"The first graduate program at RISD was established in 1957 with the MS in Art Education with the first MFA programs starting in 1961. We now have 16 graduate programs with 2 more being added in 2018.The core of any graduate program is concentrated and advanced study in an academic or professional field. Compared with undergraduate studies, graduate education is focused on producing original contributions to a field, based on research and advance practice. Graduate programs also provide the opportunity for more applied experience via internships, teaching or research. This is essential for RISD’s commitment to furthering the importance of art and design in the world and in producing distinguished professional and academic leaders." -Pradeep Sharma, RISD Provost 2014-2017

This series presents all collected student Masters Theses submitted and approved as graduation requirements from each of the seventeen departments offering a graduate degree: Architecture, Ceramics, Digital + Media, Furniture Design, Glass, Graphic Design, Illustration, Industrial Design, Interior Architecture, Jewelry + Metalsmithing, Landscape Architecture, Painting, Photography, Printmaking, Sculpture, Teaching + Learning in Art and Design, and Textiles. Postgraduate writing and research is also included.

These works are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Creative Commons License

Follow


Theses from 2025

PDF

Afrography: Scripting futures anchored in culture & community, Osmond Tshuma

PDF

Rooted in Learning: Eco-Art Pedagogy and Place-Based Learning, Emily Van Heusen

PDF

Tierras Celosas, Gery Vargas

PDF

bodies collapsing together... together as dust., Catherine J. Wang

PDF

OURCRAFT, jie wang

Link

Low Carbon Adaptation through Community Composting, Junrong Wang

PDF

Mapping Our Tears: RISD CRY, Yimiao Wang

PDF

Stranded in Time: Reawakening the Crook Point Bascule Bridge through Temporality, Zhipeng Wang

PDF

A Personal Manual of Escapism, Qing Wen

PDF

I Don't Want to Talk About It, Margaryta Winkler

PDF

Windbound, Selina Kehuan Wu

PDF

Eco-Posthumanism — A Utopian Transformation of Modernist Residence, Shuli Wu

PDF

Rural Dreams, Zongda Wu

PDF

Delusional Motel: An Architecture Evoking Negative Symptoms and Disorders, Zesha Xie

PDF

Unnatural Nature: A Visual Artist’s Reflection on Myth, Medium, and Feminine Being, Rong Xu

PDF

breath, void, ground, Huichun Yang

PDF

Chasing The Sacred: A Personal Archive, Yiko Yang

PDF

Cohabitation at Threshold: Carpenter House Reimagined for Multispecies Living, Zhixiao Yang

PDF

Returning into the Deep Forest--A Methodological Practice Around Memory, Asianness, and Speech, Yu Ye

PDF

Objects Into Things: The Ordinary into Extraordinary, Michael K. Yirenkyi

PDF

Coarse Woody Debris: Growth & Decay, Cody W. Young

PDF

The Stream of Life, Yitao Yuan

PDF

Of Primal Substance, Wu Yueting

PDF

Ecospiritual Entanglement, Ali Vedad Yüner

PDF

To Reflect & to be Reflective: Student Experiences of Critique in Art & Design Higher Education, Jade Seobin Yun

PDF

More Than Her Othering Narrative, Jiayi Zhang

PDF

The Limits of Knowing: Determinism, Uncertainty, and What’s Beyond the Human Gaze, Xilong T. Zhang

PDF

Comfort in Contradiction, Yanchen Zhao

PDF

Modes of Seeing, Means of Telling, Tina Zhou

PDF

Hunting, FEIYANG ZHUANG

Theses from 2024

PDF

CODEX OCCULTUS, Aya Abdallah

PDF

Dimensional Dialogues, Farida Abousteit

PDF

ASILI, Husna Abubakar

PDF

Unfurling Blue Carpet Memories, Sara Ahli

PDF

Detroit Jazz Geographies: Marronage and Speculative Urban Futures, Denzel Amoah

PDF

A Thesis, or Digressions on Sculptural Practice: In Which, Concepts & Influences Thereof are Explained, Set Forth, Catalogued, or Divulged by Way of Commentaries to a Poem, First Conceived by the Artist, Fed Through ChatG.P.T., and Re-edited by the Artist, to Which are Added, Annotated References, Impressions and Ruminations Thereof, Also Including Private Thoughts & Personal Accounts of the Artist, Jaimie An

PDF

Folding (and Unfolding): A Site-Responsive Strategy for Reusing Construction and Demolition Waste, Jennifer Ansley

PDF

DEFINING SELF IN THE URBAN FRONTIER, YIMENG AN

PDF

The Future Is Over, Dotan Appelbaum

PDF

I am becoming., Dai Asano

PDF

Half Dawn, Catherine Ashley

PDF

Reform Craft | Re-Form Clay, Katherine Badenhausen

PDF

Narrative Structures, Theodore Badenhausen

PDF

Tethered by Nourishment - Exploring Sovereignty within an Urban Food Apartheid, Benjamin Bailey

PDF

Sircling the Cquare, Latika Balachander

PDF

Modern Times, Will Beattie

PDF

Graphic Desire, Michelle Belgrod

PDF

Garment Making as a Practice of Freedom, Emily Bennison

PDF

New Craft: Craft Practices in the Digital Era, Paulina Bereza

PDF

Landing: body, site, material, Renata Berta

PDF

JUGAATRONICS, Monica Bhyrappa

PDF

Umbrella and Jellyfish, yanran bi

PDF

Room to Grieve: The Space of Solace in Public Life, Lauren Blonde

PDF

Never Real Historians, Emily Bluedorn

PDF

Frontier: Land, Architecture, and Abstraction, Jacob Boatman

PDF

Always Been This Way, Joanna Booth

PDF

Intangible shells, Elena Bulet

PDF

Trans-species Communication, Fueled by Efforts of Remediation, Naomi Canino

PDF

Winter Solstice, Jingwen Cao

PDF

Revitalizing Decay, Owen Carey

PDF

Rhythm of Space, Brian Carrillo

PDF

RECLAIMED BY ROOTS, Dongyang Chen

PDF

On the Impulse to Notate, Lydia Chodosh

PDF

Guilty Pleasure: Women's Perception of Health, Body Image, and Femininity, Irene *Yi-Han Chung

PDF

A Living Storyscape, Vivian Combariza

PDF

Searching for the Hyperobject: Crystals as Transscalar Vehicles, Jay Costello

PDF

Emotional Factory, Yukun Cui

PDF

Naturify 2300, Yarina Yiwei Dai

PDF

Discovering The Lightness of Being, Yuemeng Dai

PDF

The Importance of Art Programming for Underserved Youth, Aja Delgado

PDF

The Day the Door Flew Open, Clara Delgado

PDF

Unconditioning Air, Weijia Deng

PDF

Rejected Manuscripts, Yangqi Deng

PDF

Threading with Hair // Intertwined Stories, Cloris Ding

PDF

This Is For You: A handbook for design students, Gabriel Drozdov

PDF

Better Together, Jack Dumala

PDF

Function Follows Material, Pablo Ejarque González

PDF

(Matter)ial Revolution, Aleza Epstein

PDF

Designed Impermanence, An Alchemical Inquiry, Dani Epstein

PDF

Sweet Relief, Aaron Feltman

PDF

Call and Response : Experiments in Storytelling, Deanne Fernandes

PDF

Soft Procedures, Alec Figuracion

PDF

Building the Body, Jasmine Flowers

PDF

Beach Autonomous Zone, Carl Garvey

PDF

Industrial Tenderness, Elbert Girón

PDF

While We Were at Dinner, Anna Glass

PDF

So Far So Good, Cooper Goldman

PDF

House Calls, Gregory Goldstone

PDF

Thickness of Place: Urban Stratigraphy and Rammed Earth Construction in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Alexandra Goodenough

PDF

Culinary community: Collaborative Relationship Building through Improvisational Fine Dining, Victoria Goodisman

PDF

Textile Tectonics: Shaping Space Through Soft Studies, Lela Gunderson

PDF

Witnessing Timelessness: Revitalizing Heritage Tourism in the Ruins of Saudi Arabia, Reem Habis

PDF

Embodied Abstractions: Identity and Representation in the Digital Era, Srikar Hari

PDF

Remade Radical: Design Artifacts of a Third World Future, Yasmine Hassan

PDF

Repair Rolodex: Exchanges, Changes, and Patchwork Parables, Ethan Howard

PDF

Hong Kong’s Architectural Resistance: Practice Through Research, Jingjing Huang

PDF

Bilateral Vertical Urbanization, Yifan Huang

PDF

Furnicreature, Yijing Huang

PDF

Lost Stories, Yuxuan Huang

PDF

“Modern Nomads”: Unfolding Domesticity, Yifan Hu