A roundup of ideas and projects from around the Institute
Lillian Benson, BFA Art Education ’70, received Black Public Media’s 2025 Trailblazer Award for her work editing films including American Masters – Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise, Beyond the Steps: Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, and Dancing: New World, New Forms.
Visiting Associate Professor of Interior Design Ridima Jain, MID ’23, was featured in a Dwell article about emerging designers at the 2025 International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF). “Indian industrial designers Ridima Jain and Manav Singla bring a shared vision to Ridezign—to make the ephemeral feel eternal. The sculptural Tesser lighting collection is inspired by fleeting glimpses of illuminated lives through New York City’s skyscrapers.”
Doechii wore a top by Visiting Assistant Professor of Fashion Design Giovanna Flores in Cosmopolitan.
The Pratt Center for Community Development report Better Buses for Flatbush Avenue: Participatory Action Research with Riders Alliance was cited in an article in Amsterdam News on the need for faster buses in Flatbush. “In each neighborhood that Flatbush Avenue passes through, it’s a commercial corridor [and] a center of neighborhoods,” Sylvia Morse, senior program manager for research and policy at the Pratt Center, told Amsterdam News. “It’s not just like an artery that passes through. It doesn’t function like a highway. It’s a really complicated street.”
Isabel (Izzy) Lane, MS Urban and Community Planning ’26, is the 2025 Pratt School of Architecture William ‘Bill’ Menking Travel Award recipient. “In this moment of excitement and traction for urban agriculture at scale, I hope that my travels allow me to share with the Pratt community a critical analysis of the opportunities and risks of planning for urban agriculture through the frameworks of social, racial, and environmental justice,” Lane wrote in her application for the prize.
Dean of the School of Information Anthony Cocciolo published the chapter “Alice Roberts and the Breakdown of Segregation in Northern Library Schools, 1890–1940” in The Legacy of Black Women in Librarianship: When They Dared to Be Powerful (ALA Neal Schuman) edited by Nicole Cooke.
Professor in the School of Information Irene Lopatovska co-authored a new journal article with alumni Grace Pickering, MSLIS ’24, and Celia Coan, MSLIS ’24, titled “Ukrainian public libraries during the Russia-Ukraine war: Supporting individuals, communities, and the nation” in the Journal of Librarianship and Information Science.
Nick Brenner, MSLIS ’26, presented his paper “New Trends in Ottoman Transcription Software: Interventions for Librarian” at the 18th AATT (American Association of Teachers of Turkic Languages) Graduate Student Conference. The paper was developed in INFO-601 Foundations of Information.
Pratt Trustee and alumnus Derrick Adams, BFA Art and Design Education ’96, curated the inaugural Scout Art Fair, featured on WBAL news radio and in Observer.
Professor in the School of Information Leanne Bowler presented “Transdisciplinary Epistemic Practices as a Teaching Narrative: Redesigning a LIS course that integrates STEM, Arts, and Design” at Libraries in the Digital Age (LIDA) 2025 in Dubrovnik, Croatia.
From Pratt Institute News
From Pratt Institute News
