Sculpture Seminar II: Visual and Critical Literacies is the third sequential course in the Sculpture curriculum centered on research and coordinated with the content of the major studio courses. These research courses are designed to excite student learning through the practice of critical and engaged pedagogy in art history, material histories, research methods, representation, and what “counts” as artist research. Course content has been selected precisely to support the understanding of how critical literacy impacts a creative practice. De-material practices like reading, thinking, moving, and speaking can merge with, bend around, and twist through material practices.

Sculpture Seminar II: Visual and Critical Literacies is an intermediary level course which follows Junior Research Studio where students have learned about field research and the local manifestations of larger systems. The design of this seminar is to facilitate and support the study of themes relevant to art practices and conversations today. Through a series of readings, films, classroom discussion, group, and independent work, students learn to contextualize myriad discourses using the frames of art history, critical theory, philosophy, ethics, and politics. In this studio-centered seminar, students will develop critical literacy that is applicable to their working practices and the attendant process of using materials to make meaning. This course supports discourse around the formation of the artist in an effort to figure out meaningful strategies for the development and maintenance of sustainable artistic and intellectual practices.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $50.00

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

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

Building on the methods of research and synthesis learned in Junior Sculpture: Research Studio, this is an intensive semester designed to strengthen students’ knowledge of professional practices for maintaining a creative practice past graduation. Students will develop a packet of materials which include a portfolio of work, artist statement, resume, and artist CV. This course will advance their research into a range of opportunities specific to the discipline of sculpture and their own individuated practices. 

 
Each week students will be introduced to a variety of resources and skills necessary in preparing for upcoming and future opportunities such as residencies, granting organizations, graduate schools and fellowships. Additionally, topics of exhibiting works in various spaces such as galleries (artist-run, for-profit, university, etc.), museums, alternative art organizations and public art venues will be presented. There will also be workshops for preparing project budgets, archival storage of work and formatting for digital organization. This seminar aims to give students a strong foundation for professional practices prior to their final semester at RISD so they can focus on their body of work in Senior Degree Project and feel prepared to graduate.   

Estimated Cost of Materials: $300.00

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

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

The primary focus of the Senior Sculpture Degree Project is to cultivate and hone a cohesive body of work for your FINAL degree thesis exhibition. Building upon your existing professional practices foundation begun in the fall, and establishing greater autonomy around production timelines and critical discourse, this semester features an emphasis on open studio time and individual meetings that honor your individual tempos and creative workflow. Also implemented this semester is the In-Process Critique format. This critique schedule is in place for you to self-identify key moments for strategic feedback leading up to your exhibition. The first half of the semester will prioritize the Woods Gerry Senior Exhibition and time for studio work/studio visits alongside In-Process Critiques. The second half of the semester will be structured by a range of projects to prepare you for post-graduation artistic and professional practice. You will have the choice of either an artist talk or skill share to build context and guide deeper conversations around your work. These moments of the course are intended to give students the chance to present their work and research to the wider community.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

The primary focus of the Senior Sculpture Degree Project is to cultivate and hone a cohesive body of work for your FINAL degree thesis exhibition. Building upon your existing professional practices foundation begun in the fall, and establishing greater autonomy around production timelines and critical discourse, this semester features an emphasis on open studio time and individual meetings that honor your individual tempos and creative workflow. Also implemented this semester is the In-Process Critique format. This critique schedule is in place for you to self-identify key moments for strategic feedback leading up to your exhibition. The first half of the semester will prioritize the Woods Gerry Senior Exhibition and time for studio work/studio visits alongside In-Process Critiques. The second half of the semester will be structured by a range of projects to prepare you for post-graduation artistic and professional practice. You will have the choice of either an artist talk or skill share to build context and guide deeper conversations around your work. These moments of the course are intended to give students the chance to present their work and research to the wider community.

Major Requirement | BFA Sculpture

This interdisciplinary studio-seminar explores artistic practice beyond traditional exhibition spaces, focusing on public art as a collaborative, site-responsive, and audience-driven form. Drawing from socially engaged practices and ambitious public commissions, students will examine how artists, designers, and curators build careers that engage broad publics, with an emphasis on imagining and shaping more just, sustainable, and future-oriented civic spaces.

Developed in partnership with the Rose Kennedy Greenway Conservancy, the course invites students to develop public art projects that may be realized on the Greenway at the culmination of the semester. Students will draw inspiration from local contexts, case studies, historical precedents, and dialogue with guest artists and curators. These projects provide hands-on experience with the full lifecycle of public work—from concept through fabrication and presentation.

Course topics include proposal development, artist selection processes, fabrication, project management, stakeholder engagement, and public art administration, with attention to working with civic partners, navigating approvals, and designing for durability, safety, and public interaction. Using Providence and Boston as living laboratories, students will engage with sites, institutions, and collaborators, including the Greenway’s curatorial and production teams.

Co-taught by Katherine Cooper (Director of Academic and Creative Partnerships at RISD) and Audrey Lopez, Director & Curator of Public Art at the Rose Kennedy Greenway Conservancy, the course emphasizes contextually grounded, socially engaged work and offers an alternative to the commercial gallery pathway, encouraging students to develop practices aligned with their own values.

Note: While the course focuses on proposal development and prototyping, a select group of students will be invited to further develop and realize their projects for potential installation on the Greenway in 2027.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $50.00

This course is open to graduate students only. Please contact the instructor for permission to register.

Elective

Programming Sound: Performance Systems focuses on programming and designing computer-based systems for sound art and music performance. Centered on the dataflow programming language, Max, the course will be of substantial benefit to students who desire a rigorous and fast-moving foundation in algorithmic approaches to sound design. The course simultaneously facilitates explorations in sound synthesis, audio signal processing, electronics, gesture-based human computer interaction, and instrument building with microcontrollers and sensors. Coursework involves weekly homework in the form of online lectures and exercises with class sessions reserved for demonstrations, workshops, and project assistance. The course emphasizes modularity and reuse of code. Students will present their work in a public concert during the last week of the semester.

Additional Notes: In order to conduct work in this course, students will need a laptop computer running a recent OS: Mac or Windows. Previous programming experience is recommended, but not required.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

This project-based course explores the role of sound in storytelling, research, and artistic expression. Students will engage in hands-on field recording, critical listening, and curating thematic sound archives, using these collections to create narrative-driven audio projects. Through readings and discussions, students will explore key theories in sonic arts, sound design, and sound studies, integrating these concepts into their work. The course encourages interdisciplinary collaboration, connecting sound with visual arts, literature, and digital media. Dialogues on contemporary issues in sound, such as its social and cultural impact, will be central to the learning process. By the end of the course, students will have developed a body of work that demonstrates technical skill and proficiency in creative storytelling using sound.

Elective

Spatial Audio focuses on the creation of immersive 3-D sound experiences. In this course, students analyze and explore how the sensation of space is activated in the listener by making works using spatial audio techniques. These methods include high order ambisonics, vector-based amplitude panning, multichannel surround, and binaural audio, among others. Throughout the semester, a series of exercises addressing technical and theoretical issues provide students with the necessary experience to produce midterm and final projects. Coursework involves computational approaches to sound design and composition with instruction in the audio programming language Max and digital audio workstation Reaper. Students have recurring access to a 25-channel loudspeaker array for the development of works. Readings from psychology, philosophy, the arts, and sound studies support class discussions and critiques. Students will need a laptop computer (Mac or Windows). Previous experience with digital audio software recommended.
Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

This intensive studio course investigates computational approaches to generating sound and image in real time. Precedents from experimental film and video, as well as sound installation and performance art will be examined in relationship both to human perception and the, students' artistic practice. The course will include discussion of key historical works and texts, hands-on demonstrations and in-class projects, as well as critical engagement with new works by class members. Students will use programming environments such as Max and its object libraries for sound and video, MSP and Jitter to explore the creative and expressive potentials of an intermedia production practice culminating in the development of a larger work that incorporates knowledge gained throughout the course.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

In A Hands-On History of Electronic Music, we will study the development of electronic music from a tactile approach using historical studio techniques. While learning about pioneering and underrepresented artists within the genre, students will use reel-to-reel tape machines, tube signal generators, modular synthesizers, and early computer music concepts to recreate key compositions within the field. Critical listening and analysis skills will be cultivated through guided exercises and projects. The hands-on approach this course takes will support a foundational understanding of electronic music history through methodologies as they evolved into current practice.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

Intro to Sonic Arts provides a foundation in the creative and technical practices of using sound as an artistic medium. Students will be guided through the creation of original work while learning about recording and editing techniques, custom instrument building, and spatial audio design. Special attention will be given to cultivating critical listening skills, composition and improvisation techniques, as well as collaborative performance practices. No prior background is required, and the course is open to students from all disciplines. Students will need access to a laptop computer and headphones.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

Intro to Sonic Arts provides a foundation in the creative and technical practices of using sound as an artistic medium. Students will be guided through the creation of original work while learning about recording and editing techniques, custom instrument building, and spatial audio design. Special attention will be given to cultivating critical listening skills, composition and improvisation techniques, as well as collaborative performance practices. No prior background is required, and the course is open to students from all disciplines. Students will need access to a laptop computer and headphones.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00

Elective

Modular synthesizers offer a tactile approach to sound production that is consistently inventive by design. Emerging from the 1960s counterculture, they are a product of expansive thinking that challenged conventions in both instrument design and creative practice. Six decades later, the limits of possibility only increased. In Modular Synthesis Studio, we will learn and apply concepts of voltage controlled synthesizers to creative coding and embedded computing platforms. Imbued with the spirit of community, together we will design and build a one-of-a-kind RISD modular synthesizer by semester end, while also creating new sound-based works with the system. Assignments in this studio course will involve creative projects, class presentations, readings, and module fabrication. The class will provide students with a strong foundation in modular synthesis, audio programming languages, and the skills to develop physical and software instruments relating to their personal creative practices.

Students should bring a laptop computer and wired headphones to class.
Experience with programming and/or modular synthesizers recommended but not required.

Elective

Throughout the past century, electronically generated sound has challenged the aesthetic and conceptual boundaries of art and music. In this intensive studio course, students will focus on the creation of experimental sound works utilizing hybrid analog / digital systems. We will investigate synthesis techniques using the SuperCollider programming language / environment in conjunction with the Serge modular synthesizer. Students will leverage the strengths of these tools towards uniquely personal production platforms that are more than the sum of their parts, and utilize them in the creation of fixed media, generative compositions, and improvised performances. The course will include discussion of historical works / texts, hands-on demonstrations, in-class projects, and critical engagement with new works by class members, culminating in a final project that incorporates knowledge gained throughout the semester. Students will need a laptop computer running a recent OS: Mac or Windows. Previous programming experience is recommended, but not required. 

Estimated Cost of Materials: $100.00 

Elective

Sound Critique is a studio elective focused on the development and realization of sound-based work. The course centers on sustained studio practice and weekly group critique, with students at different levels working alongside one another in a shared studio environment.

Students develop and refine projects in sound design, performance, installation, and composition. Workshops address practical skills including system setup and signal flow, responding to site conditions, troubleshooting, and documentation. Students present works-in-progress at multiple stages and respond to feedback through revision and continued development. Particular attention is given to preparing work for public presentation: testing in physical space, resolving technical and logistical problems, and readying projects for concert and installation contexts. Through ongoing critique and applied practice, students build artistic direction, technical fluency, and the independence to carry long-term projects of their own.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $250.00

Elective

Digital embroidery transforms hand-crafted couture into a work of fine art. Just like a tattoo where an image is created with needles and color, so embroidered fabric or paper is needle-stitched with colored threads. A basic knowledge of Adobe Photoshop is helpful, but we will also cover the fundamentals of creating a preparatory design file in Adobe Illustrator. This vector design file will then be artistically translated into a Pulse embroidery file that can be saved and sewn out as as a multiple or repeat pattern. The resulting personalized textile can be applied to fabrics for apparel or interior applications as well as fine art. A series of small assignments will build up a repertoire of techniques and culminate in a final project that summarizes the student's ability and artistic innovation. This course will explore top of the line Tajima Pulse software with the goal of creating personalized images that will be sewn out on a 15-needle Tajima commercial embroidery machine.

Elective

Digital embroidery transforms hand-crafted couture into a work of fine art. Just like a tattoo where an image is created with needles and color, so embroidered fabric or paper is needle-stitched with colored threads. A basic knowledge of Adobe Photoshop is helpful, but we will also cover the fundamentals of creating a preparatory design file in Adobe Illustrator. This vector design file will then be artistically translated into a Pulse embroidery file that can be saved and sewn out as as a multiple or repeat pattern. The resulting personalized textile can be applied to fabrics for apparel or interior applications as well as fine art. A series of small assignments will build up a repertoire of techniques and culminate in a final project that summarizes the student's ability and artistic innovation. This course will explore top of the line Tajima Pulse software with the goal of creating personalized images that will be sewn out on a 15-needle Tajima commercial embroidery machine.

Elective

This course introduces the student to a wide variety of materials and processes involved in the production of both hand and industrially produced textiles. Topics include fiber properties and identification, spinning and yarn construction, natural and synthetic dyeing, traditional textile constructions and new technologies. Both historical and contemporary examples are studied, ranging from textiles in design to fine arts textiles. Class time is divided between lecture and lab work. Lectures are supplemented with readings, workshops and museum visits. Students conduct research on a class related topic of their choice and give presentations about their subject. Each student also prepares spinning and dyeing samples to be presented in an individual archive.

This course is a requirement for Sophomore Textiles Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Textiles

This course introduces the student to a wide variety of materials and processes involved in the production of both hand and industrially produced textiles. Topics include fiber properties and identification, spinning and yarn construction, natural and synthetic dyeing, traditional textile constructions and new technologies. Both historical and contemporary examples are studied, ranging from textiles in design to fine arts textiles. Class time is divided between lecture and lab work. Lectures are supplemented with readings, workshops and museum visits. Students conduct research on a class related topic of their choice and give presentations about their subject. Each student also prepares spinning and dyeing samples to be presented in an individual archive.

This course is a requirement for Sophomore Textiles Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Textiles

This hands-on studio is an introduction to the fundamental language of weaving —the warp and the weft—and the implications of weave structures as they relate to image, pattern, materiality, language, spaces and the body. This course will introduce students to equipment, weave structures, and materials in conversation with multiple weaving practices and histories across time and space. The range of equipment used will encourage students to explore the cultural narratives, socio-economic motivations and the histories of peoples and places embedded in the act of weaving. A variety of techniques including hand-manipulated tapestry and loom controlled patterns are taught and explored as a vehicle for the translation of ideas in this medium. The emphasis is on invention and developing a personal approach.

Readings, lectures and discussions will address the textile industry’s complicity in slavery and the environmental crisis as well as how past and present weavers, artists and designers embed stories, histories, and legacies of knowledge-making into their woven textiles.

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

Major Requirement | BFA Textiles