Here are some images of things I saw this week and Saturday, as I was walking around campus. The water building gallery has class projects on display right now. Paper folding and cardboard musical instrument. Then I ran across Architecture students work on a concrete form project near Woods-Gerry ground.  The project focused on the process of how to make concrete and applying it to a sculptural form. Here’s a picture from the RISD fall art sale that I went to on Saturday, Oct 10th. I saw a lot of great art and design items alumni and students were selling. Antonio Peters/RISD Admissions Officer/apeters@risd.edu

The A Better World by Design conference is almost here!  This annual event was founded by an interdisciplinary group of RISD and Brown students to enhance our understanding of design, technology, and sustainability on a local and global scale.  This year’s itinerary features eighteen notable speakers including RISD’s president, John Maeda.  Also, there are several thought provoking panels planned, which will be discussing topics such as architecture in developing worlds and clean energy, as well as a whole slew of workshops and events!
The conference is being held at several locations throughout downtown Providence and the Brown and RISD campuses. It begins on October 2nd and goes through October 4th.  For more information and to register for the event, click here.

Jacob Andrew Lohmann

Class year: 2011

Major: Architecture

Hometown: Berryville, VA (Born and raised in Dallas, Texas)

Summer plans: Workin’ in Providence

What do you do in your free time: Play guitar, basketball with my friends 

Favorite project at RISD: Figure drawing during freshman year

What do I like best about RISD: Its a unique place

Future plans: Be an architect one day

If you have any questions about visiting RISD or Admissions, please feel free to contact me.

Antonio Peters  

apeters@risd.edu

AIM: risd1877 

Tyler DiBiasio

Year: 2012

Major: FAV

Hometown: Exeter, Rhode Island

(the picture is from z-day)

http://providencedailydose.com/2008/04/25/is-it-z-day-already/ 

Summer plans:   Working in the admissions office and fighting communism

What do you do in your free time: Play guitar

Favorite project at RISD:  Making the instructional video “How to Keep Yourself Entertained in the Middle of Nowhere” (aka my hometown)

What you like best about RISD:  The people

Future plans:  Writing and directing my own films

Additional info: Next year my dorm in 15 West will be known as the Lazer Jungle.  Why? because we’re filling it with plants and Lazers and seeing how we can get a fog machine past the smoke detectors.

If you have any questions. Please feel free to contact me.

Antonio Peters

Apeters@risd.edu 

aim: risd1877 

Natalie Hogan

Year transferred: 2007

Class Year: Junior

Major: Sculpture

Hometown: Philadelphia

Favorite Movie: The Graduate, although I haven’t seen the new Star Trek yet!

Favorite Teacher: Tom Roberts! I took a class with him on the history of sports last Wintersession. All the closet sports fans at RISD took the class. We were required to watch the Super Bowl and go to a Providence College basketball game. He also had us stretch (literally!) before our final.

Free time: I do a lot of cooking and baking in my free time. I make a legendary cranberry pecan upside-down cake. I also go to Providence Bruins games whenever I can (the minor league hockey team). In the summer, I always try to make it to Waterfire (http://www.waterfire.org/) and spend a lot of time in the pool.

Favorite Project: My favorite project was for the Casting Elective in the Sculpture department. We were assigned to make a project relating to skin that would be cast in aluminum. I cast my foot with alginate and molded a cup on top. For the crit, I drank a milkshake out of my foot.

Like best about RISD: I like that RISD relies on the creativity of the students to make the school better outside of the studio. For example, I’m working with another student to plan orientation for new students in 2009. We’re designing t-shirts, planning the schedule, and training other students to take part in the program. There are so many opportunities like this such as the student gallery board, the What We Do conference (which was completely student run), and student sales.

Antonio Peters, Admissions Officer, apeters@risd.edu

April at RISD brings daffodils, throngs of students enjoying warm weather on the RISD beach, and senior shows.

Senior shows are a chance to show off the results of the 4 years (or 5 for you architects) of hard work you put in as a RISD student. For us admissions officers, it’s gratifying to see the final projects of students we first met as applicants. It’s a great opportunity to see how their artistic skills and style developed during the time that they were here at RISD.

Most senior shows are up for about a week, so there are constantly new things to see in the various campus galleries. One of the shows that we recently visited featured the work of five different Illustration seniors. Their pieces ranged from loose, large-scale figure paintings to small acrylic and cut paper children’s book illustrations.

At the show opening last Thursday, we caught up with two of the artists, Kate (who you may remember from Leon’s post about waiting for decision letters) and Sam. They were kind enough to let us photograph them in front of their work.

Most of Kate’s work at RISD has been children’s book illustration, but she’s looking into a couple of different options for work after she graduates.

Sam has done a lot of computer illustration and plans to work for a game design company in Providence.

The Illustration gallery is in the ISB building, and is open from 12pm-4pm every weekday.

If you have any questions about the show, feel free to contact us anytime.

Meryn Hall
mhall@risd.edu

Antonio Peters
apeters@risd.edu

The February 15 deadline for those interested in applying as a freshman has since past. In the last post we caught you up with the review process and all the required application materials we look at on our end. In particular we have noticed a fascination with the three required drawings, known almost unanimously as “The RISD Bike” as a way of describing all three works that we want you to mail in. The 12-20 piece portfolios that you guys sent are required to be reproductions in the form of .jpgs burned to a CD, slides, or unmounted photographic prints. When it comes to those three drawings we want the real deal, fold each of those 16 inch X 20 inch drawings into half twice (or into quarters) and drop them in a mailing envelope and send them off to us. Lets look back a bit at those drawings you sent and give a little history… I have noticed a lot of intrigue, confusion, wonderment, speculation, anticipation, elation, dred, and expectation concerning these. I thought taking a moment to reflect on where they came from and what we are looking for might shed some light on the whole issue. Why a bicycle and why are you sending in the actual drawings? There’s a little RISD history lesson found in the answer. The director of Admissions informed me that the roots of the current drawing assignments go back decades to a time when you had to audition in person for entry into RISD’s program. This meant you would travel to Providence and meet with a Professor and other hopeful RISD applicants. The group of applicants would then create a drawing in one of our studios under the Professors supervision. The subject would often be a group of intertwined bicycles positioned on the floor. The drawing would be timed and at the conclusion the results would be judged as part of your admissions decision. Talk about intense! Things are (thankfully) much more manageable these days. We aren’t interested in a timed response, but we are interested  in your ideas…so take you time with these drawings!  We are as concerned with results as we are with concept and idea. What are these drawings about? What are you investigating? There are three drawings we require with many different opportunities for exploration. There is much to be said for using observational drawing as a tool. Find inspiration in a real world object and go from there with your ideas to open up new possibilities. Try to avoid copying a photograph (even one you have taken yourself), or working exclusively from your imagination. This can often handicap your creative potential and remove options or ideas that searching the world around you can provide. So allow your crazy ideas to pop up and combine with the things you see around you. Whether your making a drawing of an altered piece of paper, using both sides of the paper, or drawing a bicycle think about this as solving a visual problem.  Check out all the requirements here.  Most of all have fun with these, enjoy the process and know that your individual responses are what makes these successful, not fulfilling some idea of what they should look like. We know that you guys who applied worked hard on them, so hang tight while we review, and best of luck to all!   

Leon Paul Hovanesian II 
contact me: lhovanes@risd.edu 

Visiting high schools across the country (and occasionally internationally) is one of the ways us RISD Admissions Officers occupy ourselves during the fall.  One of the places my travels took me this year was to Dr. Bob O’Boyle’s advanced art class at Hopewell Valley Central High School in New Jersey.   The art program there emphasizes observational drawing and painting, but students have a lot of freedom to experiment with different types of media and find a personal voice within their work.  While I was at HVCHS, I reviewed two portfolios.  Both students had nice work - one was very graphically inclined; the other much more interested in fine arts.  I was particularly taken with these self portraits, done by one of the two students  (a senior in Dr. O’Boyle’s class).

We come to high schools to talk with students, art teachers and guidance counselors about all the things we think make RISD a great place to go to college.  Usually these visits entail a presentation that highlights student work from all of the different departments here, and, if time allows, giving students feedback on the portfolios they are putting together.  Our travel season is winding down for the year, but if you are interested in having RISD visit your school next fall, have your art teacher or guidance counselor get in touch with us to request a visit.  We try to honor visit requests whenever possible, and we are always interested in having an opportunity to travel to new places.

Meryn Hall, Admissions Officer

Contact me at mhall@risd.edu

RISD Exhibits! One of the best parts about making all this great art + design is showing it off. RISD’s galleries all over campus have their openings every Thursday night. The epicenter tends to be the Woods Gerry Gallery found in (you guessed it) the Woods Gerry Building at 62 Prospect Street. Every department has an opening here, pictured is the Illustration Department show being installed (my old major and my old work study job). As a student you too can get an on campus work study job with Mark Moscone (director of exhibitions) and Gunner Norquist (exhibitions coordinator). They will teach you the inns and outs of hanging, nailing, gluing, lighting, positioning, and strapping everything from 15 foot canvases to ceiling hung kinetic sculptures. Check out the gallery scene at RISD here! Check out the amazing Graduate Studies Exhibition (the time-lapsed video of the set up is mesmerizing).

Now for Exhibit B…what have openings have you been to?Let me know!

Leon Paul Hovanesian II

Admissions Officer

lhovanes@risd.edu

Hello, Just a note to incoming freshmen and their parents to always feel free to come and visit Our RISD. It is where I am constantly posting news about RISD whenever I get the chance. Regards, John