MFA IN VISUAL ART
AN MFA PROGRAM FOR MAKERS AND THINKERS
LETTER FROM THE CHAIR
Welcome to the MFA in Visual Art program at WashU’s Sam Fox School. I’m excited to share with you the people and programs that make us unique.
At the Sam Fox School, we know the world needs all kinds of artists. Here, we have programs and funding to support diverse creativity—historical techniques, emerging media, scholarly research, social practice, and everything else you can and can’t yet imagine.
The MFA-VA curriculum is designed to help you craft a future studio practice you’ll mine for a lifetime; parallel courses in making and thinking build the foundation of studio as research. Our faculty are artists with broad professional experience who work generously and seriously with each of our grads.
In our halls, you’re as likely to find intense discussion as concentrated making. Artists, architects, designers and illustrators cross paths and cross-pollinate. Our six shops and several skilled shop techs train and assist students in everything from welding to 3D printing—meaning students can produce the highest level of craft without sacrificing ideas.
Experimentation, discovery and collaboration are built in, including an inspiring visiting artist program. The Sam Fox School also hosts Fox Fridays, an offering where members of the school community give workshops on lesser-known and under-utilized methods that might not fit into a class (think: RISO animation, wood lathe, video projection mapping, hollow form handbuilding in clay, Arduino circuit boards, and more).
We’re proud of our home in St. Louis—a real, historic, and complex city in which an artist can make a life. We have stunning museums with worthy collections, world-class music and theatre, and an unbelievable park system. Plus, many of our cultural institutions offer free admission—and we use it!
I hope this catalog makes you excited and curious to learn more about us. If you have questions, please reach out to me at calvertt@wustl.edu
Tiffany Calvert
Associate Professor & Chair, MFA in Visual Art Program
Sam Fox School of
Design
&
Visual Arts
Washington University in St. Louis
2 Curriculum
6 Studios & Facilities
12 St. Louis
16 MFA in Visual Art Thesis
30 Faculty
34
Visiting Lecturers & Critics
36 Alumni
41 Scholarships & Financial Aid
Background image: Installation view, Slingshot: 2024 MFA in Visual Art Thesis Exhibition. Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 2024. Photo: Virginia Harold.
CURRICULUM
CHAIRED BY Associate Professor Tiffany
Calvert, our curriculum instills students with the agency and resiliency essential to the next generation of artists.
As part of a tier-one research university, our MFA in Visual Art program is an inclusive, close-knit community of renegade makers and thinkers. We offer students a site for rigorous inquiry, humanity, and intellectual generosity.
In the Graduate Studio, students work independently with the guidance of a primary faculty mentor as well as a broad range of other faculty and visitors.
Group Critique is the heart of the curriculum. A mix of first- and secondyear students meets for rigorous weekly critiques to share new work and engage in lively, constructive discussion.
A sequence of required Graduate Seminars engages students in research methodologies and prepares them for professional careers in the arts.
MFA-VA students can enroll in Electives across the school and the university that build upon their research interests. Students also participate in Workshops to build essential technical and professional skills.
Form connections Experiment
WORKSHOPS
FOX FRIDAYS
STUDENTS CAN LEARN how to use new tools, processes, and technologies through Fox Fridays, a weekly, low-stress workshop series. Recent sessions include: Intro to Machine Learning; Sound Design; Alternative Processes in Silkscreening; Arduino Motors & Sensors; and Intro to Game Development, VR, and AR.
Working
alongside my cohort has truly been a joy and inspiration. We have collectively supported each other and developed an open way of communicating and working together even amidst the difficulties which inevitably arise with group projects and high emotion. I’ve loved many things about this experience, and getting to know the bright, intelligent people in my cohort is at the top of the list.”
–Jordan Geiger, MFA '24
During the first year, MFA-VA students develop summer independent projects supported by research to be exhibited early the following fall. Projects can be accomplished in Sam Fox School studios or by engaging in residencies with arts organizations.
In alternating years, students have the opportunity to participate in our Sommerakademie in Germany. Students develop a project proposal in spring of their first year and exhibit their work in the fall.
The College of Art subscribes to the
for the MFA degree set forth by the College Art Association (CAA) and
STUDY ABROAD
BERLIN
THE BERLIN SOMMERAKADEMIE explores multiple modes of creative and cultural production in relation to the material, social, and political conditions of Berlin, Germany. In this seminar-based course—which begins on-campus in the spring semester and extends into the summer for travel abroad—students gain an understanding of how artists address history, communities, and social contexts in relation to the conceptual and practical dimensions of their work.
Students spend about one month abroad: three weeks in Berlin, and one week in Venice for the famed Venice
Biennale. A purely exploratory program, the Sommerakademie is offered every other year; students attend following either their first or second year in the MFA program. An additional course fee applies, and students are responsible for their own travel and lodging expenses.
Students participating in the 2024 Berlin Sommerakademie visited the Palais Populaire, where they toured an exhibition called "La Chola Poblete: Guaymallén."
Photo: Roy Uptain.
BEYOND THE CURRICULUM
STUDENTS HAVE ACCESS to a wide array of fellowships, residencies, and grant funding throughout the MFA-VA program.
›› CounterPublic Fellowship
The CounterPublic Fellowship invites firstyear MFA-VA students to take part in the triennial civic exhibition and includes a $7,500 stipend. The exhibition, begun in 2019, is “one of the nation’s largest public art platforms,” and has been featured in The New York Times.
››
Lewis Collaborative Curator-in-Residence
The Lewis Collaborative Curator-inResidence is a one-year appointment open to MFA-VA students living at WashU’s Lewis Collaborative. The residency includes curating exhibitions and other events in collaboration with TechArtista, a coworking company that manages the space.
››
Grants
The MFA-VA Graduate Student Production Grant and Thesis Research and Production Grant provide up to $1,000 for students to pursue studio production ideas that would otherwise be out of reach.
›› Graduate Student Travel Stipends
The Sam Fox School offers competitive travel stipends for graduate students. These stipends primarily support travel for research and creative activity when accompanied by a strong rationale. By investing in student travel, the school aims to support creative activity and research.
My favorite thing
about participating in Counterpublic
is being a part of a team of passionate individuals who are all working to better their community through art—using art as this powerful connecting tissue that combines the city together and brings healing and vitality to all sorts of diverse neighborhoods.”
–Roy Uptain, MFA '25, 2024 CounterPublic Fellow
›› Fine Arts Work Center Scholarship
Each year, the school offers two awards for MFA-VA students to attend a one-week workshop at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts. The award covers tuition, on-site housing, travel expenses up to $500, and reimbursement for required supplies.
STUDIOS & FACILITIES
↑ WEIL HALL
Opened in fall 2019, Anabeth and John Weil Hall is a hub for our graduate programs in visual art, illustration & visual culture, architecture, landscape architecture, and urban design. Designed by the firm KieranTimberlake, the 82,000-squarefoot facility includes studio spaces across graduate programs; exhibition and project spaces; communal spaces for socializing and working; and numerous resources for making, including an experimental studio for video, film, and time-based media. The building achieved LEED Platinum status— the U.S. Green Building Council’s highest certification.
Weil Hall offers ready connections to the facilities and maker spaces in the school’s six-building complex.
Photo: Devon Hill / WashU.
→ KUEHNER COURT
Adjacent to the MFA-VA studios, Kuehner Court in Weil Hall offers a welcoming space to relax and work, and includes a lush, twostory living green wall.
Photo: James Ewing / JBSA.
MFA-VA STUDIOS ↓
MFA-VA studios are located across the south side of Weil Hall’s second and third floors, providing abundant natural light. Each student gets their own, 180-square-foot, loft-style studio space. Installation spaces throughout the studio areas allow students to convene for critiques, student-curated exhibitions, and impromptu gatherings.
Photos: Audrey Westcott (below, bottom), Caitlin Custer (right).
→ PRINTMAKING + BOOK STUDIO
The school has a new, integrated printmaking atelier for letterpress, etching, lithography, and illustrated books. The space includes the Dubinsky Printmaking Studio, which features very large, electrically powered etching presses and Island Press, our collaborative printmaking workshop. A collaboration with University Libraries, the Nancy Spirtas Kranzberg Studio for the Illustrated Book is a working book and print production facility that includes equipment for letterpress, intaglio, photopolymer plate, and silkscreen processes.
Photo: Joshua White.
↑ WOOD AND METAL SHOPS
The school’s wood and metal shops are staffed by expert teaching technicians. Walker Hall houses wood and metal shops, a CNC plasma cutter, plaster and mold-making, foundry, and ceramics facilities, including several kilns. Interior courtyards in Walker and Weil, along with numerous exterior spaces, provide opportunities for large-scale investigations.
↑ CALERES FABRICATION STUDIO
The Caleres Fabrication Studio supports complex projects and digital fabrication, featuring industry-grade tools such as laser cutters, 3D printers, a large-format CNC milling machine, vacuum and thermoforming, and a knife plotter. Special workshops, including Fox Fridays (see p. 3), provide students opportunities to learn to use these tools.
Photo: Joshua White.
ISLAND PRESS
ISLAND PRESS, directed by Professor Lisa Bulawsky, is a research-based printmaking workshop that creates and publishes innovative prints and multiples. In the context of intensive visiting artist residencies, Island Press explores the expansive theoretical and material terrain of the print. The Press is project-driven, tapping into the place where the artist’s creative activity intersects with the philosophical underpinnings of printmaking. Experimentation with new modes and technologies is a natural part of this pursuit, resulting in the creation of ambitious editions in a range of media.
Visiting artists work in collaboration with the master printer, faculty, and students, who gain access to the technical and conceptual challenges of a variety of projects. Past visiting artists include Dario Robleto, Nina Katchadourian, Beverly Semmes, Michael Joo, and Radcliffe Bailey.
↑ Diana Guerrero-Maciá The Beautiful Girls No. 4, 2018. Relief, monotype, blind embossment, and archival inkjet collage on Rives BFK off white, 17" x 14". Edition of 14.
↗ Paula Wilson. In the Desert: Coupling, 2016. Unique print—monotype and collagraph on muslin, mounted on canvas and wood, 69 ½" x 43 ¾".
→ Duane Slick. Crafting a Consequential Narrative, 2020. Collagraph, relief, screenprint, acrylic, and chine collé (on okawara) on Rives BFK white, 34 ½" x 30". Edition of 16.
↑ DES LEE GALLERY
MFA-VA students are provided numerous opportunities to exhibit their work, both on and off campus. Located in downtown St. Louis, the Des Lee Gallery is one of the School’s many exhibition spaces. Throughout the year, it presents work by students, faculty, and alumni, as well as other artists and designers.
Photo: Carol Green / WashU.
← KRANZBERG LIBRARY
The University’s library system features 12 distinct sites, including the Kenneth and Nancy Kranzberg Art & Architecture Library, which holds more than 105,000 volumes in various media, and subscribes to the foremost electronic article indexes, e-book reference works, and digital image databases. The Dowd Illustration Research Archive (DIRA) is the most comprehensive archival collection of periodical illustration held by any academic institution.
Photo: Caitlin Custer.
WHAT DO THE UNIVERSITY’S RESOURCES MEAN FOR YOU?
The Sam Fox School is an integral part of Washington University’s diverse academic community, which is home to some of the world’s leading experts in the humanities and the sciences. You’ll have access to the University’s system of 12 libraries, a professional media production center, two observatories, an environmental field station, and much more. Immersed in this rich research environment, our students are ideally equipped to develop ideas and artworks of consequence and significance.
KEMPER ART MUSEUM
AMONG THE NATION’S leading university art museums, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum serves as a center of cultural and intellectual life on campus and in St. Louis.
At the museum, encounters with original works of art inspire creativity, social and intellectual inquiry, and meaningful connections across disciplines, cultures, and histories. With approximately 8,700 works of art in its collection—dating from antiquity to the present—the museum has especially strong holdings of 19th-, 20th-, and 21st-century European and American paintings, sculpture, prints, installations, and photographs, as well as a growing collection of global art. Its special exhibitions present the work of some of today’s most important artists as well as new understandings of historical art. Unique educational offerings focus on multidisciplinary exchange that stimulates critical thinking, visual literacy, and curiosity.
See p. 16 to learn about the MFA in Visual Art Thesis Exhibition, held at the Kemper Art Museum every spring.
↑ Opening of Katharina Grosse Studio Paintings, 1988–2022: Returns, Revisions, Inventions, September 23, 2022. Photo: Virginia Harold.
↗ Kemper lobby, featuring Tomás Saraceno, Cosmic Filaments, 2019. Photo: Joshua White.
→ The Gertrude Bernoudy Gallery displays works from the museum's 19th- and early 20th-century American and European collections. Photo: Virginia Harold.
SELECTED ARTISTS
Franz Ackermann
John Baldessari
Alberto Burri
Willem de Kooning
Nicole Eisenman
Olafur Eliasson
Isa Genzken
Jenny Holzer
Barbara Kruger
Louise Lawler
Henri Matisse
Pablo Picasso
Jackson Pollock
Tim Rollins
Ed Ruscha
Lorna Simpson
Kiki Smith
Pierre Soulages
Wolfgang Tillmans
Kara Walker
Carrie Mae Weems
Pae White
ST. LOUIS
ST. LOUIS IS A GREAT PLACE for artists to integrate with the vibrant local arts scene. With dozens of small galleries, opportunities to show your work off campus are endless. Our historic city is a fascinating place to explore and acts not only as a site of engagement but also as an extension of the studio.
LOCAL MUSEUMS, GALLERIES, AND ARTS SPACES
• 21c Hotel*
• 31art Gallery
• Angad Arts Hotel
• Barrett Barrera Projects
• Bruno David Gallery
• Center of Creative Arts (COCA)
• Contemporary Art Museum (CAM)
• Cunst Gallery
• Des Lee Gallery
• Duane Reed Gallery
• Fifteen Windows Gallery
• Granite City Art and Design District (G-CADD)*
• High Low Gallery
• Houska Gallery
• Kranzberg Arts Center Gallery
• Lewis Collaborative at TechArtista
• The Luminary
• Mad Art Gallery
• Philip Slein Gallery
• Pulitzer Arts Foundation
• Saint Louis Art Museum
• The Sheldon Concert Hall & Art Galleries
• Sophie’s Artist Lounge
• Wildfruit Projects
• William Shearburn Gallery
* pictured on the following spread
Devon Hill / WashU
Photo: Devon Hill / WashU
Photo: Devon Hill / WashU
Photo: Caitlin Custer
St. Louis is a profoundly interesting city for artists. It’s funky, affordable, complex—and has good eats and a ridiculous amount of culture per square foot.”
MFA-VA first years form connections with local galleries and open-concept spaces such as City Foundry (top, above left) and the Granite City Art and Design District (G-CADD) (right) which have served as venues for past shows. Photos: Devon Hill / WashU.
–Amy Hauft, Director, College & Graduate School of Art; Jane Reuter Hitzeman and Herbert F. Hitzeman, Jr. Professor of Art
Downtown St. Louis' new 21c hotel highlights more than 70 works by a wide range of internationally celebrated artists, including MFA-VA alumni Ebony Patterson, MFA ’06 (top), Quinn Antonio Briceño, MFA ’22 (above left); and Yvonne Osei, MFA ’16 (above right). Photos: Whitney Curtis / WashU.
MFA IN VISUAL ART THESIS
THE MFA THESIS is the culmination of the MFA in Visual Art program. It comprises the thesis artwork, the thesis text, and the artist talk. You’ll present your thesis artwork at the annual MFA in Visual Art Thesis Exhibition, held at the School’s Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum.
THESIS ARTWORK
You’ll begin preparing for your thesis exhibition in the fall semester of the second year, working with faculty and curators to shape your vision of the work and develop your thesis plan in the Research for Practice Seminar.
THESIS TEXT
In the spring semester, the Thesis + Exhibition Prep Seminar provides tools for negotiating conceptual and practical matters related to the thesis exhibition as well as guidance on the writing of your thesis text and the presentation of your artist talk.
ARTIST TALK
The artist talk is given in conjunction with the thesis exhibition and is attended by your thesis committee, invited guest critics, and the general public.
Request a copy of the most recent MFA-VA Thesis Exhibition catalog by emailing us at samfoxgradadmissions@wustl.edu.
Whitney Curtis / WashU
Jamie Lee Harris, MFA '23
Maame Wata Awaits for You, Ma, 2023. Ceramic, terracotta, sand, wood, and copper, 77 × 48 × 48 in. overall.
We Sing, We Wail, We Wake, for Homegoing’s Sake, 2023. Ceramic tile, wood, raffia, shell, oil on canvas, and found objects, 96 × 72 × 51 in. Photos: Kalaija Mallery.
I went from thinking I was just going to focus on painting to working more in ceramics, to doing installations and large sculptures. These are things I wouldn’t have been able to do without the facilities here. Some schools have kilns that will fire right sometimes and not at all other times. Here, I can safely experiment and work large.”
—Jamie Lee Harris, MFA '23
Harris’ thesis project primarily focused on the mourning history of the African diaspora. With this research, she looked at different African religions, searching for common threads between a Western lens and an African lens. “I’m looking for elements that resonate with me and speak through my work,” she said.
Photo: Caitlin Custer
Jorge Rios, MFA '23 Azul, Amarillo, Rojo, 2023. Watercolor and acrylic marker on Arches paper mounted on 4 wood panels, 96 × 48 in. each.
Photos: Kalaija Mallery.
When I was applying to graduate schools, I visited the Sam Fox School and kind of fell in love with the space. I had a great connection with Professor Lisa Bulawsky. We had meaningful conversations about the work I was doing, and I knew it was a good decision to come here.
When I’m painting, feelings come in
waves.
There’s a lot of struggle, peaks and valleys, realization and joy”
—Jorge Rios, MFA '23
Rios’ thesis project is an exploration of painting itself, utilizing watercolors and acrylic markers on paper, then mounting onto plywood panels. The work is directed to painters in the way it’s constructed. “It’s inspired by the way I interact with painting as a painter—I’m very attracted to a painting that resists revealing its process, how it was made,” he said.
Photo: Caitlin Custer
Lynne Smith, MFA '24
Every One, 2024. Broken paperclip, thread, and air, 7 x 1/16 x 2 in. W14, W15 (whatever it takes), 2024. Non-standard steel (steel, foam, epoxy, adhesive, putty, saliva, and latex paint), 300 x 15 x 15 in.
Photos: Virginia Harold / WashU.
I’ve
made connections in other departments that are actively influencing my practice—I spend time in a neuroscience lab and witness the electrical charge of touch, and talk about materials, matter, particles, and energy with a friend in quantum physics. The generosity of knowledge and enthusiastic reciprocity of engagement in our respective practices is exciting.”
—Lynne Smith, MFA '24
“I hope to generate more questions than answers,” Lynne Smith said. Her thesis work examined gestures— from the minute to the massive—using humble materials and the specificity of sites to explore themes of fragility and resilience.
Photo: Caitlin Custer
Joni P. Gordon, MFA '24 [W]hole, 2024. Paint, ink, thread, rope, sand, mirror, kraft paper, and photographs on Masonite, 96 x 126 x 48 in.
Photos: Virginia Harold / WashU.
The most valuable thing that I will take away from being here at WashU is the community—the people I’ve met—and how the program allowed for experimentation. ”
—Joni P. Gordon, MFA '24
This work compares Joni Gordon’s Black identity in her homeland, Jamaica, versus in the United States. “Through this work, I confront displacement, colorism, my ancestry, and racial identity. I question both the possibility and one’s attempt to heal from the psychological scars caused by racial discrimination,” she said.
Photo: Caitlin Custer
Samantha Neu, MFA '24
Homesick, 2024. Insulation foam, joint compound, and paint, 84 x 60 x 120 in.
Photos: Dmitri Jackson (top, right), Virginia Harold / WashU (above).
When I visited WashU … I could tell the faculty and cohort would be supportive through the program, and the current students emphasized the faculty’s accessibility. I also knew I wanted to attend a school that offered classes outside of art. I have taken creative writing, archaeology, and gender studies classes here,
all of which have
my work.”
—Samantha Neu, MFA '24
influenced
Samantha Neu’s work explores the various facets of being a material body—erotic, intimate, grotesque, fragile, transient, humorous. Homesick implies body through its organic form, and at ten feet long, six feet wide, and seven feet tall, the large form suggests the body by eliciting an interaction.
“The viewer imagines climbing on the form, but they are denied this experience. They become aware of their physical relationship to the piece through this tension,” she said.
Photo: Caitlin Custer
Sophia Hatzikos, MFA '24
Absence, 2024. Ceramic and wood, 204 x 180 x 72 in.
Photos: Virginia Harold / WashU (top), Dmitri Jackson (right).
I like researching, I like learning, I like talking with people. It took me a long time to acknowledge and claim the title of artist— because that does feel like a choice. [Other disciplines] have procedures and expected ways of being. Art didn’t have rules like that. There isn’t just one way to present things.”
—Sophia Hatzikos, MFA '24
Sophia Hatzikos’ work is a recollection of her time, path, motion, and body. “I wanted to make something that people are able to walk into—to be close, to be far, to be longing. Water has this vastness that is so big and hard to contain, but I feel that everyone shares a common memory and identity with water,” she said of the sculpted relief tiles.
Photo: Caitlin Custer
FACULTY
OUR FACULTY are nationally and internationally recognized for their diverse practices, which engage complex territories on the environment, race, politics, material culture, science, and the human condition. Thwarting conventional silos, many work across disciplines and collaborate with practitioners in other fields. Several Sam Fox School faculty have joint appointments in other departments—including Film & Media Studies; American Culture Studies; Performing Arts; Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; and African and African-American Studies—so they are poised to connect you with other research areas at the university.
MFA-VA PROGRAM CORE FACULTY
Jamie Adams
Heather Bennett
Lisa Bulawsky
Tiffany Calvert
Joe deVera
Amy Hauft
Meghan Kirkwood
Arny Nadler
Patricia Olynyk
Jack Risley
Cheryl Wassenaar
Monika Weiss
SELECT FELLOWSHIPS & AWARDS
• New York Foundation for the Arts Grant
• Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant
• Fulbright Fellowship
• National Endowment for the Arts Grant
• Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award
• Yaddo Residency
• UCLA Design Media Arts Center Residency
• Civitella Ranieri Foundation Fellowship (Italy)
• International Artists Residency Fellowship (Poland)
• Pew Fellowship
• Howard Foundation Fellowship
• The Rome Prize (Italy)
SELECT EXHIBITIONS
• The New Museum
• Museum of Modern Art
• American Academy in Rome
• MoMA PS1
• Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art
• Corcoran Gallery of Art
• MASS MoCA
• Museum of Contemporary Photography
• San Francisco Black Film Festival
• Marianne Boesky Gallery
• Postmasters Gallery
• Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
Studio visits play a critical role in our program, facilitating an open exchange of ideas that can expand the context of work and elevate its content. Professor Monika Weiss reflects on the spirit of these interactions and the opportunities they present.
REFLECTING ON THE STUDIO VISIT
LET’S THINK ABOUT what takes place during a well-prepared studio visit: an artist and visitor come together to discuss (sometimes over coffee or tea) the work on view. Of the many aspects of this essential (and also vulnerable) exchange, the most important of all is the willingness of both parties to make an effort to truly understand the work on its terms and communicate with each other—on intellectual, visceral, and emotional levels. The generosity of spirit must come from both sides. In that sense, a studio visit is a perfect ground for a “non-power” place, where the only thing that matters is the work on view and its possible symbolic, aesthetic, affective, conceptual, social, or political meanings. At its best, a studio visit is a deep conversation about the work, but also about the world and about what passions and concerns drive the artist. It’s worth remembering, too, that many artists are shy, as are those who visit the studios of other artists. Mutual space, respect, and listening are necessary to create conditions for sharing. In the context of an MFA program, a studio visit also nods to Emmanuel Levinas’ philosophy of ethical reciprocity, placing accent on the “other.” In this way, the studio visit isn’t merely free of power dynamics, as much as possible, but marks a reversal of the expected power dynamic, where the accent is on the student as the artist, not on the visitor.
—Monika Weiss, professor
Q&A WITH AMY HAUFT
Director of the College of Art, Jane Reuter Hitzeman and Herbert F. Hitzeman, Jr. Professor of Art
Photo: Sid Hastings / WashU.
IN 700,000:1 | TERRA + LUNA + SOL, Amy Hauft grapples with questions of perception, celestial scale, and the space between abstract and experiential knowledge. The vast, threepart installation at MASS MoCA is the most complex of her career. In this Q&A, we spoke with her about 700,000:1, her working process, and humanity’s place in a dangerous universe.
Can you talk a bit about the title? To what does the ratio refer?
700,000:1 is the chance of a person on Earth being killed by a meteor strike. Now, that math is skewed for the possibility/ likelihood of one big, extinction-level event. But for comparison, the odds of being killed by a shark are around 8 million to one. So the risk from meteors is actually not that remote.
In 2013, a meteor the size of a bus smashed into a frozen lake in Chelyabinsk, Russia. The sonic boom blew out every window in town. I thought: But we already have so many things to worry about!
Tell us about the “Terra” section of the installation.
Imagine a sphere one mile in diameter. If you slice off the top two feet, you have a “sphere cap,” 36 feet across. In the gallery, I built that sphere-cap form as a low, turfcovered hill. I built an inverted version of that same form to represent the sky. That form was created by hanging thick blue yarn across a circular frame suspended from the ceiling, creating the illusion of an enormous bowl.
When the viewer walks to the top of the hill, their head parts the yarn strands and disappears upwards into the bottom of the bowl. To others in the gallery, their body appears headless. And for the headless viewer, their vision is bounded by the interior of a gigantic blue bowl: their new horizon.
Those are dramatic images—and quite distinct, depending on the viewer’s specific location.
In all my work, there’s a sense of physical encounter. The viewer’s body is experiencing something, telling them something. I think about the difference between what we know as physical beings and what we know as conscious entities. Here, the mind/body split is made literal. I also wanted to be sure there was value for people of all physical abilities—whether or not they climb the hill.
The “Luna” section took some complex fabrication. Can you walk us through that process?
I bought a digital file 3D model of the moon, generated by satellite telemetry, from NASA. I shrunk it, inverted the geography (so the
exterior craters show up inverted on the interior surface), and divided it up into about 140 pieces.
With a CNC router, I milled each unique piece as a foam mold and took them all to MASS MoCA, where we cast them out of Aqua-Resin.
We assembled the pieces into a 15-foot diameter sphere—it was like the world’s craziest threedimensional jigsaw puzzle!
In the gallery, most of the moon is hidden behind a floor-to-ceiling wall. The viewer climbs a short set of utility stairs and ducks their head through a portal into the sphere—and, suddenly, they’re inside the moon.
The inverted moon texture does something weird to your optical perception. The eye wants to see what it knows. But with exterior now made interior, the eye has trouble understanding. The sense of whether you’re looking at something convex or concave sort of flips back and forth.
“Sol” also plays with the limits of visual perception.
Yes, it’s in a smaller gallery, about 1,000 sf.
A Rococo chandelier, handmade in clear Venetian glass and gold leaf hangs peculiarly low to the ground. The chandelier is about 5 feet tall, maybe 4 ½ feet wide, and looks like some unreasonably
← For “Luna,” Hauft created an outside-in, 15-foot diameter model of the moon.
↓ Installation view of “Terra,” from the exhibition 700,000:1 | Terra + Luna + Sol at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts. The low hill, which measures 36 feet across, represents the top, two-foot “cap” of a sphere one mile in diameter. The draped blue yarn creates an inverted version of the same form.
Photos: Tony Luong.
extravagant flower arrangement. It feels oversized and too detailed for the space, and, of course, way too low.
Instead of the small flickering flamebulbs this chandelier would normally sport, I’ve installed 15 high-lumen LEDs. It’s all too much to look at— the over-the-top Baroque details of the chandelier, the way-too-bright lights—you have to shield your eyes from the very thing you are trying to see. The gallery is even a little warm because of the intense light.
How do you hope viewers will engage with this project?
I’m interested in creating an awareness in the viewer that we are standing atop the Earth, hurtling through space. Right now! The true physical circumstance of our tiny civilization existing within the universe is both awesome and terrifying. We spend a lot of time trying hard not to know that.
700,000:1 | Terra + Luna + Sol, on view at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts, May 2022–January 2023.
VISITING LECTURERS & CRITICS
EACH SEMESTER the Sam Fox School engages with nationally and internationally recognized artists, designers, architects, historians, and critics, promoting new ideas in practice, theory, and technology. Invited speakers often interact with students during workshops and informal gatherings, in addition to participating in studio visits, where they engage with students in one-on-one discussions about their work.
PAST VISITING ARTISTS
Diana Al-Hadid
Morehshin Allahyari
Shimon Attie+
Dave Hullfish Bailey+
Jennifer Bornstein+
David Campany
Jess T. Dugan+
Coco Fusco
Ellen Gallagher + Chitra Ganesh
Mariam Ghani +
Michelle Grabner
Katharina Grosse
Pablo Helguera
Alfredo Jaar
Michael Joo*
William Kentridge
Dana Levy+
Meleko Mokgosi + Wangechi Mutu
Catherine Opie+
Sarah Oppenheimer+
Trevor Paglen
Michael Rakowitz
Dario Robleto
Mika Rottenberg
Claudia Schmacke+
Beverly Semmes
Stephanie Syjuco
Carrie Mae Weems
* Washington University alum + Freund Teaching Fellow
Mississippi River canoe trip with visiting artist Marie Lorenz. Photo: Caitlin Custer.
FREUND TEACHING FELLOWSHIP
THE HENRY L. AND NATALIE E. FREUND TEACHING FELLOWSHIP invites a new artist each year to teach a course on a subject matter of their own choice. At the same time, they work alongside students in graduate studio space, making work for a solo exhibition for the Saint Louis Art Museum’s Currents series.
Tamara Johnson, our 2022-23 fellow, taught a course that examined concrete from its history and applications to mixing and casting recipes in class. “We all failed, succeeded, and learned together,” she said. Crystal Z Campbell, the 2023-24 fellow, invited students to explore and be inspired by history in their course, “Artist in the Archive.”
Tamara Johnson
2022-23 Fellow
Blas Isasi 2024-25 Fellow
Crystal Z Campbell 2023-24 Fellow
Clarissa Tossin 2025-26 Fellow
Ode to the Underloved (featuring REVOLVER), Film Installation at Artists Space, 2023. Photo: Destiny Mata.
Installation view of Clarissa Tossin: To Take Root Among the Stars, Frye Art Museum, Seattle, 2023. Photo: Jueqian Fang.
Cracker with Cheese, 2023. Pewter, pigmented resin, and oil-based paint, matte varnish; 2 x 2 x ½ inches. Photo: Trey Burns.
In the you-turn, 2020. Carroll Gallery, Tulane University. Photo courtesy of the artist.
ALUMNI
SUPPORT FOR YOUR ARTISTIC JOURNEY doesn’t end after graduation. The Sam Fox School provides a number of grants, residencies, and other opportunities exclusively for alumni.
Our alumni have established thriving practices in cities across the country, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and St. Louis, where many have found their first gallery representation. In their careers as university faculty, gallery and museum curators, leaders of arts organizations, and creative entrepreneurs, they build upon the close relationships they formed in the program. They continually delight us with the numerous ways they have invented to build a life around artmaking. Their many accolades include grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, Joan Mitchell Foundation, Tiffany Foundation, and Andy Warhol Foundation; residencies from the MacDowell Colony, Ox-Bow, the Irish Museum of Modern Art, and MASS MoCA; and inclusion in important national and international exhibitions, including at the Whitney Biennial, Venice Biennale, Studio Museum in Harlem, and MoMA.
We are enormously proud of who they are, what they make, and what they have gone on to achieve.
ALUMNI OPPORTUNITIES
›› Paris Studio Residency
For more than four decades, alumni, students, and faculty have had the opportunity to work in residence at the College of Art’s Paris studio at the Cité Internationale des Arts. These residencies, which are a minimum of two months long, provide artists working in any medium a place to focus on the development of their work while broadening their international network and immersing themselves in French culture.
Alumni are always able to apply for these residencies, in response to a biennial call. MFA students apply the year they graduate for the John T. Milliken Graduate Foreign Travel Award. The winner receives $8,000 and use of the Paris studio is awarded for two months.
Cité Internationale des Arts
›› Des Lee Alumnx Residency
Alumni from the past five years are eligible for the Des Lee Gallery MFA Alumnx Residency. The program includes a $2,000 unrestricted honorarium, supporting practices that require time and space for research and experimentation.
The artist-in-residence has use of the school’s downtown gallery to create and present an exhibition, project, performance, or workshop.
The residency offers an alum the time and space to continue to exercise their artistic ideas, using the gallery as a studio to develop a body of work or standalone project for public presentation.
›› Post-MFA Studio Fellowship
The Post-MFA Studio Fellowship offers a new graduate a chance to work independently alongside the MFA in Visual Art program. The recipient will have a private studio space—including continued access to WashU facilities—throughout the 2023-24 academic year for self-directed work. The fellowship also involves serving as an ambassador for the school, providing pedagogical support, and presenting work to current students.
Des Lee Gallery MFA Alumnx Resident Martin Lammert, MFA ’22, installs Carnival/General Behaviour. During the residency, Lammert built a sculptural fountain inspired by carnival attractions and waterslides. This installation is a continuation of his graduate thesis ideas about the making of water.
2024
›› Stone & DeGuire
Contemporary Art Award
The Stone & DeGuire Contemporary Art Award provides $25,000 in funding to each recipient to advance their studio practice. The award is exclusively for MFA and BFA alumni of the College of Art working in sculpture, painting, or expanded mixed media.
This award honors Nancy Stone DeGuire (1947-2013) and Lawrence R. DeGuire Jr. (1947-2006), who met as undergraduate art students at Washington University, married, and forged a life-long, shared studio practice. They created this award to assist fellow alumni in advancing their own work.
Q&A WITH YVONNE OSEI
YVONNE OSEI, MFA ’16, was one of three recipients of the 2022 Stone & DeGuire Contemporary Art Awards. In this Q&A, she shares her experience researching in Seychelles, discovering untold history, and making work that moves fluidly from one medium to the next.
Tell us about your practice. Where are you and how do you make work?
My practice is multidisciplinary and very much rooted in multimedia. It’s not fixated on one particular medium because it can transform and translate in so many different ways. Something might start off as a photograph; then, all of a sudden, the photograph is incorporated into textile work. Down the line that textile could be sewn into a garment, and that garment could be featured in a performance. The performance may later be translated into a video. There’s fluidity with how I understand mediums and visual language. Each medium provides a unique entry point into exploring my artistic journey, enabling me to reflect on my decisions, experimentations, and the conceptual shifts that occur along the way.
When you’re creating, how do you notice that the work will move into a new medium?
It’s a sense of asking, ‘what does the work want to do?’
Image courtesy Yvonne Osei
I allow the work to be what it wants to be. When I employ a photograph, I’ll think about how photographs have a very strong, almost violent way of cutting the frame, where you get to see only what I show you. With a video, you have sound and a moving image, you glean more from the environment, and passersby can become part of the materiality of the piece. Textiles are also different, and I sometimes use textile as an ode to my own culture as an Ashanti woman. If I want to embody something, then I want to be in a textile.
The way I want people to gather or see the work, or experience it, informs my decisions. I strongly believe that the work is going to be what it wants to be. I allow for that porosity. What I aspire to is allowing viewers to have a place in my work.
What sort of themes do you tend to work with?
My work addresses standards of beauty, issues of race, how history is written and understood. I’ve been very interested in who history is serving, how it’s being told, and for what purpose. History always has a purpose to serve a particular group of people at a particular time. And I’ve been really interested in exploring multiple perspectives and how to glean information through different sources. As a visual storyteller, the reward is being able to present my perspective and allowing others to have the platform to do so too.
How did you come to this understanding of history, that it’s more complex than we’ve been told?
I think for the most part, it’s been a gradual realization. But there are moments that stand out for me. Growing up in Ghana—I moved to the U.S. in 2009—we used to have social studies classes that taught my country’s history. One of the things I was quick to realize is that a lot of the content seemed fixated on colonial history. I felt there must have been a life before colonialism. So why weren’t there resources to support our understanding of that? Precolonial history would serve us a lot better as a Ghanaian people.
It’s a similar story here in the U.S. I look at St. Louis, for example. A lot of its history comes from its contributions to the World’s Fair. The issues of race, the lynchings that took place… so many of these racial issues in St. Louis have been erased. I think what is not there is as important and potent as what is there. As an artist, I’m always asking myself what has been omitted, what is not blatant to the eye.
A lot of this has to do with the psyche of Ghanaians—like myself—and also representing the African diaspora. It’s looking at how our stories have been told by other people over and over and over again, and inserting myself into a narrative. How can I insert myself into a history that I’ve been excluded from? How can I invite others that look like me to do the same?
Image courtesy Yvonne Osei
Laylah Ali
MFA '94
Lyndon Barrois Jr.
MFA '13
Adrian Cox
MFA '12
Jill Downen
MFA '01
Addoley Dzegede
MFA '15
Vita Eruhimovitz
MFA '15
Corey Escoto
MFA '07
Adam Hogan
MFA '14
Kahlil Robert Irving
MFA '17
Cole Lu
MFA '14
Yvonne Osei
MFA '16
Ebony G. Patterson
MFA '06
Jennifer Seas
MFA '12
Carlie Trosclair
MFA '10
Cayce Zavaglia
MFA '98
Ian Weaver
MFA '08
How does omitted history factor in to your interest in Seychelles?
Being a native of the Ashanti Kingdom of Ghana in West Africa, Seychelles is of specific interest to me because several of my ancestral leaders—who rebelled against colonial subjugation—were exiled to Seychelles. I spent a lot of time researching King Prempeh I and Yaa Asantewaa, who were both exiled there for decades.
What was it like traveling to Seychelles? Today, Seychelles is this incredible amalgamation of culture, which I had the pleasure of witnessing. They are really respectful of transcultural, transnational people. They welcome people who may be different, look different, worship different, talk different—and that was really refreshing to experience. When you think of Seychelles, you have all of these “exotic” images, of tourism and lush, beautiful scenes pop up. That’s all there for sure, but I saw very little of its glamour because that was not the purpose of my visit. I do hope to return someday to properly soak in all of its beauty. The people are pleasant, but underneath all of that is this unpacking of the history of separation and isolation. We often forget that Seychellois are victims too and that this colonial history is also at the expense of their own country.
relationships, comb through historical documents and visit specific sites of colonial significance.
What sort of works did you begin while in Seychelles?
I traveled with analog clocks to feature in the work, because I have felt very burdened by time. I’ve thought a lot about the cost of time. The British were building their empire at the expense of many people’s time—so what does that mean? And, what does it mean to be a prisoner in paradise?
I believe it’s essential to visit the U.K. to draw parallels between British rule and their influence in Seychelles. Additionally, it is crucial for me to return to Kumasi in Ghana, having witnessed the places where King Prempeh and Yaa Asantewaa lived during their years of exile in Seychelles. I intend to revisit St. George’s Castle in Elmina, which, despite its name, should be more accurately described as a dungeon that confined numerous enslaved Africans. My primary goal is to explore the Prempeh Room, where the King initiated his period of exile. NOTABLE
It was my first time in East Africa so I was ecstatic—that was huge and so eye-opening for me. The award provided me the opportunity to get there, establish
Another element of the work that the award helped with was to fabricate a garment. I designed it based on Queen Victoria’s wedding dress, adopting the colors of the public school uniform in Ghana. This is part of a broader body of work I started in 2018 called Who Discovers the Discoverer? That work involved me visiting cities in countries that contributed to colonialism in West Africa and really questioning and contending with its history. In the Name of Victoria (Who was No Victor) is about the weight of victory. What does it look like? Is causing your country to excel at the expense of others victory for you? Queen Victoria didn’t visit Seychelles during her lifetime, but there’s a clocktower dedicated to her, which I created a performance around. That clocktower was built to commemorate the British royal family’s official declaration that they have full control over Seychelles as a colony. It’s located at a busy intersection with constant foot and car traffic. I wanted to plant myself there and reckon with that space, primarily because of how time cripples. The fact is that if time is with you, that’s an element in gaining power.
What comes next for you?
Image courtesy Yvonne Osei
SCHOLARSHIPS & FINANCIAL AID
FINANCIAL SUPPORT is an important part of your graduate school decisionmaking process, and the Sam Fox School is committed to providing assistance to as many students as possible.
SCHOLARSHIP SUPPORT
Through our Sam Fox Ambassadors Fellowship program, the school awards 10 full-tuition graduate scholarships each year to candidates in visual art, illustration, and architecture who demonstrate exceptional potential for advanced studies and creative research in their discipline. Ambassadors receive an annual creative activity and research stipend to support research or school-sponsored travel and participate in events that build meaningful interdisciplinary connections and advance creative work and scholarship. Additional full and significant tuition scholarships and fellowships are available in recognition of academic achievement,
area of interest, experience, and leadership potential.
PAID ASSISTANTSHIPS
Visual Art graduate students are eligible for paid positions assisting in teaching. Some applicants are awarded positions as assistants in instruction (also known as teaching assistantships) with admission, and most MFA-VA students have positions in their second semester. All MFA-VA students are awarded assistant in instruction positions in their second year. Assistants support our faculty with lectures and courses in studio art.
LOAN ASSISTANCE
Federal guaranteed loans are available to students who are U.S. citizens or U.S. permanent residents who meet all eligibility requirements and who have submitted the FAFSA.
LEARN MORE ABOUT SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITIES ON OUR WEBSITE.
Washington University encourages and gives full consideration to all applicants for admission, financial aid, and employment. The University does not discriminate in access to, or treatment or employment in, its programs and activities on the basis of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, veteran status, disability, or genetic information. Applicants with a prior criminal history will not be automatically disqualified from consideration for admission. Inquiries about compliance should be addressed to the University’s Vice Chancellor for Human Resources, Washington University, MSC 8016-292220, One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO 63130.
samfoxgradadmissions@wustl.edu samfoxschool.washu.edu
MSC 1213-131-105 One Brookings Drive St. Louis, MO 63130 314.935.9300 FOLLOW US @washusamfoxschool @washuvisualart
ON THE COVER Emily Elhoffer, MFA '24. Self-Portrait, 2024. Pleather, plastic, polyester, wood, steel, projector, and computer, 92 x 39 3/8 x 33 in.
Photos: Virginia Harold.