This course adds another layer of engagement to the MFA Sculpture curriculum in relation to the work done in Grad Studio and Advanced Critical Issues. The class will be divided into two six-week sections taught by a visiting critic and visiting curator. Through these distinct perspectives, students will develop a deeper understanding of the many roles that the artist can play in society in conjunction with gaining knowledge of professional practices within the fine arts field. Additionally, this course will consider the ways that art is displayed, viewed, contextualized and experienced and how visual art can influence contemporary thought and conversation through the history of curation and exhibition-making.

The course will consist of lectures, discussions, group critiques and one-on-one studio visits. The first half of the semester will focus on professional practice and consider each student’s practice through the lens of relevant historical and contemporary artists. Course content will include discussions about maintaining post-graduate art practices, application processes and cultivating thriving creative communities. The second half will focus on curation with emphasis placed on current trends and shifts in artistic and curatorial production, theory, and criticism. Students will examine a range of curatorial practices and consider case studies of artist curated shows.

The class will also develop a proposal for a potential group exhibition to occur post-graduation. Both sections will involve the topic of exhibiting works in various spaces such as galleries (artist-run, for-profit, university, etc.), museums and alternative art organizations.

Enrollment is limited to 2nd-year Sculpture Graduate Students.

Major Requirement | MFA Sculpture

“Any attempt to understand an artistic medium through the lens of technology alone is futile and counterproductive,imposing limits on the conceptual understanding of the work. Good art is always both deeply rooted in and at the same time transcends its medium.”
-Christiane Paul
 
This course will explore digital design and fabrication within the context of contemporary art, design and architecture. Through a series of technical demonstrations and assignments, connections will be made between CAD/CAM software, fabrication technologies and the physical world. Additionally, the course will explore digital fabrication as it relates to traditional sculptural processes such as mold making + casting, metalworking and woodworking.
 
This course, although technical in nature, is not technical in spirit. Our goal is not the mastery of any one software application or fabrication technology, but instead an understanding of how to effectively leverage digital processes and tools in one’s studio.
 
The semester will be divided into a series of assignments, each exploring various approaches to digital design and fabrication, and will culminate in a final project blending digital fabrication with an existing project and/or research interest.
 
You will leave this course with the ability to model complex geometries, to collect and process 3D scan data, and to output using additive fabrication equipment. We will utilize the resources of RISD at large, but will focus on highly accessible, open source digital fabrication tools available within the Sculpture department.

Elective

This course is structured according the notion that artists can use what is on hand to research and craft simple solutions to the complex physical, mechanical, and technical problems that must be routinely addressed in their making practices. This material and process based, hands-on, research studio will be structured in response to the issues that the advanced fine arts student is grappling with on a regular basis. Many of the issues that arise in the process of making provide the opportunity to transcend perceived material-based boundaries and thinking. Some of the questions this course attends to include: How do you defy gravity? How do you generate the hidden components required to physicalize the thing we can see in our mind's eye? How is the magic we need to create our work scalable to the resources we have readily available? Example working processes include: mig welding, tig welding, casting for prototyping, woodworking, and mold making.

This course is open to junior, senior and graduate-level students. Please contact the instructor directly for permission to register.

Elective

Time-Based Objects is founded in the legacy of sculpture—tracing the expansion of the discipline from discrete objects to the realm of installation, performance, and durational practice. This course will re-imagine the role of objects through multiple vantage points such as how they are used, manipulated, and instrumentalized towards new ends. While rooted in the tradition of theatre, the course draws on costumes, props, and sets as sculptural propositions in their own right—examining how objects carry meaning, embody narrative, and activate space. Students will explore the performative capacity of objects through projects, lectures, presentations, process critiques, and improvisational exercises.

In this course we will consider time-based methods as sculptural form. Informed by conceptual art, dance, social practice, and video installation, we will learn and engage with the experimental precedents that have shaped our current understanding of sculpture. Students will consider not just what an object is, but what it does, and what it becomes when set in motion.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $300.00

Non-majors may enroll pending seat availability. Students may use the 'Request Course Section Prerequisite Override' task to request permission to register for the course.

Elective

This course will teach the advanced skills and processes necessary to achieve reliably repeatable results in casting and mold-making. Students will gain material literacy beginning with a limited range of mold making products in the Platinum Silicone and Gypsum Cement families. This skillset will provide the necessary confidence to expand into the broader range of flexible and rigid mold making products to suit individual student needs. Students will learn key methods to achieve successful multi part flexible molds, with a specific emphasis on silicone rubber products. Direct modeling materials such as Castilene and Magic Sculpt will be demonstrated as companion products for making rigid semi-permanent mold ready objects. The proficiency gained in this studio course will enable students to problem solve mold-making challenges, such as complexity and scale, multi part molds, repeatable production of multiples, and planning for larger and more advanced mold-making and casting projects.  This procedural knowledge will assist in various purposes in a studio practice such as the need for repetition, durability, economy, and sustainability. This course is intended to assist, augment and enhance ongoing studio work for all students as they workshop their emerging studio practices.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $300.00

Elective

What is the meaning of contemporary? What is the meaning of critique? What are models for sustainable and ethical artistic practice? What is the role of the artist in contemporary culture? These are but a few of the frameworks we will use to explore an array of new tools for thinking, feeling, perceiving, and analyzing the textures of our inter-subjective environment. Together, we will address the challenges implicit in the willful consideration of what exists beyond what we think we know; beyond what we have been told is true about our chosen field as artists. We take up this exploration through a selection of readings, films, lectures and class discussions. Some of the discourses we engage include the relationship between politics and aesthetics, critical race theory, myriad feminist theories, theories of institutional critique, and methods of radical practice in contemporary art.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department.

Major Requirement | MFA Sculpture

What theories and methods concerning political, historical, and artistic languages do artists rely on to inform their practices? How are you and members of your cohorts approaching aesthetic form in your own practice? What is the language being used in and around the work you are creating? How can we as a community create space to refine these messages within our work? What role does the method of critique play in this collective investigation? 

Graduate Sculpture Critique is a discussion-based, collaborative critique seminar that makes space for multiple voices and ways of being in community; foregrounding and supporting the burgeoning artistic practices represented in the grad cohorts. This course centers community building, supplemental reading, group and peer-to-peer critique, and other dialectical methods that foster an intellectual and artistic intimacy among cohort mates. Here we build a foundation that supports risk-taking, question-asking, and the reimagining of predetermined boundaries. Students are asked with great intention to expand the discussion around intersectionality, interstitially, and interdisciplinarity and how the space between things comes to bear on the method of critique.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Graduate Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | MFA Sculpture

What theories and methods concerning political, historical, and artistic languages do artists rely on to inform their practices? How are you and members of your cohorts approaching aesthetic form in your own practice? What is the language being used in and around the work you are creating? How can we as a community create space to refine these messages within our work? What role does the method of critique play in this collective investigation? 

Graduate Sculpture Critique is a discussion-based, collaborative critique seminar that makes space for multiple voices and ways of being in community; foregrounding and supporting the burgeoning artistic practices represented in the grad cohorts. This course centers community building, supplemental reading, group and peer-to-peer critique, and other dialectical methods that foster an intellectual and artistic intimacy among cohort mates. Here we build a foundation that supports risk-taking, question-asking, and the reimagining of predetermined boundaries. Students are asked with great intention to expand the discussion around intersectionality, interstitially, and interdisciplinarity and how the space between things comes to bear on the method of critique.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Graduate Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | MFA Sculpture

Building upon the independent work accomplished in Junior studio, students are expected to generate self directed work supported by in-process critiques, formal critiques, and individual meetings. Faculty and peer feedback will help students clarify their objectives, fine tune their technical abilities, and develop a strong working practice. Students are expected to hone their creative problem-solving skills and engage in a high level of dialog and work. Throughout the fall, students will practice integrating their source research into their studio practice. An increased and rigorous integration of contemporary art, critical theory, and criticism is expected. The visiting artist lecture series is a vital component of this course.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Senior Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

Students in the MFA program pursue individual work under advisement of resident faculty, visiting artists and critics. This tutorial experience has been organized to nurture student work toward a set of goals and outcomes through routine conversations with faculty and their cohort. The priority is to assist students with recognizing new objectives in their practice.  Faculty work with students to develop new or hone existing skills to set priorities and meet  goals and deadlines. At the MFA level students will experience a deeper sense of individualized mentorship.  While advising students on the material aspects of their work, faculty will simultaneously  guide students toward new conceptual, theoretical and or philosophical frameworks for their work. 

Students are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Graduate Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | MFA Sculpture

The Fall semester of Junior year represents a crucial pathway out of the sophomore experience and into independent, self-directed work in sculpture. Junior Sculpture Studio, together with Research Studio, is designed to support student’s individual interests and incorporate the multifaceted and highly personalized condition of artistic research with studio methodologies. The semester will consist of two major critique sessions, alongside various demos, assignments, artist talks, and work sessions that direct students’ conversation and growth within the studio. The work sessions will consist of artistic pursuits specific to individual practices, formal small and larger group critiques, and 1 on 1 and small group studio visits with faculty, teaching assistants and peers. The sculpture department’s visiting artist lecture series is a vital component of this course and allows insight into the practices and work of professional artists. Additionally, a curated selection of material, and personally collected archives, digital and physical as well as various forms of media will prompt deeper investigations into artist practice throughout the semester, exploring the very nature of how to explore, research, and investigate the world around you.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Junior Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

The Fall semester of Junior year represents a crucial pathway out of the sophomore experience and into independent, self-directed work in sculpture. Junior Sculpture Studio, together with Research Studio, is designed to support student’s individual interests and incorporate the multifaceted and highly personalized condition of artistic research with studio methodologies. The semester will consist of two major critique sessions, alongside various demos, assignments, artist talks, and work sessions that direct students’ conversation and growth within the studio. The work sessions will consist of artistic pursuits specific to individual practices, formal small and larger group critiques, and 1 on 1 and small group studio visits with faculty, teaching assistants and peers. The sculpture department’s visiting artist lecture series is a vital component of this course and allows insight into the practices and work of professional artists. Additionally, a curated selection of material, and personally collected archives, digital and physical as well as various forms of media will prompt deeper investigations into artist practice throughout the semester, exploring the very nature of how to explore, research, and investigate the world around you.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Junior Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

Students in the MFA program pursue individual work under advisement of resident faculty, visiting artists and critics. This tutorial experience has been organized to nurture student work toward a set of goals and outcomes through routine conversations with faculty and their cohort. The priority is to assist students with recognizing new objectives in their practice.  Faculty work with students to develop new or hone existing skills to set priorities and meet  goals and deadlines. At the MFA level students will experience a deeper sense of individualized mentorship.  While advising students on the material aspects of their work, faculty will simultaneously  guide students toward new conceptual, theoretical and or philosophical frameworks for their work.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Graduate Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | MFA Sculpture

Sophomore Sculpture: Studio I is a rigorous introduction to the practices and techniques of contemporary sculpture, with a focus on metal, wood, and various assembly techniques. In this course, students will move through material and time-based modules in order to develop a basis for a multi-dimensional practice. Sophomore Studio I, is coordinated with Sculptural Practices and Seminar I: Methods, Materials, Makers. Sculptural Practices I provides an introduction to shop tooling and accompanying technical skills. Seminar I provides an introduction to the discourses, histories, and methods that compose the expansive and transdisciplinary field of sculpture and its relationship to contemporary art practices and discourses. 

In the field of Sculpture, ideas and materials are inextricably bound together. With that in mind, this course is the fulcrum where students make things happen in physical space while thinking through the ramifications of critical and conceptual space. These physical, material, critical, and conceptual explorations serve as a foundation for project prompts, individual research, discourse, and readings. Ultimately this course will lay the foundation for students to develop their own voice to contribute meaningfully to ongoing conversations in our field.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

Sophomore Sculpture: Studio I is a rigorous introduction to the practices and techniques of contemporary sculpture, with a focus on metal, wood, and various assembly techniques. In this course, students will move through material and time-based modules in order to develop a basis for a multi-dimensional practice. Sophomore Studio I, is coordinated with Sculptural Practices and Seminar I: Methods, Materials, Makers. Sculptural Practices I provides an introduction to shop tooling and accompanying technical skills. Seminar I provides an introduction to the discourses, histories, and methods that compose the expansive and transdisciplinary field of sculpture and its relationship to contemporary art practices and discourses. 

In the field of Sculpture, ideas and materials are inextricably bound together. With that in mind, this course is the fulcrum where students make things happen in physical space while thinking through the ramifications of critical and conceptual space. These physical, material, critical, and conceptual explorations serve as a foundation for project prompts, individual research, discourse, and readings. Ultimately this course will lay the foundation for students to develop their own voice to contribute meaningfully to ongoing conversations in our field.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

This is a hands-on studio course focusing on three-dimensional object making, primarily working with wood as a medium. We develop an integration of intuitive approaches and structured processes through direct engagement with the materials. In addition to guiding the student through the various technical hurdles encountered as the projects unfold, an equal stress is placed on the development of the ideas and intent - and those ideas successfully expressed through the materials and its manipulation. At critical times, a slide presentation is given, followed by a general, open discussion on the relevant topics and how they relate to the class.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $200.00

Non-majors may enroll pending seat availability. Students may use the 'Request Course Section Prerequisite Override' task to request permission to register for the course.

Elective

Sculptural Practices I will take students through three major practices that are essential to the study of Sculpture -- metal fabrication, woodworking and photography/videography. This course is designed to work in tandem with ‘Sophomore Sculpture Studio’ and ‘Sophomore Seminar’. Each section will serve as an introduction to the fundamental ideas within each practice, including artist references, relevant material resources, vocabulary, tools/equipment, and general safety protocol. Students are expected to investigate each skill-set by way of experimentation and research, extending their practice beyond scheduled class time in order to develop familiarity with the processes taught in class. Students can expect to learn proficiency in these skills as well as gain a deeper understanding of the contents of the Sculpture toolkit. They will be encouraged to revisit these processes and tools over and over again throughout their own development. Additionally, they can expand their knowledge through focused studio electives offered in Spring of Sophomore year and in their Junior and Senior years.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. This course is a requirement for Sophomore Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

Sculptural Practices I will take students through three major practices that are essential to the study of Sculpture -- metal fabrication, woodworking and photography/videography. This course is designed to work in tandem with ‘Sophomore Sculpture Studio’ and ‘Sophomore Seminar’. Each section will serve as an introduction to the fundamental ideas within each practice, including artist references, relevant material resources, vocabulary, tools/equipment, and general safety protocol. Students are expected to investigate each skill-set by way of experimentation and research, extending their practice beyond scheduled class time in order to develop familiarity with the processes taught in class. Students can expect to learn proficiency in these skills as well as gain a deeper understanding of the contents of the Sculpture toolkit. They will be encouraged to revisit these processes and tools over and over again throughout their own development. Additionally, they can expand their knowledge through focused studio electives offered in Spring of Sophomore year and in their Junior and Senior years.

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. This course is a requirement for Sophomore Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

This seminar connects sophomore Sculpture majors to significant parts of the ever-expanding discipline of contemporary sculpture. Over the semester the class will explore how methods of artistic production, materials of artistic transformation, and practices of makers participating in various artistic movements have created and sustained the conversations so integral to contemporary sculptural practice. Through a series of film screenings, assigned readings, slide talks, and discussions, students will gain a familiarity with the historic events and trajectories that continue to produce associative canons and relational movements, forming the foundation of their chosen discipline. The course trajectory is coordinated with topics covered in Sculptural Practices I and II and Sophomore Sculpture: Studio I.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $50.00

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. This course is a requirement for Sophomore Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

This seminar connects sophomore Sculpture majors to significant parts of the ever-expanding discipline of contemporary sculpture. Over the semester the class will explore how methods of artistic production, materials of artistic transformation, and practices of makers participating in various artistic movements have created and sustained the conversations so integral to contemporary sculptural practice. Through a series of film screenings, assigned readings, slide talks, and discussions, students will gain a familiarity with the historic events and trajectories that continue to produce associative canons and relational movements, forming the foundation of their chosen discipline. The course trajectory is coordinated with topics covered in Sculptural Practices I and II and Sophomore Sculpture: Studio I.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $50.00

Majors are pre-registered for this course by the department. This course is a requirement for Sophomore Sculpture Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture