nimda

It would seem if you want to add a dimension to your experience as an artist so that you can further define your direction - then it would make a lot of sense to take a couple of years and gain the perspective of another active city, faculty, art scene, type of program and then return.

I'm in the MFA program at Penn and i'm finding it to be quite good. It is interdisciplinary in the sense that we all are in seminars together, the crits combine the disciplines - there is writing involved - but from an exploratory sense - not so much an academic thesis. We are encouraged and required to take a few courses outside of the art department. and It was just announced that three of our core grad professors will be included in the whitney biennial this spring! http://www.design.upenn.edu/files/PennDesign_MFA_Catalog.pdf

Art is absolutely necessary- or it has proved itself to be a necessity in human civilization. If artists are not able to go to art schools or find good environments to define their purpose and profession; they can find themselves in a cycle of doubt about the feasibility of being an artist. It sounds like you are asking - how could I be an artist if it does not guarantee the rewards of other jobs. It would be very difficult to start or move through an MFA program without a deeper belief in the importance and viability of the pursuit.

It is good to know how the u.s. news rankings are determined (see link below). If you visit the school, see the spaces, and talk to the students and faculty; you will be able to make much more current and precise rankings both for yourself - and for others. The current rankings were published in 2012, but may be based second-hand on the anecdotes of knowing a colleague that studied somewhere 15 years ago. http://anony.ws/i/ZUjdx.jpg

I visited the penndesign mfa program a couple of years ago for open studios. Its an interdisciplinary visual art mfa program - not a design program.

SUNY Buffalo has an amazing history of success with graduates that work with media; Gary Hill etc. It is not an example of the boonies, and is an example of the US News rankings wack. See

I have just a few, but i'm submitting excerpts because a few of the schools had time limits, and I didnt want them to fast forward through the pieces.

The thing is, i heard that while the timing of admissions may vary, the financial aid info comes in pretty much all around the same time. That said, i'm still editing my statement a bit for the PennDesign deadline, its killing me..

Chicago is a great place to live; I'm not basing too much on location though. I'm looking for the program; location doesn't matter.

A.. Its not a big deal, but also its not a big deal for them to change it out if the deadline is not past.

I'm doing this for all the apps that ask. a few have full diversity fellowships (like penn) others partial. What have you all heard about these?

Finishing Apps right now. This is good to hear another perspective about photography and PennDesign, one of my former professors mentioned that it is extremely strong at the moment, as well as an another artist friend and I had a good meeting with them at portfolio day.

There are a few faculty that I'm interested in working with at each of the schools i'm applying to. Do you think that mentioning these faculty and why I want to work with them is appropriate in a statement?

When I was at U of Penn's open house they said that the have writing workshops in the first and second year. The second year workshop runs through the spring semester and is taught by Michael Brenson. I think it would be important to have many options to work on the creative side, the exploratory side of my writing in the grad program I choose - so i have also been looking into the outside elective courses that universities might offer to MFA students at each institution. Penn had a few options, and great writers organization and of course an English dept, filled with amazing people who have an interest in the form, Kenny Goldsmith, Al Filreis, etc. I didn't get much detail on how this happens from the other schools on visits - other than the faculty reading your thesis statement. I suppose I'm just anticipating that this is what artists need to do to prepare materials for fellowships, residencies and grants, or even speak about the work, it seems that writing is important. Thank you for telling about SAIC, curious to hear more and if anyone knows about Columbia in this regard.

Curious what you all have found about writing in different Visual Art MFA programs. What have you heard about how programs are doing this? For example, is writing a part of seminar courses? do the programs expect a written thesis (how long), do they have faculty, workshops or other formats to help with writing?

It is important to not confuse the term admit with accept. Admit is how many students they invite to go to school there, accepts are how many students choose that school. If they admit 20%, they might be looking for 5% of the pool to accept the offer (their yield in this case = 25%). Another program might admit 50% looking for a yield of %50. They could both be looking for 15 students, and the first program might get all of the good ones, and the other might get the bottom half of their selection or vs versa (depending on their aid and the strength, the desirability of the program, and the applicants opinion about whether they applied to a school that is a good match with what they think they want to do ).. These % numbers are pretty empty.

Maybe it is to be competitive with aid packages in the future. It is sometimes telling and interesting to see what programs people list on this forum in a group that they are applying to. Sometimes the list is generic and all about the usnews reputation of the program, sometimes people have specific qualities that they would look for in a program.

Lovely painter - which 11 schools?

Probably a bad idea to not ask the schools you are applying to how they would process too few recommendations.

I just asked the chairs of the departments that I was applying to; they cleared it with the admissions office. Worked with a few of the schools.

Go to the place where you will have the best classmates. You will make a lot of friends in the program, it will be your network, if they are good artists and people, the friendships will outlast the loans.

They offer tuition and stipend, but only accept something like 6 per yr. Its also out there; so if you are looking for more exposure to visiting artists, etc. this might not be exactly the right place. Its worth a shot.

You will probably need to shape the portfolio so it shows what is consistent among these multiple approaches - conceptually at least.

I'm looking for the same thing. One of my considerations is that i want the interdisciplinary part to not only be different kinds of studio art approaches, also want access to other subjects within the universities. Most of the programs i'm thinking about don't really do this that well; penndesign MFA and maybe once i see the others and look at how the curriculum works; will do the trick.