School of Visual Arts
The Penn State School of Visual Arts (SoVA) is a place where creative and critical thinkers, makers, and educators shape awareness and change the way our world is seen, experienced, and understood.
You belong here
Our challenging undergraduate and graduate programs span Studio Art, Digital Arts and Design, and Art Education. We also offer online courses tailored to diverse learners.
SoVA’s internationally recognized, award-winning faculty are dedicated to learning, research, and educational imagination. Visual thinkers, creators, shapers, and educators – you belong here.
Contact
School of Visual Arts
210 Patterson Building
University Park, PA 16802
814-865-0444
814-865-1158 (fax)
sova@psu.edu
Vagner Mendonça-Whitehead
Director of School of Visual Arts
Michelle McMullen
Administrative Support Manager, SoVA
Connect
Alumni Spotlight
alumni spotlight
Devan Shimoyama
“While I’m still dreaming bigger and bigger, I always think about the incredible foundation that my Penn State education has provided for me.”
Devan’s award-winning art uses painting, sculpture, and photography to challenge gender stereotypes and confront racial and cultural injustice with a vibrant, modern edge. He has exhibited at the Andy Warhol Museum and in numerous major cities including New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and Paris.
Faculty Spotlight
See all our Faculty
faculty spotlight
Rudy Shepherd
Rudy Shepherd’s work explores the nature of evil through the mediums of painting, drawing, sculpture and performance. This exploration involves investigations into the lives of criminals and victims of crime. He explores the complexity of these stories and the grey areas between innocence and guilt in a series of paintings and drawings of both the criminals and the victims, making no visual distinctions between the two. Going along with these portraits is a series of sculptures called the Black Rock Negative Energy Absorbers and Healing Devices. They are a group of sculptures meant to remove negative energy from people, thus allowing them to respond to life with the more positive aspects of their personality.
