www.artandeducation.net/yearbook
www.artandeducation.net/school_watch
art&education now features Yearbook, a platform for schools to present student work from MFA shows, open-studio presentations, and other annual student exhibitions.
Yearbook exhibition currently on view:
Goldsmiths, University of London
MFA Fine Art 2015 Exhibition
The MFA Fine Art program at Goldsmiths helps students acquire a critical understanding of the creation and reception of contemporary art. Theory and practice are fully integrated with a strong emphasis on open discussion, peer-to-peer learning and the potential of each student to develop their abilities to the fullest. Inhabiting a spacious studio complex in a converted Edwardian swimming baths at the center of the Goldsmiths campus, students set their own objectives and goals for their MFA, with a view to developing a coherent and sustainable individual practice. This year’s MFA exhibition took place at the school in July. See the student gallery here.
School Watch reports from Rhode Island:
Saving the Maker, Cultivating the Thinker: Painting at RISD’s MFA Program
By Anne Prentnieks
Pedagogically, the painting department has historically promoted reverence for painting as a pure art form in itself, professing a gospel that eulogizes craftsmanship, composition, and visual and spatial harmony as both cornerstones to successful art-making and greater goals. Critique in the program often firstly addresses these points; the concept behind a work is often discussed to establish context—rather than being of preeminent value and supported by an artwork’s formal qualities, it is a vehicle to help inform the visual direction a piece may take. While this approach strikingly contrasts with many other MFA programs that more heavily stress theory, at its core is seemingly an altruistic ethos placing a stern onus on the artist to lift the heaviest intellectual load, creating work that “speaks for itself,” according to recent grad León, who added: “I don’t think it’s necessarily formal,” he says. “It’s a good balance between formal concerns, and context and concept. What they ask of us is to be less selfish and give more to the viewer, to make something that’s intelligent. Not something that’s so highly theoretical that you’ll only understand if you went to art school. It’s more humble in that sense.” [read more]
School Watch presents distilled perspectives on degree programs in the arts, with interviews, critical texts and editorial exposés on MFAs, Masters, Doctorates and certificate programs in fine arts, art history, curatorial, cultural and film studies, and other related areas of specialty.
