Pratt Fine Arts’ Fellowship in Civic Engagement invites an established artist who is active in collaborative, socially engaged practices for a one (renewable to two) year Fellowship. The Fellowship fosters interdisciplinary collaboration across Pratt and forges relationships with external communities and organizations.
“Pratt’s Fellowship in Civic Engagement is coming at the perfect time in American politics and my practice, as I will be running for City Council in Brooklyn for 2021. As we’re headed into a chaotic presidential election year surrounded by a media circus, my goal is to work with the community at Pratt Institute to creatively focus attention on local politics, keep us active and engaged, and continue sweeping progressive change from the ground up.” –Amy Khoshbin
Amy Khoshbin is an Iranian-American artist, activist, and educator based in Brooklyn. Her practice builds bridges between disparate communities to counteract fear with a collective sense of empowered radical acceptance. She pushes the formal and conceptual boundaries of artistic practice to foster progressive social change through performance, social practice, video, rap music, installation, sculpture, collage, tattooing, teaching, and writing. She uses humor and a handmade aesthetic to throw a counterpunch at the high-definition, profit-generating codes, and symbols that audiences are accustomed to consuming.
Amy has shown at venues such as The Whitney Museum of American Art The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Times Square Arts, Artpace, The High Line, Socrates Sculpture Park, VOLTA Art Fair, Leila Heller Gallery, Arsenal Contemporary, National Sawdust, BRIC Arts, and festivals such as River to River and South by Southwest. She has received residencies at spaces such as The Watermill Center, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Project for Empty Space, Anderson Ranch, and Banff Centre for the Arts.
Amy has received a Franklin Furnace Fund and a Rema Hort Mann Artist Community Engagement Grant. Khoshbin received an MA from New York University in Tisch School of the Arts and a BA in Film and New Media Art at the University of Texas at Austin. She has collaborated with Laurie Anderson, Karen Finley, Tina Barney, House of Trees, and poets Anne Carson and Bob Currie among others.
Bringing together electoral politics and artmaking, Amy is running for City Council in Brooklyn in 2021 to ensure space for underrepresented voices in our political system and to shift our culture towards one of creativity and compassion.
Pratt’s Fine Arts BFA and MFA programs offer a deep and sustained dialogue between imagining and making; conceptual development and mastery of means; the world of the studio and the studio of the world. Combining focused study in the student’s chosen field of practice alongside critical context and theory, the curriculum prepares students to be active contributors to culture and society. Our graduates pursue diverse creative and professional careers as studio artists, community artists and educators, critics, curators, gallerists, creative entrepreneurs and arts administrators. Students work closely with award-winning faculty who are working artists and passionately committed to their students’ growth and success. Pratt’s location in the global cultural capital of New York enlarges the campus experience with exceptional access to world-class galleries and museums.
