Studio Disciplines

The ceramics program is broadly based, encompassing both pottery and sculpture executed in a full range of construction techniques, ceramic materials and firing methods. Ceramics students employ clay and its processes to explore how objects communicate visually and physically, and to realize their personal potential for creative thinking and expression. Advanced work in ceramics becomes progressively more self-initiated and individualized. Through a continuous critical and intuitive dialog with the work they produce, students gain confidence with both a wide range of technical skills and advanced artistic expression. 

Career paths taken by graduates of the program have included studio art practices, pottery production, and teaching at the K–12 and college levels, in community art centers and in private studios.  Back to top

The drawing program strives to strengthen the fundamental principles integral to all artistic mediums, while encouraging students to explore and refine drawing as a principle medium in itself. Students are exposed to traditional modes of drawing, as well as more contemporary approaches to the medium, with an emphasis on interdisciplinary experimentation and new media integration. 

Students leave the drawing program with extensive experience with a wide variety of drawing media, processes, subject matter, and conceptual approaches. Advanced coursework in the area encourages students to cultivate their own artistic direction within an increasingly focused and individualized body of work.  Back to top

Expanded Media is an interdisciplinary approach to art making that includes, but is not limited to: video, sound, socially engaged projects, performance, and site-specific projects. Students are not required to concentrate in a specific medium in this area; instead, they are encouraged to pursue unconventional research paths and explore relationships between concept, material, and context in unexpected ways. 

Students develop their sensibilities through readings, technical workshops, and critiques while learning to contextualize their work historically, theoretically, and culturally. The goal of the expanded media area is to foster independent creative thinkers with diverse skill sets and unique work methodologies that reflect contemporary art practices.  Back to top

The metals program offers comprehensive technical, critical and conceptual curriculum in the field of metalsmithing. The program builds on metalsmithing's rich hybrid history based in fine art, studio craft, and industrial design, and encourages students to explore a wide range of conceptual avenues in the creation of jewelry, functional objects, design prototypes, installation performance and sculpture. 

The 4,100 sq. ft. state of the art metals facility features dedicated studios for fabrication, casting and mold making, machining, etching and patination, enameling, soldering, raising, and forming, with an additional outdoor forging and welding patio. Students have access to a substantial collection of tools and equipment for all basic and advanced metalsmithing techniques. 

Graduates of the metals program have a number of career options; they are regularly accepted into respected graduate programs or move directly into jewelry and metalsmithing related employment and teaching.  Back to top

The painting program provides comprehensive instruction in the creative, technical and historical aspects of painting. The program encourages individual growth and development through a broad range of studio and academic experiences. 

Beginning-level instruction centers the fundamentals of painting technique and observational skills, while advanced coursework in the area offers students the opportunity to cultivate an increasingly individualized and focused body of work centered on their technical and conceptual interests. 

Many graduates of the painting program have gone on to study at some of the most prestigious graduate schools in the country, including the School for the Visual Arts in New York, The Boston Museum School, Rhode Island School of Design, Claremont Graduate School in California, San Francisco Institute, Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia and the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore.  Back to top

The printmaking area offers instruction in a range of methods for printing and image making, including screen printing, relief, intaglio, lithography, digital printing, monotypes, and other techniques. 

Beginning-level coursework focuses on exposure to the variety of printmaking techniques available, while advanced coursework increasingly focuses the student on creating a personal and professional body of work. In the upper division courses, a strong emphasis is placed on not only making the work, but also professional artwork documentation, writing, competition submissions, and exhibition. Back to top

The field of sculpture continues to undergo dramatic changes in conceptual approaches, materials and techniques. The sculpture area provides the student with an environment that is conducive to the exploration of ideas through contemporary and traditional approaches to making art. These include light, sound, performance and site-specific installation, as well as the much-cherished use of the foundry, woodshop, welding and modeling facilities.

The development of a student's personal aesthetic is always coupled with their expansion into the ever-diversifying approaches to making sculpture. The sculpture facility provides ample room for students to experiment with large-scale works and to become technically proficient in a variety of media. In addition, the students are encouraged to bridge their interests across areas by combining coursework in the sculpture areas with, for example, other 3D processes such as metals and ceramics. Back to top