"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 collection presents student Masters Theses submitted and approved as graduation requirements from each of the 16 departments offering a graduate degree: Architecture, Ceramics, Digital + Media, Furniture Design, Glass, Graphic Design, 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.

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Theses from 2019

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Personal trauma, community healing : reimagining sanctuary for survivors of gun violence, Eva McCarthy

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Standards, rules, setting, Robert McConnell

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In the wake of the atoms+sphaira, Jesús Meléndez Vázquez

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Externalized : origins of aesthetic motivations, Tim Miller

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The urban shelf : a hybrid between architecture and infrastructure, William Morales

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Pekka : social software to improve in-game dynamics, Yu Mo

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Lost & found : a model for retreated landscapes, Madison Murray

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Trash as culture : culture as trash, Sara Naja

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Abjad orientations, Mohammed Nassem

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Softweave, Annaka Olsen

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The In-Betweens: Exploring Integration Within the Arts, Ruchi Pathak

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Groundwork, Marcus Peabody

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Where we are : where we thought we were going, Nathan Prebonick

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Playfulness : exploring experience through a trajectory, Yingjing Qu

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Awe-struck, Emily Robertson

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Kippee-ki-yay : an energy case study, Madison Blaize Russ

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Re-activating collective memory : museum as a workshop, Sfoorti Sachdev

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Body of work, Oliva de Salve Villedieu

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An intricate ensemble : the art-science of an ecological imaginary for the Anthropocene epoch, Alyce Santoro

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Grid as a frame, Young In Sa

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Field in adaptive reuse : discussion of the existence of the field and its influence, Yilun Shao

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Evolution of a type : street vending as urban strategy in Guangzhou, China, Yuying Shen

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Floating, Nina Shishkina

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Film for landscape architecture : learning from Alfonso Cuarón's Roma, Ramon Solis

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Breaking barriers, opening doors : integrating the formerly incarcerated with community, Ruoyi Song

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Icarus : how to survive the fall, Emile Stark-Menneg

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Recharging Bangkok : a climate adaptive vision for Saen Saeb Canal, Ratchu Surajaras

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Landscape as framework : downtown revival through rebuilding spatial identity, Dawei Tang

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Cosmosis, Angela Torchio

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Remembering culture in the modern era : cultural center SPA Grössling, Alex Trajanov-Godmas

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HAB mitigation : wetland restoration in farmlands, Jae Won Wang

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Edge of emergence : landscape as a journey of memory, Jiayue Wang

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Regenerative assemblage : future vision for the canals of Pingdingshan, Meng Wang

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Re-creation : a package design for daily life, Wei-Hao Wang

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When the wind blows, Yiying Wang

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Landscape succession : oil field transformed through landscape process, Yuanbin Wang

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Supposing truth is a woman, Chloe Wilwerding

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Can you shut the door? : exploring the personal as political in the domestic bathroom, Hannah Winders

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The movement in nature : deep missing, missing you from far away, Chia-Chi Wu

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Regeneration of memory and home : rebuilding urban resilience and people's mental perceptions after the Camp fire in Paradise, CA, Xinye Xie

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Time traveler : interpreting landscape process through time by immersive narrative, Zhiyuan Yang

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Interface philosophy, June Yoon

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Game / landscape / us, Dongqi Zhang

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Emerging ecotone, Tongyi Zhang

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Salt pans matter : a system of ecology and culture cohabitation for Cabo de Gata, Andalusia, Spain, Chenglin Zhu

Theses from 2018

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This is public work, Nick Adam

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Domestic disorientation, Marisa Adesman

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Evoking the divine : from secular to sacred and back again, Dragos Tiberiu Alexandru

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Environmental diversity for student residence life, Jiaying Bai

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Life after dark, Austin Bamford

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Architecture as water-human mediator, Hui Bao

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Autonomous vehicle futures : designing experiences that enable trust and adoption, Jeremy Bass

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Creating connection in a digital society, Mariah Bennett

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Haptic wonder : the sensation of exquisite craft, Anjuli Berstein

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Ghost, a stone, Audrey Blood

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Between gods and animals : deconstructing heteronormative masculines pursuit to sustain power, Shawn Bush

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Haunt : casual surrealism, Cara Buzzell

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The space in between : liminal space, Wei-Chun Cheng

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Me too park : inform, connect, heal, Xiao Chen

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Placefulness, Ellen Christensen

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Revealing context & complexity in urban historic sites, Simin Chu

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Foodways for earthlings : recipes and tools for eating in extreme environments, Maggie Coblentz

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Opine : positioning architecture, Kevin Crouse

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Amending the idle : an analysis of urban idle spaces + third places, Paige Davidson

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Curious things, Allison Davis

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Ouroboros, Christopher Dove Drury

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Chaos and order, Jie Du

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Archinaut : Archinaut design laboratory office manual, Joseph Echavarria

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Idiosyncratic uniform, Erica Efstratoudakis

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Pretend power, Rosemary Engstrom

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Matriarchy, M. Camila Escobar Vélez

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Anachropomorphism!, Carson Evans

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The evolution of ornament, Charlotte Ngaio Fairless

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Living with impoundment, Chuxiong Feng

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Zoom-out : expansion of pedagogical approaches within moving image education, Thomas Flint

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To see again, Ada Goldfeld

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Lingua Franca, Tatiana Gomez Gaggero

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On the edge of being, Zoe Gross

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Space in between : finding a third space for art education & creative community, Denise Gunter

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Reveal the aura : RISD contemplative atrium, Shuyi Guo

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Wild power, Iris Han

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The contested landscapes of Mnemosyne : constructing maps of memory, Valeria Rachel Herrera

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Moments of rotary motion : temporary use in vacant industrial heritage architecture, Xuecheng He

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We can HOST! : preparing Miami's neighborhoods for an amphibious future, Dongning Huang

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Woven curvature, Yuhao Jiang

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Summer peaches and salt-tinged fog, Carolina Jiménez

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Really clean no problems at all, Christina Johnston

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Sky well, Molly Kaderka

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Letsqube, Biniam Assegid Kebede

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Throwing architecture to the sea : discipline out of context, Andrea Kelly

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Tightrope walking on the red lines, Arghavan Khosravi

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Transporting eating architecture, Margaret Kiladjian

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Learning environments of our stories, Grace M. Kim

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The long forgotten city element, Yun Chu King

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The bird's eye view, Ipek Kosova

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Preventing lonely death, Hyun Kyu Lee and Menghan Zhou

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Embody phenomenal transparency : the expanded application of "phenomenal transparency" in landscape architecture, Hongfei Li

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Floating Miami, Jiongye Li

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Facade of democracy : realizing the architecture of the fourth wall, Johnny Yueh Han Lin

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Möbius system : a pseudo-world made from pseudo-science, Xinye Lin