We are living in a world that is experiencing the largest and fastest cultural shifts of all time. In a world where bits of information travel at the speed of light. In a world where technology makes it possible to think simultaneously in the smallest and the largest terms ever known to man. In a world where buildings generate as much pollution as cars and factories combined.
As we enter the twenty-first century, graduate education has a responsibility to address the realities and the dreams of our time. RISD's graduate programs are diverse, dynamic, and demanding. They are designed to support students to become active and informed artists, designers, architects, and art educators. The programs span a spectrum of professional endeavors and are discipline-specific. They rely heavily upon the development of initiation, research, experimentation, critical thinking, expertise — and courage. The programs are predicated upon the development of individual and team-based inquiry that manifests through a final thesis, in both written and exhibition forms.
Graduate students come to RISD to be part of its long-established reputation. They come to study with world-renown faculty who are dedicated to teaching and who are making significant contributions in their respective fields. Students come to work in some of the best facilities in the country. They come seeking a place where the exchange of ideas and discourse across disciplines and cultures can help them formulate the questions that will drive their work, the questions that will help them address the questions of our time — which are, indeed, unlike the questions of any other time in history. They come seeking a place where questions precede answers, where search goes beyond re-search, and where products are aspects of true practice founded in work and guided by the logic of intuition.
