her work and in her life. Congratulations to the class of 2025!