What is your Recipe? What ingredients make up your story? What has been the secret recipe to your success? What makes you who you are?
MARCH 8TH
4:30PM EST
4:30PM EST
SPEAKERS
Seeing Boundlessly, Before It’s Too Late
BFA Painting 2025
Currently studying painting and drawing at RISD, Valerie Mirra is an immigrant, traveler, and avid outdoorswoman. Her figurative paintings, centering on animal and plant adaptation in the wake of natural disaster, are created directly from images produced through her devoted plein air painting practice. Valerie’s talk will weave her travels and use of plein air as a tool to look deeply, asserting that paying attention gives us the power to empathize with the landscapes around us, a vital tool to conserve our commons and the living beings who depend on them.
This spring, Valerie is working at her beloved Nature Lab and interning for Congress of the Birds, working to integrate the arts and activism in bird rehabilitation.
Currently studying painting and drawing at RISD, Valerie Mirra is an immigrant, traveler, and avid outdoorswoman. Her figurative paintings, centering on animal and plant adaptation in the wake of natural disaster, are created directly from images produced through her devoted plein air painting practice. Valerie’s talk will weave her travels and use of plein air as a tool to look deeply, asserting that paying attention gives us the power to empathize with the landscapes around us, a vital tool to conserve our commons and the living beings who depend on them.
This spring, Valerie is working at her beloved Nature Lab and interning for Congress of the Birds, working to integrate the arts and activism in bird rehabilitation.
Forget New Cars—Mod the One You Have
BFA Industrial Design 2025
Born and raised in Charlottesville, Virginia, Gresh is passionate about material and system innovation. Considering himself a “pretengineer,” Gresh works with some neighboring engineers at Brown U, where he and a group of friends build an annual race car. “My current goal is to use aerodynamics and ecology to lower the carbon footprint of vehicles,” he says. Outside of school, Gresh has designed and built 3 roadgoing vehicles. Gresh will speak about his journey making a 30- year-old Japanese car more sustainable through maintenance, ecology, and aerodynamics.
Born and raised in Charlottesville, Virginia, Gresh is passionate about material and system innovation. Considering himself a “pretengineer,” Gresh works with some neighboring engineers at Brown U, where he and a group of friends build an annual race car. “My current goal is to use aerodynamics and ecology to lower the carbon footprint of vehicles,” he says. Outside of school, Gresh has designed and built 3 roadgoing vehicles. Gresh will speak about his journey making a 30- year-old Japanese car more sustainable through maintenance, ecology, and aerodynamics.
A Recipe for Emphathy: How Encouraging Comedy from Neurodivergent Voices Will Improve the Future
BFA 02, Professor in Film/Animation/Video
Ryan Cunningham is a queer writer/director and Emmy & Peabody award-winning producer in film, television, and theater. Directing credits include the hit off-Broadway show Sugar Daddy and the upcoming award-winning feature Lone Wolves. TV Producing credits include Broad City, Search Party, and Inside Amy Schumer. She lives in Brooklyn with her daughter, who likes to build elaborate installations around their apartment. Ryan is a graduate of Rhode Island School of Design, a former professor in the Film/Animation/Video department and a Trustee on RISD’s Board. Her TED talk will be about how neurodivergent storytelling is the recipe for empathy in the world.
Ryan Cunningham is a queer writer/director and Emmy & Peabody award-winning producer in film, television, and theater. Directing credits include the hit off-Broadway show Sugar Daddy and the upcoming award-winning feature Lone Wolves. TV Producing credits include Broad City, Search Party, and Inside Amy Schumer. She lives in Brooklyn with her daughter, who likes to build elaborate installations around their apartment. Ryan is a graduate of Rhode Island School of Design, a former professor in the Film/Animation/Video department and a Trustee on RISD’s Board. Her TED talk will be about how neurodivergent storytelling is the recipe for empathy in the world.
The Prophecy: How to Save the Hood
BFA Sculpture 2025
Isaiah “Prophet” Raines is an interdisciplinary artist from Fall River, Massachusetts. In 2023, he and his family were displaced from their apartment in the Southside of Fall River as a result of gentrification, causing Prophet to lose connection with one of the most cherished aspects of his life. He intends to speak on his experiences with artwashing and gentrification to provide strategies for pushback, warning about a process he’s seen replicated in almost every city he’s stepped foot in since. He also intends to spark hope in the people he loves, people who have to invisibly withstand what he personally understands to be a uniquely evil manifestation of greed and inhumanity.
Isaiah “Prophet” Raines is an interdisciplinary artist from Fall River, Massachusetts. In 2023, he and his family were displaced from their apartment in the Southside of Fall River as a result of gentrification, causing Prophet to lose connection with one of the most cherished aspects of his life. He intends to speak on his experiences with artwashing and gentrification to provide strategies for pushback, warning about a process he’s seen replicated in almost every city he’s stepped foot in since. He also intends to spark hope in the people he loves, people who have to invisibly withstand what he personally understands to be a uniquely evil manifestation of greed and inhumanity.
Protecting Stories and Culture in the Face of New Technology
RISD Professor in History, Philosophy, and Social Science
Angelo Baca (Diné/Hopi) is an assistant professor at the Rhode Island School of Design in History, Philosophy, and Social Sciences with a focus on Indigenous and Native American Studies. His work encompasses sacred lands protection, repatriation, and food sovereignty. His work reflects his commitment to collaborative research with Indigenous communities on equal and respectful terms and a long-standing dedication to both Western and Indigenous knowledge. Additionally, he serves on the Derogatory Place names and the Bears Ears National Monument Committees appointed by Secretary Deb Haaland. He strives to empower local and traditional knowledge keepers of Indigenous communities in the stewardship of their own cultural practices and landscapes. His talk will address concerns of Indigenous Intellectual Property and Artificial Intelligence for Native American communities, in particular, the Navajo Nation and how they will engage it from a cultural and philosophical context.
Angelo Baca (Diné/Hopi) is an assistant professor at the Rhode Island School of Design in History, Philosophy, and Social Sciences with a focus on Indigenous and Native American Studies. His work encompasses sacred lands protection, repatriation, and food sovereignty. His work reflects his commitment to collaborative research with Indigenous communities on equal and respectful terms and a long-standing dedication to both Western and Indigenous knowledge. Additionally, he serves on the Derogatory Place names and the Bears Ears National Monument Committees appointed by Secretary Deb Haaland. He strives to empower local and traditional knowledge keepers of Indigenous communities in the stewardship of their own cultural practices and landscapes. His talk will address concerns of Indigenous Intellectual Property and Artificial Intelligence for Native American communities, in particular, the Navajo Nation and how they will engage it from a cultural and philosophical context.
Finding Epic Color in the Everyday
RISD Professor in Theory and History of Art and Design
Michelle Charest is an anthropologist/archaeologist, textile artist/designer, and naturalist specializing in traditional, Indigenous, and historic ways of making. She is a Senior Lecturer at Rhode Island School of Design in the Theory & History of Art & Design. She also has a PhD in Anthropology from Brown University. Michelle’s work in textiles and fiber arts involves every stage of the production chain using small-scale traditional and Indigenous approaches, from sourcing and preparing pigments and fibers to spinning, dyeing, felting, weaving, knitting, finishing, sewing, and preservation. Michelle’s textile studio/workshop is called Hedge Witch Labs.
Michelle's TED talk will discuss how family traditions and foraging for so-called weeds combined with a healthy dose of childhood exploration helped her to create a colorful plan for the future.
Michelle Charest is an anthropologist/archaeologist, textile artist/designer, and naturalist specializing in traditional, Indigenous, and historic ways of making. She is a Senior Lecturer at Rhode Island School of Design in the Theory & History of Art & Design. She also has a PhD in Anthropology from Brown University. Michelle’s work in textiles and fiber arts involves every stage of the production chain using small-scale traditional and Indigenous approaches, from sourcing and preparing pigments and fibers to spinning, dyeing, felting, weaving, knitting, finishing, sewing, and preservation. Michelle’s textile studio/workshop is called Hedge Witch Labs.
Michelle's TED talk will discuss how family traditions and foraging for so-called weeds combined with a healthy dose of childhood exploration helped her to create a colorful plan for the future.