Art and Art History

Undergraduate Degree Programs

Graphic Design in the Department of Art & Art History is predicated upon Graphic Design as a multifaceted discipline in the art and practice of verbalizing, visualizing and communicating ideas. This approach offers students the creative, intellectual and technological skill sets necessary to become design practitioners engaged with real world design opportunities.

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Illustration/Animation concentration prepares students to pursue visual narrative storytelling as an applied art creatively and professionally. Emphasis is on creative process, visual thinking, communication, authoring extended illustration and/or animation works, and understanding professional practice. Illustration/Animation gives students a working knowledge of both traditional approaches and new technologies. Students merge personal expression with communication goals in their comprehensive professional preparation as they pursue a wide variety of projects in both analog and digital environments, including: book, editorial, institutional, and children’s illustration; 2-D and stop-motion animation; character and environment design; design for products; comics, cartoons, and graphic novels; self-promotion, among so much more.

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Industrial Design is the practice of envisioning and creating solutions to complex problems, in the context of human experience. Industrial Designers apply research and creativity to identify opportunities for creating new products, services or systems with a focus on human factors, aesthetic value and user input. Industrial Design prepares students to generate creative solutions to complex problems and increase their capacity to be creative thinkers. Human centered design coursework enables students to design objects, environments, systems and experiences that are formulated in the context of real world challenges. By developing resourcefulness and adaptability, students learn to identify and analyze problems and objectively evaluate information to form actionable design solutions. A core objective in Industrial Design focuses on helping students develop a design practice based on ethically sound principles that recognize and value the social impact of design, and create environmentally responsible solutions.

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Photography/Video prepares students for careers from fine art to commercial photography. A central premise of the program is that ideas and techniques are inextricably intertwined, and are explored together. Understanding principles and concepts behind both new and traditional imaging media, and establishing a firm grounding in basic ideas and techniques empowers students to respond effectively to future change. Photography/Video facilities include digital and wet darkrooms providing students with a wide range of experiences from traditional black and white film to state of the art color prints using archival pigment ink sets. Cameras in various formats, tripods, lighting equipment, and other accessories are available for student use. Our lighting studio is available for individual student sessions.

Video provides students with a chance to explore time-based images in an art context displayed in all forms from projections to web and installations. Work addresses personally and socially meaningful subjects framed by the rich history of the medium, and explored through screenings of important videos. A range of digital cameras and editing stations is available for students to use.

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Printmaking functions as an intersection where many approaches to print media are practiced in unison. Coursework encourages both dynamic group interaction and independent inquiry. Students utilize fully equipped facilities to investigate a broad range of traditional printmaking media including intaglio, lithography, silkscreen, and letterpress, as well as new and experimental approaches incorporating digital processes, laser engraving and cutting, and alternative types of presentation and media.

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Painting has a long history. The decision to be a painter means learning the history of the medium and how one can choose to use or disrupt that history. Painting/Drawing values painting as a language that comprises a vocabulary of symbols, metaphors, representational systems, and documentary ambitions, and material processes. From the earliest images on cave walls, painters have found inspiration in both the world around them and their own internal worlds. Issues of representation are explored through projects that inspire risk-taking and discovery. Equally important are projects that encourage thematic investigation, whether it be through observational painting or investigations of personal, political, and socially coded imagery. Abstraction, conceptual concerns, and mixed media serve as vehicles for extending the painting experience.

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Sculpture/Ceramics immerses students in multidimensional art making including functional forms, sculptural objects, site specific installation, community engagement and performance art. Students pursue material and conceptual investigations in new and traditional media in fully equipped woodworking, metalworking, digital sculpture, mold making and casting, and ceramics studios. Design and craft balanced with history and theory engage creative practice within contemporary culture and society.

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Art History Program

Graduate Degree Programs