Welcome Fine Arts Students

The Masters of Fine Arts program facilitates in-depth engagement with the skills and technologies of art-making as well as with the intellectual and theoretical discourse necessary for an artist to situate themselves and their work in a set of intersecting histories and fields of practice. At the center of the program’s curriculum is your own studio production, developed with the support of a robust constellation of individual and group studio critiques led by the faculty and an acclaimed group of rotating visitors: senior critics, visiting artists, curators and writers.

Key to the two-year study are these relationships between students and our diverse group of resident faculty and visiting faculty whose research and practices span many mediums and engage a range of social, political and aesthetic questions. Students choose from a robust set of departmental courses in a range of media from video, photography, sculpture, painting and drawing to performance, animation and biological design.

In addition to seminars within the Fine Arts department, students are encouraged to pursue coursework outside of the department in topics relevant to their work such as science and the humanities. Student select courses from an impressive selection of courses offered across the university. 

Additionally, each year students in the program participate in an exhibition on campus and attend lectures at the University of Pennsylvania’s Institute of Contemporary Art in preparation for a career in the arts that reaches the public through multiple channels of engagement. 

The MFA coursework requires eleven credit units of Graduate Studio and eight credit units of electives. Of the eight elective courses, two are graduate seminars, two are taken outside of the Fine Arts Department, the remaining four courses may be taken either in Fine Arts or anywhere in the university. Each candidate works with an advisor to select courses that will best support the development of their research and artwork. Additional requirements a thesis statement and a thesis exhibition. For more information on the courses see our curriculum page. 

Fine Arts offers numerous research, residency and engagement opportunities to graduate students in the arts. These include Research Assistantships available by application and invitation and our professional development & travel research funding.

The department also support students who are accepted at professional residencies including the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, with financial assistance to cover the fees of attendance. Additionally, we work in concert with the Arthur Ross Gallery, the ICA, the Common Press, and the Penn Library system to develop unique research, curatorial, and outreach opportunities for students.  

For those graduate students who have an interest in developing their teaching experience while working on their degree, the department offers all incoming graduate students a Teaching Assistantship in the first year. Depending on student performance, interest, and the availability of positions, additional assignments may follow. Teaching Assistants are rewarded with a stipend of up to $3,000 per semester. 

There is also an opportunity for MFA students to teach their own course from a selection of undergraduate fine art foundation level courses in drawing, painting, photography, video and sculpture. This opportunity, called the Extended Studio Program, is competitive and is available to students in their 2nd year by application. Awarded students receive $7000 stipend for teaching this course.