The latest issue of Visual Opinion (VO), SVA’s student-run magazine, is now online. The VO staff used this issue, titled Louder, as a platform for underrepresented voices in SVA’s student body.

The VO showcases the diverse and talented members of the SVA student body. For every edition, the VO staff decides on a theme and selects submissions that best exemplify the College’s range of departments and disciplines, and that best fit the motif. Undergraduates and graduate students in all programs are invited to submit work, and each issue features a multitude of mediums, including photography, illustration, comics, poetry, painting and sculpture.

This year has been challenging, to say the least; from the pandemic to civil unrest, we SVA students have learned a lot. 2020 has brought us the opportunity to shed light on the fight we’re all striving for: the battle for social, economic and political justice and equality. On the days that we could not shout or scream louder, our creative actions spoke for us. We wanted to use our first issue of this academic year as a platform for the underrepresented voices in our student body, thus the theme of “Louder.” This issue also features a unique collaboration with SVA’s Black Student Union (BSU). The front cover features a sculpture, Double Consciousness, by the BSU’s president, Emmanuel Massillon (BFA Fine Arts); the back cover is My Cup Runneth Over, a painting by BSU member Ryan Cosbert (BFA Fine Arts).

We hope to show the power of all forms of art and the difference it can make in society.

The writer of this article, Srishti Dass, is a BFA Fine Arts student and the Visual Opinion Associate Editor.

The magazine features art and writing by undergraduates and graduates in the College’s various programs.