Chipped Teeth & Empty Bellies

Parsons Fine Arts MFA 2026 thesis exhibition: Friday April 17–Tuesday, April 28, 2026. Opening reception: Friday, April 17, 2026, 6–8pm.

Sheila C. Johnson Design Center at The New School, Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Gallery, 2 West 13th Street, New York, NY 10011. Arnold and Sheila Aronson Galleries, 66 5th Ave, New York, NY 10011. Gallery hours: 12–6pm (daily) / 8pm (Thursday).

Chipped Teeth & Empty Bellies
Exhibiting artists: Emīlija Berga, Jackie Brady, Yi Chen, Becca Dugas,  Giovanna Eley, Mil Fienco, Vanda Focanti, Mckenna Goade, Karis Huang, H, Jayden Liu, Diego Qi, Shrujana Niranjani Shridhar, Aida Sulova, Alekz Thoms, Juana Vargas Moreno.

In Chipped Teeth & Empty Bellies, the Parsons Fine Arts MFA Thesis Exhibition for the Class of 2026, there is a formal inquiry that emphasizes the process of taking apart and breaking down: a formal curiosity that is also a hunger. Across different media, the sixteen artists of the exhibition call attention to the process of chewing, churning, digesting, and absorbing, of disassembly and reassembly, of destruction and play. There is the taking apart of a tool or a toy; the breaking down of a supply chain or a sentence, of institutional structures, social relations, cultural identities, or material histories; the hunger about the body itself as an assemblage of habits, techniques, technologies, laws, norms, and desires. If the title evokes Franz Kafka’s “hunger artist,” it also refers to the appetite for learning, for living: for asking questions, for critique, and for the reconfiguration of new forms–and play–that could also be described as dreamwork.  

Located in the heart of Greenwich Village in New York City, the MFA Fine Arts Program at Parsons School of Design at The New School is distinctive for the experimentation and interdisciplinarity of its two-year curriculum, as well as its international and diverse faculty and student body. The MFA Fine Arts Program is a vital part of The New School, a progressive university with a long, storied history of experimentation and interdisciplinary collaboration across the arts, the humanities, and the social sciences. Founded in 1896 and incorporated into The New School in 1970, the Parsons School of Design has served as a leader in the field of Art and Design for more than a century. 

For more information about the program, please visit the website or contact the Director of Parsons Fine Arts MFA, Soyoung Yoon.