Filmmaker and Smith College Alum Named 2025 MacArthur Fellow

Garrett Bradley ’07—award-winning artist, Oscar-nominated filmmaker, and Smith College graduate—has been named a 2025 MacArthur Fellow.

“To say that I am honored and deeply moved is true, but doesn’t begin to capture the depth of how it feels,” says Bradley. “I aim to carry the opportunity as far as it can reach, to share it and give back by continuing to create with the same clarity of purpose, care, and commitment that I believe made this moment possible.”

Bradley, who majored in religion at Smith, is known for her intimate and deeply personal filmmaking that weaves together elements of narrative, documentary, and experimental cinema to shine a light on injustice and interrogate issues related to capitalism, cultural visibility, and the complicated history of the United States. In a 2022 profile for the Smith Quarterly, Bradley noted that part of her responsibility as an artist and filmmaker is to “create visibility around what is working and, in doing so, support a better future.”

Bradley credits her experience at Smith with instilling in her the “essential ingredients for how to make movies.” She arrived at Smith in fall 2003 eager to study art; however, she eventually found herself drawn more to the stories behind the images she was studying, many of which were religious. Her curiosity led her to the religion department, and it was there—under the tutelage of Joel Kaminsky, the Morningstar Professor of Jewish Studies and Professor of Religion, and Andy Rotman, Jill Ker Conway Chair in Religion and Director of Buddhist studies—that Garrett discovered the powerful interplay between stories and images. Her studies, she says, “opened up this whole other world that was connected to images but also had elements of philosophy and storytelling” that would ultimately inform her approach to filmmaking.

A video installation by Bradley titled AKA is currently on display at the Smith College Museum of Art through February 1, 2026. The installation addresses how colorism and upward mobility affect relationships between mothers and daughters.

Bradley joins several other faculty and alumnae “genius grant” recipients, including Associate Professor of the Study of Women & Gender Loretta J. Ross, who received a fellowship in 2022; writer Adrian LeBlanc ’86, who was honored in 2006; wildlife researcher Cynthia Moss ’62, who received her MacArthur Fellowship in 2001; political scientist Rosalind Petchesky ’64, who was awarded her fellowship in 1995; and author Kelly Link, the Elizabeth Drew Professor of English Language and Literature, received a MacArthur Fellowship in 2018.

The MacArthur Fellowship is presented to talented individuals in a variety of fields who have shown exceptional originality in and dedication to their creative pursuits. Fellows, who are nominated anonymously by leaders in their respective fields, receive $800,000 stipends that are bestowed with no conditions.

Bradley’s body of work spans short- and feature-length films, video installations, photography, television, and a range of publications, including artists books and visual essays. In 2017, Bradley’s short film Alone took the top prize for documentary shorts at the Sundance Film Festival. Her debut full-length documentary, Time, is a moving commentary on mass incarceration and its impact on not only prisoners but also on the loved ones they leave behind. It was nominated for an Academy Award in 2020 and garnered the Sundance award for best director of a U.S. documentary, making Garrett the first Black woman to receive that honor. Filmmaker Ava DuVernay called Time “a seminal cinematic work [that] must be seen.”

In addition to the MacArthur Fellowship, Bradley is the recipient of a 2024 Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts. Following her graduation from Smith, Bradley received a master in fine arts in directing from the UCLA School of Theater, Film, and Television.