ABOUT
THE DEPARTMENT
The
Department of Art and Art History offers courses leading to a Bachelor
of Arts degree. Students may major or minor in studio
art or art history and minor in architecture and design studies. We
prepare our students for the most competitive MFA programs in studio
art, Ph.D. programs in art history, or M. Arch. programs in architecture.
One of the strongest features of this program is the opportunity to
participate in some remarkable off-campus programs in the junior and
senior year. Majors and minors, both in studio art and art history,
are encouraged to take part in at least one of the university's off-campus
programs such as the summer or fall semester in London or GLCA internship
in New York where one can work directly with professionals in the field.
In addition, the faculty are all publishing and exhibiting artists
and scholars. Students, therefore, will have direct contact with active
leading professionals, and can often participate or collaborate in
their work or research. The department has a regular program of gallery
exhibitions, lectures, and studio critiques by well-known artists,
lecturers and practicing professionals. Students can expect easy access
to faculty who are experienced teachers and deeply concerned with their
students' development as individuals.
Another major feature of the program, both in studio and art history, is that
students are given a great deal of direction in the first two years, but in their
junior and senior years they are encouraged to develop their own line of research
under the close direction of a faculty member. This work has led students to
present papers at professional conferences and to exhibit their artwork in national
juried exhibitions. We know within the liberal arts context our senior art students
have the foundation and technical ability to express their ideas.
The approach of the Department is to impart rigorous mastery of conventional
skills (e.g. illusionistic rendering and life drawing in studio, knowledge of
classical forms in architecture) coupled with an insistence upon personal experiment
and knowledge of abstraction in the Modernist tradition. As students advance,
instruction in all fields becomes increasingly tutorial with a great deal of
individual attention from their professors.
COURSE
LIST |
