Degree: Master of Fine Arts

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Art Center’s Graduate Art Program is built on intensive studio practice and rigorous academic coursework, made possible by an extraordinarily low faculty-to-student ratio that provides students with the help they need.

Our faculty and students are artists of all genres—film, video, photography, painting, sculpture, performance and installation.

A significant number of our alumni have achieved national and international acclaim, many sharing their insights and expertise as visiting faculty and guest lecturers.

Much of our teaching consists of one-on-one meetings between students and faculty. Our full-time faculty is composed of a core faculty of seven artists, including the Department Chair, three theorists and two artists who serve as technical faculty. In addition, we have a part-time, adjunct faculty of approximately 20 artists, critics and theorists.

Students are required to meet with core faculty, who give them a collective grade for their work at the end of each of the first four terms.

For the final two terms, students are graded by a thesis committee consisting of three core faculty members plus a faculty member chosen by the student. 

Students are required to take Graduate Seminar, a visiting speakers class; Theories of Construction, in which they critique each other’s work with the help of a faculty member, and two academic classes in each of their six full-time terms. Theories of Construction always includes students from each of the six terms, and is arranged so that no student takes the class with the same teacher twice.

Academic work may be folded into the curriculum of a workshop at the Chair’s discretion.

In addition to the work we require, we strongly encourage (and occasionally require) students to participate in one or more of the film/video, painting and sculpture workshops. In the interest of maximizing exposure to multiple perspectives and encouraging discussions, workshops are usually taught by groups of artists and theorists.

Applicants to our program do not need to have an undergraduate degree in art—although most do—but do need to be prepared to work hard to become better artists, and to freely and seriously engage in analysis and criticism of their work.

In addition to successfully completing six terms of course work, MFA applicants exhibit a solo show of their most recent work during their sixth term, delivering a written thesis on their work or a closely related subject to their committee at the same time.

Both the show and the thesis are then defended by the student at a final public review with the core and full-time faculty.