Visual & Performing Arts

Program Description

New York University

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NYU’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development offers a diverse range of undergraduate and graduate programs in applied psychology, art, communication, education, health, and music. Our School has a long history of connecting theory to applied learning experiences through dozens of affiliations and partnerships with urban institutions, building communities within and beyond our classrooms and nurturing the human spirit. Our faculty members are intellectually adventurous and socially conscious. Our students study in the expansive environment of a great research university, and use the urban neighborhoods of New York City and countries around the world as their laboratories. Now in our 118th year of educating artists, professionals, scholars, and researchers, we are applying our creativity and knowledge where it is needed most.

Located in the heart of downtown New York, NYU Steinhardt’s Department of Art and Art Professions is shaped by the intensity and innovation of the international art world. A home for artists who are celebrated for their dedication, creativity, and skill in exploring unconventional ideas, New York City has long been a place where art truly matters. The city’s galleries, museums, schools, studios, and performance spaces are an integral part of our department, as are the University’s vast intellectual and academic resources.

The department’s Barney Building, a six-story complex of studios, classrooms, and exhibition spaces—as well as facilities for painting, drawing, sculpture, craft media, printmaking, photography, video, and digital art—pays homage to the visionary and iconoclastic artists of its legendary East Village neighborhood. Enriched by this legacy, the department’s interdisciplinary approach to art, with its commitment to individual insight and experimentation as well as collaboration and community practice, underscores the central role of contemporary art in translating social and historical change into human experience. We seek to nurture and empower our students and artists to find a visual language through which they can respond to current culture on their own terms.

The B.F.A. combines an ambitious series of interdisciplinary studio courses with art history, seminar, and liberal arts classes to expose students to a wide range of ideas and practices. Many participate in internships during the junior and senior years, and one or two semesters of study abroad is encouraged. In the senior year, students take the course Art, Culture, and Society, which culminates in a written thesis. With special permission, students may also enroll in a senior honors studio course in which they participate in group critiques and meet independently in their studio workspace with two senior mentors and visiting artists. Over the course of the senior year, all students develop a cohesive body of work as well as a written thesis outlining the ideas and contexts that drive their creative process. In the spring, students participate in formal exhibitions.

The M.F.A. and M.A. programs bring exceptional students together with artists, educators, therapists, administrators, and visual culture innovators who influence the visual arts at local, national, and international levels. The department offers top graduate-level internship and field placement experiences with unparalleled networking potential. Recent internships have included the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the New Museum, P.S. 1, Art in General, Percent for Art, Creative Time, Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and prominent galleries and artists’ studios.

The department is a work in progress, bringing exceptional students together with internationally renowned artists, critics, educators, and art professionals in a shared exploration of the issues, forms, and ideas that continually redefine contemporary art.

Faculty, Resident Artists, and Alumni

 Faculty members are artists, educators, and professionals who are recognized nationally and internationally for their expertise and accomplishments. Faculty artists show extensively worldwide and represent broadly diverse approaches to content and media. Faculty arts professionals influence arts policy and practice. The department is supported by a strong network of alumni who exhibit, educate, curate, publish, manage, and consult all over the world.

Student Exhibition Opportunities

 Undergraduate and graduate students have many exhibition opportunities throughout the department and can submit proposals to participate as curators and exhibitors in the Rosenberg Gallery and the Commons. Barney Building open houses and open studios are organized twice a year, and all students are encouraged to participate. The department’s 80 Washington Square East Galleries provide excellent professional exhibition space in the heart of the campus.

Special Programs

 Undergraduates are encouraged to enroll in one of several excellent University-based study-abroad programs in Berlin, Buenos Aires, Florence, Ghana, London, Madrid, Paris, Prague, and Shanghai. Graduate summer-study-abroad programs include studio art in Venice; photography in China; visual arts culture in Cape Town and Pretoria, South Africa; and arts administration in the Netherlands and Berlin. A high school residential summer art intensive allows young artists ages 16 to 18 the opportunity to explore their ideas in the heart of the international art world.

Application Procedures

Deadline--freshmen: January 15; transfers: April 1. Notification date--freshmen: April 1; transfers: September 1. Required: essay, high school transcript, college transcript(s) for transfer students, 3 letters of recommendation, portfolio, SAT or ACT test scores, TOEFL score for non-native English speakers, strong high school GPA. Auditions held 1 time. Portfolio reviews held on campus and off campus in venues in New York State; the submission of slides may be substituted for portfolios.

Undergraduate Contact

Ms. Candice MacLusky, Assistant Director of Undergraduate Admissions, New York University, 22 Washington Square North, New York, New York 10011-9191; 212-998-4500, fax: 212-995-4902.

Graduate Contact

Mr. John Myers, Director of Enrollment Services, Office of Graduate Admissions, New York University, 82 Washington Square East, 3rd Floor, New York, New York 10003-6680; 212-998-5030, fax: 212-995-4328.