By Emma Hapner, May 1, 2025

I recently was lucky enough to get the inside scoop on one of the most prestigious and exciting art programs in NYC: The Master’s of Fine Arts at Pratt Institute. Here I was able to learn more about the program and explore the studios of some of the incredibly talented students. Pratt Institute’s Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program in Brooklyn offers an immersive, interdisciplinary education for artists seeking to deepen their practice and engage critically with contemporary art. Ranked among the top 15 MFA programs nationwide by U.S. News & World Report, Pratt’s program is renowned for its distinguished faculty, exceptional facilities, and a supportive community of peers. The MFA program emphasizes interdisciplinary practice, allowing students to explore various media, including painting and drawing, printmaking, sculpture, and integrated practices.

Leda Tsoutreli, MFA studio, Pratt Institute, Spring 2025

The first studio I visited belongs to an incredible artist, and friend, Jessi Olarsch, who is about to complete her first year of the MFA program, with a focus on painting. Olarsch is a figurative painter based in New York City whose work radiates with bold purples, hot pinks, and bursts of texture through hand-crocheted elements. Her paintings are deeply personal yet widely resonant, drawing from her lived experiences to explore the complexities of chronic illness, the tender intimacy of queer friendship, and the evolving thresholds between public and private queer life. With a practice rooted in both vulnerability and celebration, Olarsch captures the layered, often contradictory emotions of belonging—inviting viewers into the messy, joyful, and transformative process of coming into community.

Jessi Olarsch, *On the Interpersonal Politics of Lesbian Volleyball Teams* (2024). Oil on Canvas 36x48

Next, I stopped by the studio of Ayoung Yoo, a multidisciplinary artist based in Brooklyn, NY, whose practice spans painting and textile art. Originally from Seoul, Korea, Yoo creates delicate yet powerful works that explore the arc of human existence—from birth to death—through the lens of breath, time, and relational connection. Her art investigates both vertical lines of lineage, particularly through maternal relationships, and horizontal bonds between individuals, all while contemplating the fragile boundary between life and death. Drawing from nature, poetry, and the quiet rhythms of daily life, Yoo works with materials such as organza silk, hand-dyed pigments, crochet, and hand stitching. Her practice ranges from large-scale wall works inspired by anatomical and traditional clothing forms, including the Hanbok silhouette, to intimate hanging installations that echo the cyclical nature of life. With every thread and gesture, Yoo invites viewers into a space of reflection, ritual, and continuity. Yoo is in her second year at Pratt, preparing to graduate from the program this Spring.

Ayoung Yoo, *Blooming* (2025). Korean pigment on organza silk, stitching, crocheting and installation, Dimensions variable

Last, I stopped by the studio of Leda Tsoutreli is a contemporary painter based in New York City, originally from Athens, Greece, whose visceral, gestural oil paintings trace the fleeting movements of her body across the canvas. Working within—and against—the confines of the two-dimensional surface, Tsoutreli uses mark-making as a means to explore instinct, space, and ritual. Her practice embraces the rawness of animalistic and childlike impulses, allegorically transforming the canvas into a “religious pasture” where paint becomes nourishment and the artist, the sheep.

Through this metaphor, Tsoutreli reimagines painting as an act of both consumption and creation—wandering through layers of pigment in search of meaning, sustenance, and self. A graduate of Kingston School of Art, she has exhibited in group shows across New York and has been featured in art publications in London. Tsoutreli is also set to graduate from Pratt with her MFA this Spring.