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Featured Student and Alumni Achievements
In Displacement of (M)others in Twenty-First-Century US Films (Bloomsbury, 2026), Jessica Rodríguez-Colón examines how film shapes maternal identities of "Other" subjects. She is an Associate Adjunct Professor at Lehman College, CUNY. In 2026, she carried this research to the Mallen Conference and to PACT at the University of Hawai'i–Hilo.
Nicole Crawford was named Executive Director of the Barry Art Museum at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, in 2026. She previously served as Director and Chief Curator of the University of Wyoming Art Museum. Her research on decolonizing museum practice, which she presented at CAA in 2025, shapes her leadership of one of Virginia's newest university art museums.
Michael Hogan presented "Art of the Street: Derrida and the Aesthetics of Displacement" at the international Derrida Today conference in Paris in 2026. He extended his work on philosophy and the avant-garde at SECAC 2026 with "Language Happening: Mythology and the Art of Allan Kaprow."
Lisa Williamson, Full Professor of 2D and 3D Design at the University of Memphis, completed a month-long residency at the Golden Foundation in New Berlin, New York, in 2026, ending with an open studio. It builds on her 2024 Arctic Circle Residency and her ongoing collaborative exhibitions with artist Richard Lou.
Nic Tanner received a Fulbright Scholar Award for 2025–26 in Nepal, working with Kathmandu University. His doctoral research at IDSVA traced the idea of wonder through Western philosophy. The Fulbright project takes that question into the Buddhist tradition, through a new body of photographs made in Nepal.
Tory Schendel-Vyvoda presented her solo exhibition Navigating the Molecular: The Collective I Series at Georgia Southern University in 2026. It followed the first showing of Navigating the Molecular at the Sleeth Gallery at West Virginia Wesleyan College. Her work brings together art, philosophy, and medieval studies. She is also an inaugural fellow of the KOSMICA Institute for research in the Space Humanities.
Through an impressive array of exhibitions, conference presentations, and publications, IDSVA students and alumni are actively changing how we see and think. Their work demonstrates the real-world impact of combining rigorous philosophical training with creative practice—contributing new knowledge to both academic discourse and contemporary culture.
This point is proven again and again by what our students say and do, and is demonstrated by their achievements as academics, artists, community organizers, public speakers, business owners, and leaders in a variety of fields.
The interdisciplinary nature of the program allows students to develop skills that are not limited to technical expertise in a narrowly defined field, but constitute a broad set of know-how and professional competences applicable in a variety of contexts. Most importantly, students prepare to assume positions of leadership through the cultivation of rigorous study, methodological practices, and a collaborative attitude throughout their course of study.
Our Students and Alumni
