May 5–14, 2010 (Tuesday–Friday, 12PM–6PM; Sat ,11AM–6PM )
Reception: Tuesday, May 10, 6-8 PM
The Kitchen
512 West 19th Street
New York, NY 10011-2899
Parsons Fine Arts is proud to present the 2011 MFA Thesis Exhibition at The Kitchen in Chelsea. This year the exhibition is curated by Jeffrey Kastner and Sina Najafi (Cabinet Magazine) and will bring together works by the 19 artists who will graduate from the program this May. The reception for the exhibition will take place on Tuesday May 10, from 6–8 PM, coinciding with The Parsons Festival. The exhibition is free and open to the public.
The artists in the exhibition are: Rehan Bashir, Atalay Harrison, Mauricio Herrero, Chris Mansour, Gene Kim, Kenna Kindig, Brendan McCarthy, Thomas O’Grady, Bridget O’Rourke, Tatiana Istomina, Neha Majithia, JD Siazon, Schih Chieh Lo, Beomdo Seo, Logan T. Sibrel, Isabelle Webster, Guang Yu Wu, Azin Feizabadi, Monica L.Bernal and Magnus Weik.
“The characteristic shared most vividly by the twenty artists comprising the class of 2011 is their emphatic, confident individuality. Irrespective of their chosen media, each already understands—even at this early, emergent moment in their careers—that more than ever in this era of post-disciplinary atomization, what makes work successful is not the way it can be plugged into neat formal or stylistic categorizations, but rather the degree to which it expresses the full conceptual commitment of its authors and persuasively claims its own physical and intellectual space. For young artists coming of age in an era when the rules of the artistic profession are being rewritten from the ground up, we can think of no better lesson to take from the classroom into the world.”
—Jeffrey Kastner and Sina Najafi
The MFA Thesis Exhibition is the capstone of a year that has been filled with students exhibiting in national and international contexts, curating innovative programs, publishing and leading award winning projects.
Under the guidance of MFA Director Simone Douglas, students participated in Parsons’ exchange program in China and received 1st, 3rd, and special jurors award prizes in the international ‘BrotherWin Cup’ University Students Art & Design Competition for the video, photography and performances that they created in the Gobi Desert in the summer of 2010.
The MFA Thesis Exhibition is part of The Parsons Festival that runs from May 7 to 23. For more information about the festival please visit www.newschool.edu/parsonsfestival.
Parsons The New School for Design is one of the premier institutions for art and design education. Founded in 1896, is has served as a pioneer in the field for more than a century. Based in New York but active around the world, the school offers undergraduate and graduate programs in the full spectrum of design disciplines. Critical thinking and collaboration are at the heart of a Parsons education. Parsons offers rigorous training that allows for interdisciplinary collaboration across five thematic schools. An integral part of The New School, Parsons builds on the university’s legacy of progressive ideals, scholarship, and pedagogy. Parsons graduates are leaders in their respective fields, with a shared commitment to creatively and critically addressing the complexities of life in the 21st century.