In the first wake of COVID-19 during the spring of 2020, most of the country’s MFA programs either cancelled their graduating students’ thesis exhibitions or moved them online and then proceeded to award degrees and dismiss their students into the world. ArtCenter has recognized the importance of the final show for these design and art students who were about to graduate and wanted to give them an opportunity to honor their work during their time at ArtCenter.

Thanks to Bruce Hainley, the MFA program chair of ArtCenter, the final thesis shows were not cancelled and instead, they were postponed to the end of the summer allowing students to have an opportunity to showcase the work that they’ve invested in for the past two years.

In order to support the graduating MFA students, MADWORKSHOP has assisted by donating relief funds that would provide students with the resources needed to install their final thesis exhibition. Students have used the summer to slowly regain access to studios and to also coordinate a safe way to exhibit their final thesis works. We firmly believe and support the students of ArtCenter in their pursuit of becoming artists and designers.

Here are some of the work examples of the 2020 MFA ArtCenter students.