hoo_boy

hi everyone ! i am having a really hard time deciding between 2 programs in LA: CalArts and ArtCenter. i got a great package from CalArts that ArtCenter sounds open to matching… if money isn’t a factor, which school do you recommend for an interdisciplinary artist (whose dream school was UCLA, like everyone else)? for extra context, i got into CalArts with the integrated media concentration and am not new to MFAs, having dropped out of Bard years ago due to $$

I think that (unless you're specifically encouraged to or discouraged from detail shots) you really have to use your judgment on this question, depending on your work and medium and how best you want to convey it to a jury with little time/attention span. To offer a different perspective from others in this thread, I submitted three stills of videos in addition to uploading said three videos, which I guess could be considered kind of like a detail shot — mainly because I wasn't sure how much of the videos would get viewed and because those videos kind of anchor my whole portfolio. Similarly, I included a couple of shots of an installation I wrote about in my application; not exactly "detail" per se, more like a few versions/iterations of the same project. Hope this helps!

I went to the accepted students event at CalArts last week and they said CalArts financial aid packages would be sent out this week.

seems like we can log into ArtCenter portal now but mine is still missing all funding info… same with CalArts (states something like funding “under review”) despite my acceptance arriving weeks ago and non-stop email communications asking for my deposit… has anyone heard from either school about $$$?

will message you privately!

I asked about deferral here last week too... Following the topic in case anyone has good insight about deferring at a full-residency program. My own two cents, from my last time in MFAs (Bard dropout here), was that they allowed people to take summers off (it's a low-res program) but I don't know if anyone ever deferred their first year. So, a lot of people would put off their second year or third year and in the end, the classes became very mixed (when I was there, there was only one student graduating in Film/Video because everyone else had deferred that summer).

have you interviewed at any of these spots? only asking because our list of schools is quite similar

I have a few questions regarding posts I saw go up in last year's thread that I couldn't find answers to... asking them here in case anyone else has sifted through other years' forums and is better at reading-comprehension that yours truly. 1. Does anyone know about protocol regarding deferring MFA admission for a year? is it a thing that's [ever/been] done? 2. People last year (and I believe the year prior) said that UCLA "doesn't always interview" the students it admits. Is this purely anecdotal or has anyone seen this be the case with admitted students on GradCafe or know someone it happened to? 3. I know we're all waiting on any word from UCLA... Does anyone have any indication that their recommenders have been contacted?

I literally just hung up from my interview 2 hours ago so can say with confidence the process is ongoing.

Yeah, I kind of asked about funding in my interview and it sounds like if one (1) person gets a full ride next year, that would be lucky. "Down the line," they'd like to strive for all 30+ but it seems like they're a long way from that and like the Zwirner auction didn't produce the results they were hoping for.

I despise this question. I intentionally left it blank in my written application and felt absolutely put on the spot in my Zoom interview when it was asked again. I even tried to flout it once, saying I had applied to schools "in the Southern California area" and was further pressed on it — at which case I saw no other choice but to answer. When I got said interview, the truth was that I hadn't heard back from any of the other programs (I only applied to 4, and this nosey institution was actually the first to get back to me). I said as much and my other interviews eventually trickled in in the following weeks... I'm honestly at a loss at what they wanted to hear so early in February and what they were trying to get out of my answer. ETA: I realize it's some sort of betting/playing odds of whether an applicant will accept your offer based on (I'm assuming?) the cost/standing of the other institutions, but it seems absolutely wack to me. The outcome, if anyone is curious, was that I was waitlisted after revealing my list! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

was this ArtCenter? i got verbatim the exact same q's

has anyone heard anything from UCLA New Genres? I know ID, Ceramics, and Painting already seem to have gone out

innnteresting, it seems like CalArts is staggering their interviews because it seems some people have already gotten interviews and others have gotten rejections... i have gotten neither 🙃