RISD 2024-25 Presidential Fellows 100 Days In

Since the Society of Presidential Fellows was launched in 2019, more than 40 talented graduate students have joined the RISD community and benefited from full-tuition funding for the duration of their studies. The largest cohort yet—comprising 12 students—began their creative journeys at RISD this fall and have now completed their first semester on campus.

“As we approach our 150th anniversary, programs like these—supported by generous donors, including RISD alums and trustees—ensure that RISD is a place where any student with the talent and will can pursue exciting artistic approaches, stretch their thinking and making, and share experiences and perspectives that enrich the RISD community and the world,” President Crystal Williams explains. 

Sculptor Nahom Ghebredngl MFA 26 SC appreciates the freedom the program affords him to explore new creative avenues, take chances and even fail along the way without doubting his abilities as a maker. “The best part of the experience has been building relationships with other grad students, who are so generous with their ideas and so damn good—and engaged and humble,” he adds. “It is really energizing.”

Before joining RISD’s Sculpture department, Ghebredngl studied computer science as an undergrad at Michigan State University and began his creative journey making pottery on the wheel. His work explores themes of the body, sensuality and the dichotomy between possession and freedom. Since he came to RISD, he has been focusing on a series of papier-mâché sculptures, and he is beginning to explore scale and materiality in the work.

Unlike Ghebredngl, Architecture student Raveena Deshpande MArch 26 is not starting out in a completely different field, but she finds RISD’s approach to her chosen medium to be unlike anything she faced in her home country of India and a refreshing new experience. “My process has changed quite a bit since I arrived here,” she says. “Everything is new—new country, new systems, new traditions! I was so lost in the beginning, but [Graduate Program Director] Debbie Chen has been super helpful, and I’m getting the hang of it.”

Deshpande’s practice addresses climate- and waste-related issues, and she has been working closely with Biodesign Fellow Jessica Smith in the Edna W. Lawrence Nature Lab, focusing in her first semester on designing cooling systems that do not use energy. “I’ve never had access to these kinds of resources before,” she says, “and I intend to continue pursuing this line of research over the next year and a half and just keep expanding my mind and pushing myself.”

Industrial Design student Alicia Lee MID 26 has also been blown away by the resources she’s had access to since coming to RISD. “I visited for the first time in December and fell in love with the place: Co-Works, the Nature Lab, Brown’s facilities,” she says. “I’m still finding my niche, which will probably involve toy design using CAD and a 3D printer to create prototypes. My style is very playful.”

Has she experienced any surprises in her first semester? “Focusing on thought processes rather than making itself was a surprise for me,” Lee says. “Our studio course this semester is about speculative and discursive design, a perspective that criticizes and questions rather than answering, which was totally new to me.”

Also inspired by new technology, New Orleans native Matthew Brown MFA 26 CR is exploring the interplay between physical and digital spaces through multimedia clay sculptures in the Ceramics department. Aspiring to teach at a university one day and produce art books, he views RISD as the ideal place to further his artistic journey.

“There’s always something going on at RISD: a talk, an exhibition, an adventure,” he notes. “I’m surrounded by a lot of different people with a lot of different perspectives, and they’re all passionate about what they do and willing to go the distance.”

Brown is joined in the Fine Arts division by Glass department student Abby Sunde MFA 26 GL—also the recipient of a LoveFrom, fellowship—whose artistic practice is deeply informed by her experiences as a queer, mixed-Indigenous woman and her background in environmental science; painter Shiyeon Ku MFA 26 PT, a mixed-race immigrant artist whose work examines the constructed binaries and societal constraints placed on bodies; and printmaker Priyanka Kumar MFA 26 PR, whose work focuses on mental healing and community through the lens of Indian mythology and contemporary social issues.

In the Architecture and Design division, presidential fellow Jeremy Grail MID 26 is working in the Industrial Design department on projects at the intersection of emerging technologies and traditional techniques. Tanaka Mapondera MFA 27 GD, who grew up in Zimbabwe and came to RISD with a background in industrial design, says she hopes to use design “to change how people think.” Elizabeth Tjahja MArch 26 and Apellonia Williams MArch 26 are both pushing boundaries and developing unique perspectives in the Architecture department.

Rounding out the cohort is Areeha Ahmad MA 25 GAC, a Global Arts and Cultures student and active advocate for women’s rights in her home country of Pakistan and around the world. “My mission is to empower women, especially in rural Punjab, and to recognize them as true artists.”

Top image: President Williams (center) welcomes the new cohort of presidential fellows. Photo by Jo Sittenfeld MFA 08 PH

Simone Solondz / studio photos by Kaylee Pugliese
January 7, 2025