Soyoung Yoon Appointed Director of Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program

The Whitney Museum of American Art has appointed Soyoung Yoon as Director of its renowned Independent Study Program (ISP), one of the most influential postgraduate programmes for artists, curators and scholars working in contemporary art. Yoon assumed the role on 16 June 2026 and will lead the programme as it welcomes a new cohort in autumn 2027.

A scholar of contemporary art, media theory and critical studies, Yoon joins the Whitney from The New School in New York, where she served as Director of the Fine Arts MFA Programme at Parsons School of Design and Associate Professor of Art History and Visual Studies at Eugene Lang College. During her tenure, she expanded and internationalised academic programmes, redesigned admissions processes and helped build diverse student and faculty communities across disciplines including photography, film, media, performance and curatorial studies.

Yoon brings a long-standing relationship with the Independent Study Program itself. She was a Helena Rubinstein Critical Studies Fellow in the 2006–2007 ISP cohort before returning as a faculty member from 2012 to 2023, where she led seminars in critical theory and advised participants across the Studio, Curatorial and Critical Studies tracks. More recently, she served on an advisory committee established to help shape the programme’s future.

Announcing the appointment, Adrienne Edwards, Engell Speyer Family Senior Curator and Associate Director of Curatorial Programs at the Whitney, described Yoon as a leader with an exceptional understanding of the programme’s history and significance.

“She knows the ISP intimately, as a former participant and longtime member of its faculty, and understands what makes the program unique and vitally important to our field,” Edwards said. “She brings intellectual rigor, a superb administrative acuity, and unwavering belief in the importance of theoretical and artistic inquiry.”

Scott Rothkopf, the Whitney’s Alice Pratt Brown Director, emphasised the programme’s role within contemporary art, describing it as a “laboratory and learning community for artists, critics and curators” whose alumni have made significant contributions across the field.

Yoon’s research focuses on the politics of mobility, testimony and storytelling in moving-image culture, drawing on critical theory, Marxism, psychoanalysis, feminist, queer and disability studies. Her writing has appeared in publications including Grey Room, Discourse, Camera Obscura and Millennium Film Journal, as well as the catalogue for the Whitney Biennial 2022: Quiet as It’s Kept. She is currently working on several forthcoming books, including Walkie Talkie and TV Buddhas.

Founded in 1968, the Independent Study Program has played a pivotal role in shaping contemporary art discourse and practice. Over the decades, it has supported generations of artists, curators, critics and art historians, including Andrea Fraser, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Jenny Holzer, Glenn Ligon, Naomi Beckwith, Johanna Burton and Sheena Wagstaff. Since 2023, the programme has been based in the renovated Roy Lichtenstein Studio in Greenwich Village, New York.

Reflecting on her appointment, Yoon described the ISP as a space for those who challenge established methodologies and disciplinary boundaries. She noted the programme’s continued importance as a site for critical inquiry and artistic experimentation, adding that it remains committed to supporting new generations of artists, curators and thinkers.