University degrees: Postgraduate
Course length: two years (60 credits)
The Master of Fine Arts program in the Art and Art History Department at Columbia College Chicago will prepare you to be a professional working artist. In this MFA program, you’ll develop your art practice in your chosen medium while gaining professional skills related to the business of fine art practice. We’re especially proud of our graduate teaching seminar, a unique-to-the-field course where you gain hands-on experience learning pedagogies for teaching art to others. We want you to have options in how you structure your career, so we have designed the program with your professional success in mind.
Working with award-winning faculty, you will create a professional body of artwork while demonstrating mastery of materials and techniques and participating in critiques of your work and the work of others. As mentors, the faculty members will share advice on making a living in the constantly changing contemporary art field. The program culminates in a gallery exhibition for graduating MFA students.
Chicago’s contributions to art make the city an ideal place to establish your career. It’s an affordable cultural hub, where artists push boundaries and make important, innovative contributions to the field. As a working artist, your success will depend on your network, and at Columbia, we will help you plan and initiate your own professional strategy.
There is no shortage of art to see and explore in Chicago. Columbia is located within walking distance of world-renowned museums and some of the country’s finest alternative and mainstream galleries and spaces. The city is also home to a welcoming artist community that is always sharing and supporting new work in innovative ways.
At Columbia, you’ll study with award-winning professional artists/educators making innovative contributions to the field. Our faculty members take their roles as mentors seriously. They give thoughtful, supportive critiques and share candid advice about professional practice. They’ll be in your studio, discussing your work and facilitating feedback from your peers.
Columbia’s Master of Fine Arts program takes a pragmatic approach to educating fine artists. We believe that your artistic practice should be supported by thoughtful and deliberate professional experiences. We’ve incorporated courses and experiences into the curriculum that ensure you’re gaining the practical skills needed to build a sustainable career. You’ll think critically about topics like grants, residencies, contracts, networking, and audience cultivation in addition to refining your artistic work. You’ll take graduate-level courses on topics like media arts and law and leadership in arts management. You’ll work closely with our faculty to hone the skillset that’s right for your particular career path. You’ll also take a graduate teaching seminar, which makes you eligible for opportunities to teach as instructor of record in the Art and Art History Department.
Every graduate student gets their own dedicated studio space at Columbia. In addition to a studio on campus in downtown Chicago, you’ll have access to an incredible wealth of facilities—like our 15,000-square-foot Fabrication Facility as well as our digital printing bureau and media center outfitted with projectors, cameras, lighting, and sound equipment. Our creative spaces in downtown Chicago include book binding, papermaking, and print media studios as well as photography facilities. We have plenty of space for you to set up work, including dedicated installation spaces and a highly flexible, 1,200-square-foot, multiuse black-box-style lab.
