Letter from the Chair of Fine Arts

Through studio work, seminar courses, and interactions with vital working artists, the Fine Arts programs in PennDesign provide an open intellectual framework to foster critical awareness and independent methods of artistic research. The fluid curriculum and instruction within the department envelopes the cyclical practice of perception, notation, and reflection. Students in the program seek and assume their roles as citizens of the world.

In our undergraduate program, we offer a BA Major and Minor in Fine Arts, a Minor in photography as well as several joint degrees with Cinema Studies, Visual Studies, the Annenberg School of Communications, the School of Engineering, and the Departments of Art History and Philosophy.

The two-year Master of Fine Arts program at Penn is focused on the professional development of studio artists. The program encourages exploration, extending studies into other disciplines within the School of Design and the university with a rich selection of outside electives and optional certificate and dual-degree programs.

Both the graduate and undergraduate programs offers twenty-four hour access to individual studios and access to a broad range of facilities for fabrication, visual research, and installation. The Fine Arts department programs a dynamic lecture series held at the Institute of Contemporary Art on Penn's campus. Through the departments exhibition program, students and visiting artists engage in exhibitions in eight on-campus galleries, and in off-campus exhibition in the city of Philadelphia.

Joshua Mosley
Professor and Chair of Fine Arts