# List of Virginia Commonwealth University alumni

This article lists notable alumni and students of the Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia.

## Art

* Diana al-Hadid – sculptor and installation artist (MFA 2005)
* Moses Jacob Ezekiel, sculptor (1866–68)
* Hannah Altman – photographer (MFA 2020)
* Trudy Benson – abstract artist (BFA 2007)
* James Bumgardner – painter, multimedia artist, RPI, VCU art faculty (BFA 1955)
* Tony Cokes – video artist (MFA 1985)
* Rose Datoc Dall – painter (BFA 1990)
* Tara Donovan – sculptor (MFA 1999)
* Torkwase Dyson – painter (BFA 1999)
* Joseph Craig English – printmaker (BFA 1970)
* Donwan Harrell – fashion designer, founder of Prps and Akademiks (BFA 1989)
* Lisa Hoke – sculptor and installation artist (BFA 1978)
* Sterling Hundley – illustrator and painter (BFA 1998)
* Abby Kasonik – painter (BFA 1998)
* Nate Lewis – cut paper sculptor (BS 2009)
* Whitney Lynn – sculptor and performance artist (BFA 2004)
* Philip B. Meggs – graphic designer and historian of design (BFA 1964, MFA 1971)
* Eric Millikin – conceptual, internet, video and performance artist (MFA 2021)Moses Jacob Ezekiel, sculptor
* Janice Smith – furniture maker (BFA 1976)
* Carol Sutton – painter and sculptor (BFA 1967)
* Alice Tangerini – botanical illustrator (BFA 1972)
* Alessandra Torres – performance and installation artist (MFA 2006)
* Charles Vess – fantasy and comics illustrator (BFA 1974)
* Judith Godwin – Abstract painter
* Emmet Gowin – Photographer and portraitist
* Chino Amobi – Contemporary artist, musician and painter
* Fahmida Azim – Pulitzer Prize winning illustrator
* Sam Bass – Motorsports artist
* Nell Blaine – American landscape painter
* Noah Bradley – Fantasy artist known for Dungeons & Dragons
* Loryn Brazier – Painter, known for her portraits of Virginia politicians
* Lauren Clay – Sculptor known for her large fantasy inspired installations
* Daryl Cobb – Children's book illustrator
* Tony Cokes – Visual artist and educator
* Bonnie Collura – artist known for figurative multi-media sculptures, textiles and installations
* Assil Diab – Sudanese graphic designer
* Paul DiPasquale –Sculptor known for designing several public sculptures in Virginia, including the Arthur Ashe Monument on Richmond's Monument Avenue and King Neptune on Virginia Beach's boardwalk
* Tarfia Faizullah – Poet
* Mark Sloan, curator, author and painterAnna Journey – Poet
* Jon Pineda – Poet
* Kevin Powers – Poet
* Ron Smith – Poet
* Allison Titus – Poet
* Colette Fu – photographer, book artist and paper engineer, known for her pop-up books
* Sylvia Harris – graphic designer known for designing the U.S. Census and as a pioneer in social impact design
* Sally Heller – Artist known for her large installations
* Lisa Hoke – Visual artist known for abstract sculptures
* Brian Hubble – American illustrator
* Katie Hudnall – Artist known for her woodworking
* Sterling Hundley – Illustrator and painter
* Michael Kaluta – Comic book artist
* Abby Kasonik – Painter
* Dawn Kasper – Interdisciplinary artist
* Matt Kenyon – New media artist
* Ana Ines Barragan King – Founder of the Latin Ballet of Virginia
* Mia LaBerge – Oil painter
* Abigail Larson – Fantasy artist
* Philip B. Meggs – Graphic designer and historian who authored books on graphic design
* Wiley Miller – Cartoonist
* Ayanah Moor – Conceptual artist
* Lois Morrison – Book artist
* Charlotte Moss – interior designer, author and philanthropist
* Mel Odom – Book cover artist
* G. Byron Peck – Mural artist
* Alston Purvis – Graphic designer and author
* Beatrice Riese – Artist and art collector
* Rob G. – Comic book artist
* Anne Savedge – Photographic artist
* Steve Segal – Pixar animator
* Mark Sloan – Museum curator
* Janice Smith – Furniture maker
* Alice Tangerini – Botanical illustrator
* Kevin Tinsley – Comic book illustrator
* Phil Trumbo – Art director and graphic designer
* Betony Vernon – Jewelry designer

## Business

* William Gifford – CEO of Altria (BBA)4chan founder Christopher Poole
* Christopher Poole – founder of 4chan
* Donwan Harrell – Creator of luxury denim line PRPS and designer at Nike,
* Norman Sisisky – founder of Petersburg Bottling Company, which became Pepsi (BBA)
* Kenneth Sullivan – CEO of Smithfield Foods
* Robert Graboyes – American economist and musician
* John Graham – Economist and Professor at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business
* Jeff Ray Clark – Economist specializing in public choice theory
* Edward N. Coffman – Accounting Scholar who specialized in its history
* Jerry Dipoto – Seattle Mariners baseball executive
* Catherine C. Eckel – Behavioral economist
* Jenny Hollowell – Music industry executive
* Mildred Callahan Jones – Known as the "Flag Lady," she pioneered the decorative flag industry
* Carole Ann Klonarides – Art consultant
* Angela Patton – CEO of Girls for a Change
* Richard M. Bracken – Chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) of the Hospital Corporation of America

## Government

* U.S. Representative Rob WittmanDanny Avula – Mayor of Richmond, Virginia
* John Fulmer Bright – Mayor of Richmond, Virginia
* Watkins Abbitt, Jr. – member of the Virginia House of Delegates
* Chris LaCivita – Senior Advisor to Donald Trump's 2024 campaign
* Marilyn Tavenner – Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services
* Lashrecse Aird – member of the Virginia State Senate
* Lamont Bagby – member of the Virginia State Senate
* Rosalyn Dance – former member of the Virginia State Senate
* Yasonna Laoly – Minister of Law and Human Rights of Indonesia (2014–present)
* Nancy McFalane – Former Mayor of Raleigh, North Carolina (2011–2019)
* Todd Pillion – member of the Virginia State Senate
* Will Sessoms – Mayor of Virginia Beach, VA (2008–2018)
* Kim Taylor – member of Virginia House of DelegatesYasonna Laoly, Minister of Law and Human Rights for Indonesia Danny Avula, Mayor of Richmond, Virginia and led Virginia's vaccine efforts during COVID-19
* Schuyler VanValkenburg – member of Virginia House of Delegates
* Justin Wilson – Mayor of Alexandria, Virginia
* Rob Wittman – Republican member of the United States House of Representatives, representing Virginia's 1st congressional district
* Todd Haymore, Virginia Secretary of Commerce (MBA)
* Debra Gardner, member of the Virginia House of Delegates
* Alan Gross – U.S. Government Contractor arrested in Cuba
* Clay Athey – Politician and jurist
* Lamont Bagby – State politician from Virginia
* Cynthia Ball – State politician from North Carolina
* Peter A. Blake – Virginia Secretary of Education
* Michael Chapman – Director of Homeland Security for Missouri
* Keyanna Conner – Virginia Secretary of Administration
* Nikuyah Walker – Mayor of Charlottesville, Virginia
* Rosalyn Dance – Virginia State Senator
* Natalie Edwards – Former senior official at the United States Department of the Treasury
* Megan Healy – Virginia Secretary of Labor
* Cynthia Eppes Hudson – Deputy Attorney General for Virginia
* Anita Josey-Herring – Chief Judge of the Superior Court of Washington D.C.
* John W. Marshall – Secretary of Public Safety for Virginia
* Adele McClure - Member of the Virginia House of Delegates
* Nancy McFarlane – Pharmacist and politician
* Delores McQuinn – Member of the Virginia House of Delegates
* Jackson Miller – Director of the Department of Criminal Justice Services of Virginia
* Todd Pillion – Dentist and State Senator
* Javaid Siddiqi – Virginia Secretary of Education
* Ronald L. Tillett – Virginia Secretary of Finance
* Dietra Trent – Virginia Secretary of Education
* Carl E. Bain – pharmacist and politician who served in the Virginia House of Delegates
* Walter C. Caudill – Member of the Virginia General Assembly
* Virgil J. Cox – Member of the Virginia House of Delegates
* Bob Deuell – Member of the Texas Senate
* Kim E. Petersen – security and counter-terrorism expert
* Conley E. Greear – American politician and dentist

## Media

* Mamé Adjei – runner-up of America's Next Top Model cycle 22
* David Baldacci – author, best known for his novel Absolute Power (1996)
* Macon Blair – actor and Sundance Grand Jury Prize-winning filmmaker, known for his collaborations with Jeremy Saulnier
* Author David BaldacciReilly Brown – comic book illustrator and writer, known for his work on Cable & Deadpool
* Caressa Cameron – 2010 Miss America
* Paris Campbell Grace – TikToker, singer, and comedian
* Daryl Cobb – author, national children's educational presenter
* Chad L. Coleman – actor
* Andrea Detwiler – 2006 Daytime Emmy winner
* Stephen Furst – actor and director, known as "Flounder" in the National Lampoon classic Animal House (1978) as well as TV series St. Elsewhere and Babylon 5
* Jason Butler Harner – Broadway, television, and film actor; performed in original production of Coast of Utopia; was in Clint Eastwood's Oscar-nominated film Changeling
* Bilal Khan – Pakistani singer and actor
* Zachary Knighton – actor, ABC series Happy Endings
* Boris Kodjoe – actor, model
* Robert Lanham – author, best known for his book The Hipster Handbook (2003)Actor Boris Kodjoe
* Valerie LaPointe – director and storyboard artist for Pixar Animation Studios
* Debbie Matenopoulos – TV host, known for co-hosting ABC's The View, The Daily 10, and TV Guide Channel's The Screening Room
* Wiley Miller – cartoonist and author of the comic strip Non Sequitur
* Caelynn Miller-Keyes – runner-up Miss USA 2018, Bachelor and Bachelor in Paradise contestant
* Trevor Moore – comedian and founding member of The Whitest Kids U' Know
* Actor Jason Butler HarnerHoward Owen – journalist, author of crime fiction and the novel Littlejohn
* Jay Pharoah – comedian and Saturday Night Live cast member
* Jon Pineda – award-winning poet and novelist
* Christopher Poole, aka moot – founder of 4chan
* Kevin Powers – novelist and poet, known for The Yellow Birds (2013), a finalist for the National Book Award
* Tom Robbins – author, best known for his novel Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1976)
* Rob Scoggins Jr - Actor "I'll Fly Away (NBC), Welcome Freshman (Nick), Voice Actor Garfield and Friends, Bonkers Disney, Producer Radio Show Host CBS News Radio "The Topic of Conversation"
* Steve Segal – comic artist, animation director
* Robb Spewak – producer and radio personality for The Don and Mike Show and The Mike O'Meara Show
* Rose Szabo – author of What Big Teeth
* Ronnie Sidney II, graphic novelist
* Steve Rasnic Tem – horror fiction writer, winner of the World Fantasy, British Fantasy and Bram Stoker Awards
* Phil Trumbo – film animator, artist
* Brandon Wardell – comedian and Twitter personality
* Mike Wieringo – comic book artist for Marvel and DC comics; co-creator of Image Comics series Tellos
* Greg Barrett – Journalist and public speaker
* Cocoa Brown – Actress
* Jason Butler Harner – Actor in Ozark
* Jennifer A. Johnson - Chief Editor of the journal Sexualization, Media, and Society
* Zachary Knighton – Actor in Happy Endings
* Rebekah McKendry – Film Director

## Music

* Chino Amobi – experimental electronic musician
* Anhayla – singer-songwriter, guitarist
* Sam Beam – singer/songwriter known as Iron and Wine
* Lucy Dacus – singer-songwriter
* Nickelus F – rapper, producer, videographer
* GWAR – several founding members of the band, including Dave Brockie
* Gordy Haab – composer of the Star Wars video games music and multiple award winner in that genre
* Lamb of God – several founding members of the band
* Stefan Lessard – bassist for Dave Matthews Band
* Matthew Ramsey – songwriter, lead singer for Old Dominion
* Nate Smith – drummer, songwriter, producer, and three-time Grammy nominee
* Eric Stanley – violinist, composer
* Robbin Thompson – singer-songwriter
* Steve West – drummer of the indie rock band Pavement and front man for Marble Valley
* Chris Adler – Drummer for Lamb of God
* Anthony Anderson – Operatic baretone singer
* Bruce Bouton – American Country Music guitarist
* McKinley Dixon – Rapper and singer
* Loston Harris – Jazz pianist
* Darius Jones – Saxophonist
* Emre Kartari – Turkish jazz percussionist
* Matthew Ramsey – Country Music musician known for the band Old Dominion

## Science

* Arpana Agrawal – psychiatric geneticist and professor of psychiatry, 2018 Theodore Reich Young Investigator Award
* Hunter "Patch" Adams – founder of the Gesundheit! Institute and subject of the movie Patch Adams
* Baruj Benacerraf – winner of the 1980 Nobel Prize in Medicine, class of 1945
* Gladys Smithwick – American physician and Presbyterian medical missionary in China and the Belgian Congo.
* Georgia Chenevix-Trench – researcher who investigates genetic predispositions to cancer
* Ann S. Fulcher – abdominal radiologist and chair of the department of radiology at Virginia Commonwealth University/Medical College of Medicine
* Saul Krugman– medical researcher who discovered a vaccine against hepatitis B
* Jeffery Taubenberger, M.D. – virologist
* Arpad Vass – research scientist, forensic anthropologist and professorPhysician, actor, activist, author and clown Patch Adams
* Patch Adams, M.D., class of 1971
* Georgia Chenevix-Trench class of 1985, Ph.D.
* Jean Harris, the first African-American student, class of 1955, became Virginia's Secretary of Health and Human Resources.
* Jeffery Taubenberger, M.D. class of 1986, Ph.D. class of 1987
* Percy Wootton, M.D., class of 1957, past president, American Medical Association
* William Chivous Bostic Sr. class of 1905
* Meike Bartels – Behavioral geneticist, known for research on the genetics of happiness
* Kathleen T. Brady – American psychiatrist
* Caroline Orr Bueno (PhD) – social and behavioral sciences researcher specializing in disinformation networks
* Brian D'Onofrio – psychologist who researches the causes of psychopathology in children and adolescents
* Francis L. Delmonico, health expert in the field of transplantation and Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School.Eduardo D. Rodriguez – Cuban American plastic and reconstructive surgeon, and reconstructive transplant surgeon, who is known for his contribution to the field of facial transplantation and vascularized composite allotransplantation
* Dorothy Espelage – American psychologist and expert in teen violence
* Philip C. Kendall – Psychologist who produced the Coping Cat program
* Feng Liu – Material physicist
* Michael L. Madigan – Biomedical engineer
* Benjamin Neale – statistical geneticist with a specialty in psychiatric genetics
* Sudhir Srivastava – chief of the Cancer Biomarkers Research Group of the Division of Cancer Prevention at the United States NCI
* Beatriz Amendola – Urugayan-American radiation oncologist
* Mary Baughman – physician, medical school professor, and clubwoman
* Frederick Bieber – Canadian-American geneticist currently serving as Senior Medical Geneticist at Brigham and Women's Hospital, a member of the Faculty of Medicine at Harvard University
* Joseph DeJarnette – Director of Western State Hospital, physician and eugenicist
* Lorna Breen – American physician
* Georgia Chenevix-Trench – Cancer researcher who investigates genetic predispositions to cancer
* Anne L. Coleman – Chair of the Department of Ophthalmology and Director of the Stein Eye Institute at University of California, Los Angeles
* Francis L. Delmonico – surgeon, clinical professor and health expert in the field of transplantation
* Mary Cynthia Farach-Carson – biochemist, known for her work in extracellular matrix, perlecan, tissue engineering and bone metastasis
* Isabel Garcia – Dentist and academic administrator
* Nassir Ghaemi – Psychiatrist, author, and Professor of Psychiatry at Tufts University School of Medicine

## Sports

* Mo Alie-Cox – current tight end for the Indianapolis ColtsBasketball and Football player Mo Alie-Cox
* Yann Bonato – former European professional basketball player; former France National Team member; member of France's silver medal-winning men's basketball team at the 2000 Sydney Olympics; played one season (1990–91) at VCU
* Troy Daniels – current shooting guard for Olimpia Milano
* Andrew Dykstra – MLS goalkeeper for D.C. United; also played with the Chicago Fire in MLS
* Treveon Graham – current forward in the G League
* Lanto Griffin – current professional golfer on the PGA Tour
* Sherman Hamilton – former member of Canadian National Men's Basketball Team; participated in 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia
* Gerald Henderson – played for the Boston Celtics, Detroit Pistons, Seattle SuperSonics, and San Antonio Spurs, winning four NBA championships
* Quanitra Hollingsworth – center for the Washington Mystics of the WNBA; member of Turkey's 2012 Olympic women's basketball teamDave Van Horne, broadcaster honored at the Baseball Hall of Fame
* Brandon Inge – MLB infielder, formerly with the Pittsburgh Pirates, Oakland Athletics and Detroit Tigers
* Sean Marshall – relief pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds
* Eric Maynor – played for the Washington Wizards and Philadelphia 76ers
* Cla Meredith – former MLB relief pitcher; played for the Boston Red Sox, San Diego Padres and Baltimore Orioles
* Hayley Moorwood – member of New Zealand women's Olympic Soccer Team in Beijing in 2008 and London in 2012
* Dominic Oduro – current forward for the Columbus Crew in MLS
* Juvonte Reddic (born 1992) – basketball player in the Israeli Basketball Premier League
* John Rollins – professional golfer and PGA pro
* Larry Sanders – drafted #15 overall by the Milwaukee Bucks in the 2010 NBA Draft
* Gonzalo Segares – former defender for Apollon Limassol in Cyprus; former defender for the Chicago Fire in MLS
* Scott Sizemore – infielder for the Oakland Athletics
* Justin Tillman (born 1996) – basketball player for Hapoel Tel Aviv in the Israeli Basketball Premier League
* Brianté Weber (born 1992) – basketball player in the Israeli Basketball Premier League
* Dave Van Horne – Broadcaster honored at the Baseball Hall of Fame

## Other

* Mirta Martin (Ph.D. 1996) – ninth president of Fort Hays State University
* Grace E. Harris, academic administrator and social worker
* Susan Higginbotham, historical fiction novelist and attorney Frank E. Grizzard Jr., American Historian
* Leona S. Aiken – Psychology Professor
* William M. Anderson Jr. (BA) – President of the University of Mary Washington
* Nancy Wright Beasley - Author
* Errett Callahan - Archeologist
* Jack Hranicky - Archeologist
* Caressa Cameron - Miss Virginia
* Eric H. du Plessis - Author, translator and educator
* Susan Higginbotham - American historical fiction author and attorney
* Hendrée E. Jones - Researcher on women's substance abuse
* Eileen A. Joy - Old English literary specialist
* Margaret Ann Neale - Adams Distinguished Professor of Management, Emerita, at the Stanford Graduate School of Business
* Sheri Reynolds - Author of contemporary Southern fiction
* Howard Owen - Author and winner of the Hammett Prize