Submit your notes for fall 2026—here are our submission guidelines:
Pratt alumni, we want to know what you’re up to, and so do your fellow graduates. Send your updates on work and life to classnotes@pratt.edu. Notes may be up to 75 words in length. Please include your full name, degree or program, and graduation year. Submissions will be edited for length, clarity, and style. Image submissions should be high resolution (300 dpi at 5 x 7 inches).
Keep up with the latest alumni updates. Visit the new Alumni News and Events page.
Group Highlights
Terry Winters, BFA Art Education ’71; Carl E. Hazlewood, BFA Fine Arts ’75; Nanette Carter, MFA Fine Arts ’78; and Shahpour Pouyan, MFA Fine Arts ’12, were elected by the National Academy of Design as national academicians in the class of 2025.
Annabelle Selldorf, BArch ’85, and Mickalene Thomas, BFA ’00, were recognized with spots on the annual TIME100 list, which features Time magazine’s picks for the 100 most influential people of the year. Selldorf was recognized for her transformative expansion of The Frick Collection in New York City. Thomas was spotlighted for her internationally touring exhibition Mickalene Thomas: All About Love, which debuted at The Broad in Los Angeles before traveling to London, Toulouse, and Philadelphia. (Time)
Lucy Harris, MS Interior Design ’06, and Michael Warren, MFA Interior Design ’21, of Lucy Harris Studio, designed the interiors for a Brooklyn townhouse featured in global publications such as Brownstoner, AD Italia, and Elle Decoration France. According to the studio, the design infused the homeowners’ love of cooking, design, nature, and travel into the decor. (Lucy Harris Studio newsletter)
Erik Martinez, BArch ’10; Isaac Michan, MArch ’13; and Juan Sala, MArch ’15, earned spots on the inaugural World Architecture Festival and The Architect’s Newspaper “40 Under 40 North America” list. Laura Salazar-Altobelli, assistant professor of undergraduate architecture, was also recognized. (The Architect’s Newspaper)
Jesse Ludington, MS Museums and Digital Culture ’23, and Maddy Heller, MSLIS ’25, presented “Memories of Memorialization: The Presbrey-Leland Memorials Collection at the Woodlawn Cemetery & Conservancy” at the Archivists Round Table of Metropolitan New York Symposium in October 2025. (School of Information newsletter)
Becca Anton and Pranav Dawar, both BFA Film ’25, received recognition from the National Board of Review Student Grant Committee. The program helps young filmmakers complete their projects and exhibit them at film festivals like Sundance and New Directors/New Films. (@prattfilm_video)
Six Pratt alumni created designs for the 2025 NYCxDesign “Ode to NYC” poster series: Catherine Nina, BFA Communications Design ’24; Sakarit Chankaew, BFA Communications Design ’25; Isabel Chun, MFA Communications Design ’25; Mallory Kurkjian, BFA Communications Design ’25; Yua Maekawa, BFA Communications Design ’25; and Aidan Wesighan, BFA Communications Design ’25. (Poster House)
Ankit Muhury and Emily Sardo, both MArch ’25, won two 2025 SARA NY Design Awards for projects developed in their graduate studios. “Imprints,” from a studio led by Florencia Pita, visiting assistant professor in the Graduate Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Urban Design (GA/LA/UD) Department, received the Design Award of Excellence, while “The Living Machine,” from a studio with Hart Marlow, MArch ’09, interim assistant chair of GA/LA/UD and adjunct associate professor, earned the Design Award of Honor. (SARA NY)
HIGHLIGHT: John F. Gould
John F. Gould, General Art ’26 (1906–1996), was the subject of a feature article in The Saturday Evening Post, authored by his son, Robert Gould. A prolific illustrator, particularly during the 1940s, Gould created thousands of pieces for the Post and other publications. The article highlights his 70-year career, his collaborations with writers such as Roald Dahl, and his artistic process. Gould also taught art at Pratt Institute for 22 years.
Gould’s first illustration for the Post was for the story “Song for a Handsaw” by Dorothy Thomas in the August 23, 1941, issue, marking the beginning of a major chapter in his professional career. Before his Post tenure, Gould illustrated some 15,000 pen-and-ink drawings for pulp magazines during the Great Depression. The Gould family donated the original framed artwork for “Song for a Handsaw” to the Norman Rockwell Museum in 2014, where it now resides in the permanent collection. (The Saturday Evening Post)
1950s
Arthur King, BID ’57, exhibited his photographs at Carrie Haddad Gallery in Hudson, New York. Weathered, on view from August 1 to September 21, 2025, included photographs that King took as a student at Pratt and in the following years.
1960s
Lorna Ritz, BFA Fine Arts (Painting) ’69, received her first solo exhibition in New York with Lorna Ritz: Paintings, on view at YveYang Gallery from July 11 to August 16, 2025. Ritz, who trained under James Gahagan (1927–1999) at Pratt Institute, is a MacDowell Fellow whose work is held by museums including the Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth, and the Anderson Museum of Contemporary Art.
1970s
Michela Griffo, MFA Fine Arts ’70, presented new paintings in a solo exhibition at Moskowitz Bayse in Los Angeles. Who’s Laughing Now? was on view from November 8 to December 20, 2025.
James Vincent Griffin, BFA Fine Arts ’72, has illustrated over 4,000 book covers over the past 50 years. In 2025, he had his vintage romance book cover artwork in an exhibition, Romancing the Novel, at McDaniel College in Westminster, Maryland. In 2022, he opened the Griffin Art Gallery in Jonesborough, Tennessee, where he teaches weekly classes. Last year, he had a solo exhibition, Tapestry of Movement, at the William King Museum in Abington, Virginia, featuring paintings from the past five decades.
Elaine Norman, BFA Fine Arts ’72, created the cover art for the book How Do You Wear The Universe?: Poems & Essays: 2002–2025 by Steve Zeitlin, published by MediacsBooks in January 2025. She also continued her series of personal collage books with the publication of Otherwise Engaged: Weekly Collages from the Year 2020.
George Ranalli, BArch ’72, designed the “Valentine #2” Chair, which entered the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1990. A drawing for this chair was on view at the Paul Rudolph Institute for Modern Architecture from July 2 through September 20, 2025, in the exhibition Architecture = Art: The Susan Grant Lewin Collection, curated by Eshaan Mehta, BArch ’26. (Designer’s newsletter)
B. Robert Johnson, BFA Fine Arts ’73, received two awards for his work at SUNY Ulster’s arts and literary magazine, including the Gold Medallion Award for logo design for the National Council for Marketing & Public Relations and the SUNY CUAD for excellence in creativity for magazine design. He serves as the director of printing and graphic services at SUNY Ulster, where his paintings and drawings were recently on view at the Muroff Kotler Visual Arts Gallery in the exhibition time Again.
Michael Garland, BFA Communications Design ’74, won the Society of Illustrators 2025 Stevan Dohanos Award for his oil painting Owl Face. He also won the California Reading Association’s 2024 EUREKA! 2024 Silver Award for nonfiction children’s books for We’re Not Weird: Structure and Function in the Animal Kingdom, which he wrote and illustrated. Garland has written and illustrated over 30 children’s books over the course of his career.
Ken Aptekar, MFA Fine Arts ’75, had his first European solo exhibition of illuminated manuscripts at Le Clezio Gallery in Paris this spring. Previous exhibitions of the manuscripts were held at the Tibor de Nagy Gallery in New York and Wasserman Projects in Detroit.
C Bangs, MFA Fine Arts ’75, is a featured artist for Cornell’s Alpha CubeSat, a cube-shaped satellite that features the first holograms in space. Alpha’s holograms feature exposures of C Bangs’s clay sculptures, with a moth, fish, man, woman, and cat serving as ambassadors for life on Earth.
Xenobia Bailey, BID ’77, had her hand-crocheted artwork Sun Birthing (1999) featured on the cover of the fall 2025 issue of BOMB. The issue also featured an oral history of the artist in conversation with Terence Washington, as well as a conversation between Deborah Willis, MFA Photography ’79, and Kalia Brooks. (@prattbap)
Phoebe Farris, PhD, MPS Art Therapy ’77, curated the exhibition Bernard/Bernie Boston Retrospective: A Photojournalist, Social Justice Advocate, and Family Man, on view at two sites in McLean, Virginia. Farris also exhibited four photographs and wrote a catalog essay for the group exhibition Decolonial Pilgrimage, on view from October 6, 2025, to January 9, 2026, at Stockton University’s Noyes Galleries at Kramer Hall in Hammonton, New Jersey.
Deborah Willis, PhD, MFA Photography ’79, and Philip Brookman cocurated the exhibition Photography of the Black Arts Movement, 1955–1985. Following its debut at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, it is touring to the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles and the Mississippi Museum of Art in Jackson in 2026. The exhibition examines how artists used the camera to shape Black identity, document the Civil Rights Movement, and foster community empowerment. (NGA)
1980s
Lisa Corinne Davis, BFA Fine Arts ’80, had her second solo exhibition at Miles McEnery Gallery in New York. Syllogism was on view from September 4 to October 25, 2025. In a review in Hyperallergic, critic John Yau writes, “It is amply clear to me that Davis has made geometric abstraction germane to our swiftly changing, downward spiraling times, and that is no small accomplishment.” (Hyperallergic)
Greer Lankton, BFA Fine Arts ’81 (1958–1996), was posthumously recognized with her first monograph, Could It Be Love, published by Weitzman’s Magic Hour Press in October 2025. The book project, featuring text by Hilton Als, was initiated by artist and activist Nan Goldin, who was Lankton’s friend and roommate in the early ’80s, and the editors Jordan Weitzman and Francis Schichtel. (T Magazine)
Bruce Southard, BFA Communications Design ’81, published his novel A Final Harvest. He writes, “For all of us who dream about a return to the land and the simple good life we knew, this novel provides unflinching, informative, and sometimes humorous detail on the work that life required. It is a coming-of-age story as well as a story of aging and the end of life in modern-day America.”
Charles Freeman, BFA Communications Design ’82, opened Gallery Charles in the Palm Beach area. The gallery features a selection of his limited-edition photographic works on metal—many captured in and around Paris, including in Versailles—that reimagine classic French architecture, historic interiors, and other spaces, such as mid-century airport lounges, in refined, large-scale compositions.
Rotimi Fani-Kayode, MFA Fine Arts ’83 (1955–1989), was featured in the “Overlooked No More” section of The New York Times. The article posthumously recognizes the photographer as “a pioneering figure in Black British art whose rebellious, symbol-rich images explored race, queerness, desire and spirituality.” (The New York Times)
Dustan Knight, MFA Fine Arts ’83, had a solo exhibition, Creative Joy, on view at the York Public Library in Maine from September 4 to October 31, 2025. A MacDowell Fellow and arts educator, Knight states, “I work in several styles that I return to continuously—ambiguous narratives inspired by overheard snippets of life, abstract landscapes that express my experiences in nature, and playful works that explore themes of chaos, humor, and joy.” (York Public Library)
Moses Ros, BArch ’83, a sculptor, painter, and printmaker, served as the artist-in-residence at the Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Connecticut, from February to August 2025. The body of work he created during his residency, HUMAN / NATURE, was on view at the museum from October 8, 2025, to January 4, 2026.
Lew Holzman, MSLIS ’84, most recently showed his digital art made with AI technologies at the Azit Gallery in Seoul, South Korea. A published poet and recipient of an artist’s grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, he moved from photography to digital media before incorporating AI into his practice. “My library degree afforded me the opportunity to work with information and share that, but also gave me the time to be a creative,” Holzman says.
Meryl Lettire, BFA Communications Design ’86, writes that she found success as a commercial illustrator and is now a full-time studio artist focused on “socially engaged textile portraiture.” Her series Heroes of the Holocaust was on view from September 2 to December 8, 2025, at the Human Rights Institute Gallery at Kean University in Union, New Jersey, following a solo exhibition that also included the series The Madonnas at ArtWRKD in Newtown, Pennsylvania.
Kate Buehner, MPS Art Therapy and Creativity Development ’87, had a solo exhibition of new paintings, Activation of Shapes, Color and Design, on view from August 28 to September 7, 2025, at River Arts in Damariscotta, Maine. During her career in mental health, Buehner maintained an active art practice. Now retired, the Maine resident creates work from a studio in her home’s attached barn. (Times-Record)
Valery Rizzo, BFA Communications Design ’88, published a book titled Brooklyn 2007–2023 (Kehrer Verlag). The book features Rizzo’s photography made with plastic toy cameras between 2007 and 2023, chronicling a period of major change in the borough through the eyes of a native Brooklynite.
Emilio Sosa, BFA Fashion Design ’89, created the costumes for Jesus Christ Superstar staged at the Hollywood Bowl from August 1 to 3, 2025, starring Tony Award winner Cynthia Erivo. (Playbill)
1990s
Michelle Frick, BFA Film ’91; MFA Fine Arts (Sculpture) ’23, had two sculptures featured in the group exhibition Trees, we breathe, on view from May 31 to November 30, 2025, at Wave Hill in the Bronx, New York. The presentation reflected on the vital role of trees in ecosystems, and Frick’s sculptures engaged with the legacy of the American chestnut tree, a once thriving species decimated by blight to functional extinction. (School of Art newsletter)
Gisela Romero, MFA Fine Arts ’92, presented new drawings in the exhibition WE, on view at the Orange County Administration Center in Orlando from September 29, 2025, to January 27, 2026. The works were inspired by the faces of people Romero saw from the window in her studio overlooking one of Orlando’s busiest thoroughfares. (Orlando Weekly)
Tina Periquet, MS Interior Design ’94, was honored with the Ani ng Dangal Award by the Philippine National Commission of Culture and the Arts in 2025. She is principal of Periquet Galicia, a design atelier based in Manila. The firm’s major projects include the Philippine National Museum of Natural History and Arya Residences, the only certified LEED gold residential building in the Philippines.
Jean Shin, BFA Fine Arts (Painting) ’94; MS Art History and Criticism ’96, received a solo exhibition at the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art at SUNY New Paltz. On view from September 6 to December 7, 2025, Jean Shin: Bodies of Knowledge brought together “key works that consider how lived experience, labor, and shared memory continue to inform how we learn, remember, and communicate,” according to the museum. Shin, an adjunct professor in Pratt’s Fine Arts Department, was also recently awarded a Pollock-Krasner Foundation grant. (Pollock-Krasner Foundation)
HIGHLIGHT: Illya Azaroff
Illya Azaroff, MS Construction Management ’97, was inaugurated as the 102nd president of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) in December 2025. An internationally recognized leader with over 30 years of experience in resilient design and disaster response, Azaroff is the founder of +LAB architect, a firm focused on building resilient capacity for underserved communities. He is also a professor at New York City College of Technology and has served AIA in several key roles, including as the 2021 AIA New York State president and as founder of the Design for Risk and Reconstruction committee at AIANY. “Architects are at the forefront of designing buildings and spaces that can withstand nature’s fury. As AIA President, I will work to ensure architects are empowered to create communities that are better prepared to deal with future disruptions,” Azaroff stated in his inaugural address. (AIA.org)
Jason Karolak, BFA Fine Arts (Painting) ’97, received a solo exhibition at Robischon Gallery in Denver. Peregrine featured recent oil paintings and water-based paintings on paper inspired by Karolak’s experiences in Senegal. It was on view from October 16 to December 31, 2025.
Jay Kaplan, MFA Sculpture ’98, was awarded a two-week residency as part of the Arts and Science Residency Program through the Peaked Hill Trust at the historic Ray Wells Dune Shack in Truro, Massachusetts. He writes that he spent time “off the grid” in the dunes while working on his Heart Mooring sculptures and other pieces for his latest body of work, Wrecked.
Jill Loewenthal, MPS Design Management ’98, had an exhibition of paintings, Unstill Life, at the Spring Street Gallery in New Shoreham, Rhode Island, from August 22 to September 4, 2025. The Block Island Times wrote that Loewenthal “invites viewers to pause, reflect, and rediscover beauty in natural and man-made objects—such as ripe fruit or a woven basket—rendered with energy and emotional depth.” (The Block Island Times)
Saba Besier, MFA Fine Arts ’99, presented an installation of ceramic sculptures at the Old Jail Art Center in Albany, Texas. Deep Resilience, on view from June 7 to September 6, 2025, featured coral-like formations to “explore and celebrate the concept of oceanic organisms’ ability to adapt, survive, and build bio-diverse habitats on man-made structures, where natural habitats have been eradicated due to pollution, overfishing, coastal development, and climate change,” according to the artist. (Old Jail Art Center)
Debbie Han, MFA Fine Arts (New Forms) ’99, received a solo exhibition at the Youngeun Museum of Contemporary Art in Gwangju, Gyeonggi-do, Korea, as part of an artist residency. Odyssey of Becoming: SHADOW PEOPLE, on view from October 28 to December 28, 2025, featured new works exploring “the complexities of human identity in the digital age,” according to the artist.
2000s
Jen Pawol, BFA Fine Arts (Painting) ’00, became the first woman to umpire a regular-season MLB game during an August 9 doubleheader between the Miami Marlins and the Atlanta Braves at Truist Park in Atlanta. As a Pratt student, she balanced her studies with umping softball games on the weekend. (Referee)
Sarah Krasley, BFA Fine Arts (Sculpture) ’01, was appointed a visiting fellow at Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations, where she is researching the intersection of automation and climate adaptation in industrial labor markets. Krasley is also the founder of Shimmy, an ed-tech company that upskills and retrains factory workers for the age of automation. Shimmy recently trained its 12,000th worker.
Eddie Bautista, MS City and Regional Planning ’02, and New York City Councilmember Alexa Avilés coauthored an op-ed in The Brooklyn Daily Eagle examining the proposed Brooklyn Marine Terminal redevelopment plan. Bautista serves as the executive director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance. (The Brooklyn Daily Eagle)
Mika Song, BFA Film ’02, wrote and illustrated a new children’s graphic novel. Night Chef: An Epic Tale of Friendship with a Side of Deliciousness! was published by Random House Graphic in October 2025. The story centers on a lonely raccoon chef who must leave the confines of the restaurant where she secretly lives to reunite a baby crow with his family. (Publishers Weekly)
Camille Wainer, BFA Communications Design ’02, has artwork and animation featured in Lemurs in Art, a limited-edition art book published by the Lemur Conservation Foundation to raise awareness of issues that threaten the future of wildlife on Madagascar. Wainer’s flash animation MadagaSCARS is held in the Foundation’s permanent collection.
Tom Yeaton, BFA Communications Design ’03, is a senior designer who built a career in strategic creative consulting and design with clients including New Balance, International Justice Mission, Kodiak, and Rios Partners. For 16 years, he worked as a consultant for Timberland, with projects that included numerous logos, catalogs, and a window display at Macy’s Herald Square. At Pratt, Yeaton was a scholarship awardee whose achievements were recognized at an event keynoted by advertising designer Stan Richards.
Tomokazu Matsuyama, MS Communications Design ’04, received a solo exhibition at the SCAD Museum of Art. Liberation Back Home, on view from August 1, 2025, to January 4, 2026, featured paintings and large-scale works that artnet News said “reverberate with West Coast skate energy.” (artnet News)
Laura Terry, BFA Fine Arts (Painting) ’04, published her second fantasy graphic novel, Adorable Empire, with Scholastic in August 2025. Described as “engagingly original” in Kirkus Reviews, the story focuses on a middle schooler named Jinx who is struggling with bullies, her parents’ divorce, and moving to an unfamiliar apartment. When a magic crystal unleashes a band of supernatural forest creatures into her life, Jinx learns to accept the changes in her life and to find happiness once again. (Kirkus Reviews)
Jared Lairmore, BID ’04, served as the design director for Radical Acts of Unrelenting Beauty, an immersive performance by Jordan Roth that took place at the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, on July 10, 2025.
Samantha Black, BFA Fashion Design ’05, founder and designer of Sammy B, headlined the 16th annual Finale Runway Show during Fashion Week Columbus in September. Black, a contestant on the series Project Runway and Project Runway All Stars, trained at the London atelier of Alexander McQueen before launching her own label. Her designs have been worn by Beyoncé, Rihanna, Gabrielle Union, Nicki Minaj, Keke Palmer, and other celebrities. (Columbus Fashion Council)
Chrissy Angliker, BID ’06, shared warm memories of the artistic community that formed around her Clinton Hill studio space of 14 years, which was recently featured in a short documentary film produced by Jason Schmidt and Cory Jacobs, The Candy Factory, available to stream for free on The New Yorker’s YouTube page. Angliker writes, “We need more counterculture built on love, respect, and creativity.” (Artist’s newsletter)
Mark Grattan, BID ’06, launched his debut collaboration with HBF Textiles. The collection, featuring three patterns inspired by Grattan’s creative journeys in New York City, Mexico City, and Rio de Janeiro, was awarded the Interior Design HiP Award for Best Hospitality Fabric and Textiles in 2025. (Hospitality Design)
Duke Riley, MFA Fine Arts (Sculpture) ’06, received a survey exhibition at Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art. O’er the Wide and Plastic Sea, on view from February 7 to August 31, 2025, was highlighted in Virginia Living. (Virginia Living)
Phoebe Robinson, BFA Writing ’06, released a new comedy special, I Don’t Wanna Work Anymore, on YouTube in October. (The Hollywood Reporter)
Liz Hannah, BFA Film ’07, will collaborate with author Liz Moore to adapt Moore’s bestselling novel The God of the Woods for Netflix. Hannah and Moore will serve as co-showrunners, writers, and executive producers. (Variety)
Serban Ionescu, BArch ’07, had a solo exhibition at PLUS-ONE Projects in Antwerp. Vicus, on view from August 30 to October 4, 2025, featured new drawings and paintings. The artist told The Observer (UK), “Everything emerges from an act of drawing. I think there are three organs of thought: the mind, the stomach and the hand—and I rely a lot on the hand.” (The Observer)
Alyona Makeeva, MID ’07, is working as a lead visual merchandising designer at Estée Lauder. For the past two years, she has collaborated with the brands Kilian Paris and Frederic Malle. Her work includes design and production for Macy’s Holiday Windows, pop-ups at Bergdorf Goodman, and a booth at the Sephora Conference in Las Vegas.
Ben Gould, BID ’08, and Dawn Mostow, MFA Fine Arts ’08, won the Supreme WOW Award at World of WearableArt 2025 for latex garments inspired by Japanese tsukumogami. Mostow and Gould met as students at Pratt Institute and married in 2011. Their garments have been worn by celebrities like Katy Perry and Beyoncé and featured in Vogue.
Lizbeth Murphy, BFA Art and Design Education ’08, ran the 2025 New York City Marathon in support of Self Help Africa, an organization with a mission to empower rural women entrepreneurs across the continent.
Robert Yerachmiel Sniderman, BFA Writing ’09, made the film Night Herons with Joanna Rajkowska for the 2020 edition of the Austrian contemporary art festival Steirischer Herbst. Following its presentation in Joanna Rajkowksa: Night Herons at the gallery Lokal_30 in Warsaw, the film received the 2024 ING Polish Art Foundation Grand Prize, was screened at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea, and entered the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw.
2010s
Daniel Lopatin, MSLIS ’10, scored the film Marty Supreme, directed by Josh Safdie and released by A24 on December 25, 2025. Lopatin, also known as Oneohtrix Point Never, previously scored the Safdie Brothers’ features Good Time (2017) and Uncut Gems (2019). (School of Information newsletter)
Oleg Lyamin, BArch ’10, was promoted to senior associate at Huntsman Architectural Group in October 2025. Over the course of his career, Lyamin has provided technical leadership on projects for ColliersDelta Dental, Moody’s, Hines, Silverstein Properties, Flagstar, and Citizens Bank.
Nick Pedersen, MFA Digital Arts ’11, was awarded an artist grant by Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Public Art Challenge to represent Salt Lake City (one of eight cities selected nationally to receive $1 million for temporary public art projects addressing urgent civic issues). His project, Here Today, Gone Tomorrow, featured two opposing billboards highlighting the decline of the Great Salt Lake and its potential ecological and economic impacts on the city, state, and region.
Cory Sellers, MFA ’11, was a featured artist in the annual Winter Group Show at Houska Gallery in St. Louis. Sellers’s presentation, titled Immediate Connections, was on view from December 5, 2025, to March 7, 2026.
HIGHLIGHT: Hiba Schahbaz
Hiba Schahbaz, MFA Fine Arts ’12, received her first solo museum exhibition, The Garden, at the Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami. The presentation, which was on view from November 5, 2025, to March 16, 2026, featured more than 70 works exploring themes of fantasy, heritage, and selfhood. The retrospective was framed conceptually through the idea of the jannat, or “Paradise Garden,” an idyllic space referenced in Islamic tradition and Sufi poetry. The curatorial layout drew inspiration from the Persian and Mughal char-bagh, a quadrilateral garden divided by water channels. Schahbaz’s practice is rooted in the tradition of Indo-Persian miniature painting but has expanded to include large-scale compositions and installations that merge autobiographical and mythological elements. Vogue described the exhibition as “breathtaking” in a feature article, praising the artist’s “intuitive, almost spiritual” process. (Vogue)
Liu Kincheloe, MFA Fine Arts (Painting and Drawing) ’12, received her first solo exhibition. Chirality was on view at the Turley Gallery in Hudson, New York, from September 20 to November 2, 2025. (School of Art newsletter)
Kevin Griendling, AIA NCARB, BArch ’13, launched PrepARE, a comprehensive Architect Registration Exam prep series, in partnership with AIA East Bay. Griendling writes that the program blends on-demand video, community learning, and practice exams “to help demystify the ARE and strengthen career readiness through strategic study design and professional mentorship.”
Noor Ahmed, BFA Fine Arts ’14, was named curator of the fifth edition of the Karachi Biennale (KB27), scheduled to open in January 2027. Organizers say the event “aims to push boundaries, spark dialogue, and reimagine the role of contemporary art in Pakistan’s cultural landscape.” (Karachi Biennale Trust)
Bill Levay, MSLIS ’15, visiting assistant professor in the School of Information, spoke at the Creative Operations Summit in New York. Levay shared how the New York Philharmonic’s archives play a role in the organization’s marketing, storytelling, and audience engagement. (Henry Stewart Conferences)
Judy Yi, BFA Fashion Design ’15, is launching MOONLIT+ silk sleep goggles, a reimagined sleep mask. Yi writes that the patent-pending design “blends blackout comfort with skincare-friendly innovation.”
Izzy Nova, BFA Fine Arts (Drawing) ’16, cocurated the exhibition Artist Narrator: The Art of Storytelling in Contemporary Painting, on view at the nonprofit organization Art House Productions in Jersey City, New Jersey, from September 6 to September 28, 2025. (Artist’s newsletter)
Aarushi Agni, MFA Writing ’17, inaugurated the Writing program’s alum-in-residence program in fall 2025. The initiative is designed to connect cohorts of Pratt writers and help current students understand the career paths that are open to them. A writer, comedian, singer, artist, and educator, Agni performed her show EMOJI: Or how I stopped worrying and learned to send the risky text at Pratt in November.
Rafaella Castagnola, BFA Communications Design ’17, presented Urbe Infinita (Infinite Metropolis), a multimedia solo exhibition that opened in May 2025 in Lima, Peru. The exhibition explored Lima’s evolving landscape of self-built architecture through the Google Maps archive, photography, video, and family stories to reflect on the city’s continuous process of growth and change.
Anika Jade Levy, BFA Writing ’17, published her debut novel Flat Earth (Catapult), which The New York Times described as “funny and sharp.” (The New York Times)
Jive Poetic, MFA Writing ’17, was one of three spoken word poets featured at the Adirondack Center for Writing’s Poetry on Broadway program. Poetic, whose memoir Skip Tracer was published by W.W. Norton in 2024, is the founder of Insurgent Poets Society and Carnival Slam: Cultural Exchange and the cofounder of the Brooklyn Poetry Slam. (Adirondack Almanack)
Erik Troy, BFA Film ’17, began his career directing commercials in the Boston area. He is currently living and working in the film industry in Southern California, where he is developing his first feature film, Calameda Road.
Chris Rutledge, BFA Digital Arts (3D Animation) ’18, won the animated series competition at the 2025 Ottawa International Animation Festival for Eggland, which he directed with Cole Kush. (OIAF)
Isabelle Brourman, MFA Fine Arts ’19, received the New York Press Club’s Continuing Coverage–National Magazine Award in October 2025 for her illustrations for the “Trump on Trial” series in New York Magazine. (New York Press Club)
Jungwon Phee, BFA Fine Arts ’19, was selected through a competitive open call process to present his work at the SOMA Museum of Art in Seoul, South Korea. 51 Into Drawing: Archival Painting, on view from September 26 to November 2, 2025, featured over 300 paintings and a large-scale installation.
Ava Rikki, BFA Film ’19, made the 2026 Forbes 30 Under 30 list in the Marketing and Advertising category as a director. Rikki writes, “I’m incredibly grateful for the education, mentorship, and community I found at Pratt. So many of the skills and values I carry into my career today were shaped there, and I’d love to share this milestone with the alumni community.”
2020s
Paolo Balboa, MSLIS ’20, was appointed the chief digital equity officer for the City of New York. In this role, he will implement New York City’s plan to ensure that all New Yorkers have access to broadband internet service and the skills training they need to apply for jobs, fill their prescriptions, apply for child care, and complete other essential tasks. (NYC Office of Technology and Innovation)
Jason Chen, BID ’21, founder of Studio Chen, was recognized among Architectural Digest’s 2025 New American Voices. The highlight noted that Chen began his career working for Billy Cotton, BID ’07, before launching his own studio, where “he has developed his own style while remaining attuned to client needs—whether leaning into the Colonial Revival spirit of a Berkshires house or conjuring a new Manhattan dining concept for the team behind Jupiter and King.” (Architectural Digest)
Avery Toomes, BFA Writing ’22, contributed an essay to Empathy Impact: The Wild Effects of Kindness in Action, published by Sulit Press Books in December 2025. The volume highlights stories of how acts of empathy created change in individual lives and communities, with proceeds donated to Louder Than Silence, a nonprofit offering free therapy and support services to survivors of sexual violence. (Pratt Writing Alumni Listserv)
Mackie Mallison, BFA Film ’23, was chosen for the inaugural 2025 Sundance Institute Filmmakers Fund, which awards grants to emerging artists.
Joe Turpin, MFA Fine Arts (Painting and Drawing) ’23, is among the artists featured in the exhibition Proverbs, Adages, and Maxims, on view at Heller Museum at Hebrew Union College from August 18, 2025, to June 24, 2026. Turpin’s work, You Can’t Hold a Candle To It! (The Beastie Boys as Shadrack, Meshack and Abednego) recasts a story from the Book of Daniel about three men who were rescued by divine intervention after they were thrown into a furnace. (School of Art newsletter)
Izzy Chavez, BFA Digital Arts (2-D Animation) ’24, had their work, Adam and Eve in the Kingdom of Animals, screened at the 2025 Annecy Festival. (MUBI)
Isabela Fraga-Abaza, BFA Digital Arts (2-D Animation) ’24, received the Stephen Hillenburg Animation Honor from the Princess Grace Awards following a nomination by Princess Grace Award winner and Pratt assistant professor Caitlin Craggs. (Variety)
Michael Ortiz Jiménez and Paula Stoddard Sotomayor, both MArch ’24, won in the furniture category of Launch Pad at WANTED, a juried competition for emerging designers that took place as part of the International Contemporary Furniture Fair. Collaborating under the name Estudio PM, they created the collection Herencia Tótem, which transforms reclaimed textiles into side tables and stools. (Dwell)
Ashanti Hampton, MID ’25, plans to open a community pottery studio in Atlanta called East Atlanta Clay. Hampton envisions the studio as a place where artists of all ages can boost their creativity and connect with their neighbors. (The Southerner)
Andrew Riad, MFA Writing ’25, was selected as the winner of the 2025 Megaphone Prize. Riad’s work of poetry, MARTYRED, MOTHER: A FUTURENARRATIVE, will be published by the Brooklyn-based press Radix in 2026. (@radix.coop)
Ciara Sergi, BFA Fine Arts ’25, was featured in the Woodstock Film Festival in October 2025 with her film No Free Brains, which centers around Lamb Chop, a “regular guy” looking to buy a new brain. (Woodstock Film Festival)
Johnny Xie, BID ’25, presented his flat-pack chair design, Pivota, at a trade show at Gensler’s New York City office in October. Xie was previously recognized with the Best of Students Award at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair for this design.
Submission guidelines:
Pratt alumni, we want to know what you’re up to, and so do your fellow graduates. Send your updates on work and life to classnotes@pratt.edu. Notes may be up to 75 words in length. Please include your full name, degree or program, and graduation year. Submissions will be edited for length, clarity, and style. Image submissions should be high resolution (300 dpi at 5 x 7 inches).
Keep up with the latest alumni updates. Visit the new Alumni News and Events page: pratt.edu/alumni.