Si está pensando en aplicar a una beca y/o endeudarse para hacer su maestría fuera del país, le puede interesar este top 10 de los posgrados «más influyentes del mundo» que se publicó en Artspace (casi todos en Estados Unidos), seguido de una selección de nueve programas influyentes en otras partes del mundo. Su autor aporta costos (el artículo es de 2014, los costos se actualizaron a 2017), profesores y alumnos destacados, y detalles de sus programas que los hacen tan influyentes y prestigiosos.
10 of the Most Influential MFA Programs in the World
With spring break already fading into a distant memory and graduation dates quickly approaching, we thought we would get an extra-long head start on back-to-school season by tallying up the top 10 Masters of Fine Arts programs in the world. While they may not be the cheapest avenues into the art world, these are, without a doubt, the top-ranked MFA programs for art students looking to add a gold star to the top of their CVs—and to build a ladder into the gallery sphere. Of course, there’s no «silver bullet» for instant post-graduate success. But there are certain programs that tend to spark the interest of curators, critics, and collectors alike.
YALE UNIVERSITY
LOCATION: New Haven, Connecticut
SPECIALTIES: Sculpture, painting and printmaking, graphic design
TUITION: $37.632
TIME TO DEGREE: ≤ 3 years
NOTABLE FACULTY: Rochelle Feinstein (director of painting/printmaking dept.), Gregory Crewdson (director of photography dept.), Martin Kersels (director of sculpture dept.), Trevor Paglen, Shirin Neshat, Huma Bhabha, Carroll Dunham, Barbara London
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Robert Mangold, Eva Hesse, Wangechi Mutu, Matthew Barney, Chuck Close, Brice Marden
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: The potential for connection-building is high here—there are rumors of second-year students in the program being signed with galleries and invited to participate in international exhibitions before they’ve even graduated. It’s reputed to have the best graphic-design and photography departments. Also, check out the Yale School of Art’s snazzy, GIF-heavy website, and the fact that its visual arts facilities are housed in a series of recently-built, cutting-edge eco-friendly buildings to get a sense of the progressively-minded nature of the program.
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
LOCATION: New York City
SPECIALTIES: The program is interdisciplinary, but applicants apply to either painting, printmaking, sculpture, photography, or «new genres»
TUITION: $63,961
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
NOTABLE FACULTY: Gregory Amenoff, Sanford Biggers, Nicola Lopez, Rirkrit Tiravanija,Kara Walker
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Jon Kessler, Korakrit Arunanondchai, Georgia Sagri, Guy Ben-Ner, Lisi Raskin
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: As with many of the Ivies, in Columbia’s case, self-perpetuating exclusivity plays a major part here: only two percent of applicants to Columbia’s MFA in the visual arts are accepted. As of fall 2013, the highly selective program also offers a degree in Sound Art—so if that medium’s your thing, this is the place for you. Also, if you’re looking to enter the art profession, it doesn’t hurt to spend your formative years of training in the artistic capital of the world.
GOLDSMITHS COLLEGE
LOCATION: New Cross, London
SPECIALTIES: The school offers a tutorial system, allowing students to choose their focus, but its known for teaching conceptually weighted work
TUITION: £3,330 ($5,600) for Brits; £8,130 ($15,340) for international students
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
NOTABLE FACULLTY: Suhail Malik, Mark Leckey, Lindsay Seers
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Malcolm McLaren, Lucian Freud, Yinka Shonibare, Bridget Riley, Damien Hirst, Sarah Lucas, Liam Gillick
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: Goldsmiths offers a unique blend of studio practice, theoretical, and art-historical training that has made it the U.K.’s most notable and best-known graduate program. It’s this vigorous atmosphere that birthed the artists associated with the Young British Artists in the 1990s, among many other notable alumns.
THE SCHOOL OF THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO
LOCATION: Chicago, Illinois
SPECIALTIES: Fiber and material studies, film/video/new media/animation, art and technology, sound, and performance
TUITION: $48,750
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
NOTABLE FACULTY: Michelle Grabner, Gregg Bordowitz, Joseph Grigely, Josiah McElheny,Glenn Ligon
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Tania Bruguera, Sanford Biggers, Claes Oldenburg, Jeff Koons, Leon Golub, Apichatpong Weerasethakul
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: For the true interdisciplinarian, SAIC has a unique program—its MA in Visual and Critical Studies—which, more than other interdisciplinary programs at comparable schools, embraces the crossover nature of contemporary artistic discourse. Based on the intersection of visual phenomena, critical studies, and creative production, the program combines aspects of a studio-based program and theoretical study, and can include art history, criticism, the general liberal arts, and studio practice.
THE SCHOOL OF THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, BOSTON
LOCATION: Boston, Massachusetts
SPECIALTY: Interdisciplinary
TUITION: $39,928
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
NOTABLE FACULTY: Jim Dow, Chantal Zakari, Susan Jane Belton, Mark Cooper
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Jim Dine, Joan Jonas, David Lynch, Larry Poons, Nan Goldin, Ellsworth Kelly
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: The major draw for aspiring artists to choose the SMFA, which was itself founded by a group of artists in 1876, is the opportunity to exhibit work at the MFA Boston, one of the city’s most important cultural institutions. The school is also partnered with nearby Tufts University, where SMFA students can sit in on classes and take advantage of Tufts’s hardy academic resources.
RHODE ISLAND SCHOOL OF DESIGN
LOCATION: Providence, Rhode Island
SPECIALTIES: Literally everything from furniture design to landscape architecture to painting, with the most popular majors being illustration, industrial design, architecture, and graphic design
TUITION: $48,470
TIME TO DEGREE: 1–3 years; most students finish in 2
NOTABLE FACULTY: Dike Blair, Naomi Fry, Dean Snyder, Patricia Treib, Henry Ferreira
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Ryan Trecartin, Roni Horn, Dan Colen, Do Ho Suh, Andrea Zittel
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: While many MFA programs offer a post-studio mix of critical theory and interdisciplinary experimentation, RISD’s curriculum is firmly planted in the mastery of technical craft, with a curriculum that emphasizes traditional skill sets over conceptualism—in other words, this program is for those who like to get their hands dirty. RISD also benefits from a close relationship with its equally prestigious neighbor Brown University.
CALARTS
LOCATION: Valencia, California
SPECIALTIES: Art, graphic design, photography and media, and art and technology.
ANNUAL TUITION: $46,830
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
NOTABLE FACULTY: Sam Durant, Charles Gaines
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Ashley Bickerton, Mark Bradford, Mike Kelley, Jack Goldstein, Elad Lassry
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: CalArts was founded in 1960 by none other than Walt Disneyhimself. The media mogul merged Los Angeles’s Conservatory of Music with its Chouinard Art Institute, with the assistance of the conservatory’s chair, Lulu May Von Hagen, to form the new school. (The school was envisioned as a «CalTech for the arts»—hence the name.) As a result, CalArts still retains strong ties to Hollywood and California’s media industries. Under the direction of the late artist Michael Asher, the school also became famous for its durational «crits,» nothing-is-off-the-table discussions of students’ work that could go for 14-hour marathon stretches.
BARD COLLEGE
LOCATION: Annandale-on-Hudson, New York
SPECIALTIES: Film/video, music/sound, painting, photography, sculpture, and writing
TUITION: $60,410
TIME TO DEGREE: a total of 2 years, with two summer sessions and two independent-study sessions
NOTABLE FACULTY: Amy Sillman, Ulrike Muller, Sadie Benning, Huma Babha, Thomas Eggerer, Zoe Leonard, Nick Mauss, R.H. Quaytman
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Amy Sillman, Paul Chan, Carolee Schneeman, David Horvitz, Herb Ritts,Rachel Harrison, R.H. Quaytman, Trisha Baga, Zak Kitnik, Lucy Raven
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: Bard spearheaded the low-residency MFA program, with students gathering for sessions that are clustered in eight-week summer ‘residencies’ and divide up long periods of independent work lasting from two to three years. This means the focus is on creating art, rather than credits, grades, or classes. The program’s unique rhythm means that it has been able to secure a number of influential artists as visiting professors, as well—many of whom are alumni of the program themselves. The widespread influence of Bard’s program on the contemporary art scene has led some to speak of the «Bard mafia.»
THE SCHOOL OF VISUAL ARTS
LOCATION: New York, New York
SPECIALTIES: Computer art; visual narrative; photography, video, and related media; fine arts (painting, sculpture, printmaking)
TUITION: $42,570
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
NOTABLE FACULTY: Mark Tribe, Marilyn Minter, Laurel Nakadate, Polly Apfelbaum, Hannah Wilke
NOTABLE ALUMNI: Inka Essenhigh, Barnaby Furnas, Keith Haring, Andrea Fraser, Sarah Sze,Sol LeWitt
BIGGEST SELLING POINT: SVA is more than the snazzy ad campaign you may have seen plastered around New York’s subway system. The school’s program in ‘visual narratives’ combines writing and visual art, for those interested in illustration, graphic novels, and other forms of ‘visual storytelling.’ Lately, however, there has been been substantial turnover among the school’s faculty.
UCLA
LOCATION: Los Angeles, California
SPECIALTIES: Ceramics, interdisciplinary studio, new genres, painting and drawing, photography, sculpture
TUITION: $ 16,818 for California residents; $29,063 for everyone else
TIME TO DEGREE: 2–3 years
NOTABLE FACULTY: James Welling, Greg Lynn, Catherine Opie, Barbara Kruger
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Sharon Hayes, Matthew Brandt, Xavier Cha, Shana Lutker
BIGGEST SELLING POINTS: As a public university, UCLA is much cheaper than some of the Ivy league options out there while offering a totally comparable experience in terms of the quality of its programs. It also is renowend for its highly competitive «New Genres» program, which immerses students in installation, video, film, audio, performance, and digital work, plus «hybrid and emerging art forms.»
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The World’s Most Influential MFA Programs, Part 2
You may have noticed that our recent survey of 10 of the world’s most influential MFA programs was heavily focused on the United States. That’s because we’re patriots. But there are numerous other art schools around the world that have also made enormous impacts on the history of art, yielding generations of exalted alumni, boasting world-class faculty, and operating on a totally different scale and historical timeframe from schools of the U.S. model. (To give some perspective, the Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, included in the list below, opened 14 years before the Declaration of Independence was written.)
While Europe certainly has more than its fair share of art schools with major institutional gravitas, newer institutions in emerging contemporary-art centers—like China, for example—are pushing cutting-edge programs that upend traditional notions of what an art program should be. With that in mind, we’ve compiled an addendum to our original list that considers the most influential, prominent, and respected graduate-level fine-art programs outside the U.S. Not all of them are technically Masters programs—but given the international scope we’ve considered any school that either grants an MA degree or has an equivalent post-graduate program.
STÄDELSCHULE HOCHSCHULE FÜR BILDENDE KÜNSTE
LOCATION: Frankfurt am Main, Germany
NOTABLE FACULTY: Judith Hopf, Douglas Gordon, Isabelle Graw, Michael Krebber
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Anton Burger, Nora Schultz, Maria Loboda, Wolfgang Winter, Sergei Jensen
TIME TO DEGREE: 4 years
SELLING POINTS: The Städelschule, as it’s known, was established in 1817 by a foundation set up by Johann Friedrich Städel to house his art collection and to establish the school. Forty percent of the student body comes from abroad, making this one of the most international art schools in Europe. The school’s contemporary exhibition venue Portikus was opened in 1987 by the school’s director, noted art historian and curator Kaspar König, adding to the Städelschule’s reputation for progressive initiatives. We should note that the school doesn’t technically grant either Bachelors’ or Masters’ degrees—at the end of their studies students receive the title of Mesterschüler(in) (literally «school master»), a special honor.
AALTO UNIVERSITY, SCHOOL OF ARTS, DESIGN, AND ARCHITECTURE
LOCATION: Greater Helsinki, Finland
NOTABLE FACULTY: Irit Rogoff, Peterri Nisunen, Nora Sternfeld
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Marita Liulia, Magnus Charmanoff, Helena Hietanen, Klaus Härö
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
SELLING POINTS: Named for Alvar Aalto, prominent Finnish architect and designer, Aalto University was founded in 2010 by merging Helsinki’s University of Technology, School of Economics, and University of Art and Design (formerly known by the abbreviation TaiK). The school’s Pallas Fine Arts degree program launched in 1994. Based on the interdisciplinary nature of art and the linkages between art and science, Aalto’s highly individualized program mixes fine art, art history, and theory, taught by professors who are all working artists in the fields of painting, sculpture, visual composition, environmental arts, and art history. As a contemporary answer to the Bauhaus’s combination of the fine and applied arts, Aalto’s faculty also includes lecturers in drawing, color theory, printmaking, design history, theory, and aesthetics.
OSLO NATIONAL ACADEMY OF THE ARTS
LOCATION: Oslo, Norway
NOTABLE FACULTY: Ingjerd Hanevold, Hans Hamid Rasmussen, Ellen Kjellberg
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Dag Hol, Karen Holtsmark, Svein Nyhus, Aase Texmon Rygh
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
SELLING POINTS: Oslo’s National Academy of the Arts offers specialized programs in the textile, metalwork, graphic art, ceramics, and ever-popular «interdisciplinary» tracks. The school’s structure acknowledges that contemporary artists have to be trained at the intersection of several fields—an approach exemplified by the school’s new pilot program, the Masters in Art and Public Space, a two year program starting in fall 2014 that focuses on art in spaces outside of the traditional museum or exhibition institution.
STAATLICHE KUNSTAKADEMIE DÜSSELDORF
LOCATION: Düsseldorf, Germany
NOTABLE FACULTY: Tomma Abts, Peter Doig, Max Dudler, Katharina Fritsch, Rosemarie Trockel, Rebecca Warren
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Thomas Ruff, Joseph Beuys, Sigmar Polke, Andreas Gursky, Thomas Demand, Gerhard Richter
TIME TO DEGREE: 4 years
SELLING POINTS: Düsseldorf’s famous academy—which incubated the talents of the now well-established artists like Thomas Ruff and Sigmar Polke in the 1960s—was originally founded as a school for drawing in 1762. It became world-renowned in the 1850s when the genre and landscape painting associated with the «Düsseldorf School»—a century’s worth of painters including Peter Behrens, Hans Dahl, and Otto Hupp, among many others—gained widespread international attention, attracting students from the United States, Scandinavia, and Russia. Then, in the postwar era, another Düsseldorf School was born in a different medium, when the famed teachers Bernd and Hilla Becher ushered in a new era of documentary-style photography through such students as Ruff, Candida Hofer, and Andreas Gursky.
ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARTS
LOCATION: London, England
NOTABLE FACULTY: Fiona Rae, Richard Wilson, Dara Birnbaum, Marc Camille Chaimowicz, Brian Dillon, VALIE EXPORT, Haroon Mirza
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Richard Hamilton, William Blake, William Heath Robinson, Sandra Blow
TIME TO DEGREE: 3 years
SELLING POINTS: One of Britain’s most competitive and well-respected art schools, the Royal Academy of Art accepts only 17 students per year for its three-year program, the only one of its kind in Europe. Student painters, sculptors, and draftsmen enjoy access to state-of-the-art facilities including a digital media suite, sculpture workshop, video-editing suite, printmaking studios, and world-class library.
CENTRAL ACADEMY OF FINE ARTS, SCHOOL OF FINE ART
LOCATION: Beijing, China
NOTABLE FACULTY: Yu Hong, Xu Bing, Liu Xiaodong, Zhan Wang
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Zhang Dali, Zhang Huan, Fang Lijun, Jin Shangyi
TIME TO DEGREE: 3 years
SELLING POINTS: The only art academy of higher learning directly under China’s Ministry of Education, the Central Academy of Fine Arts (or CAFA) was founded in 1950 by incorporating the National Beiping Art Collegeand the Fine Arts Department of Huabei University. The school drew international media attention during 1989’s protests in Tiananmen Square, when CAFA students created a plastic-foam-and-papier-mâché statue they called the «Goddess of Democracy» as part of their demonstration. The school’s graduate programs get incredibly specific—for example, students can enter with a concentration in «research on the expressive language of concrete oil painting.» (That’s within the Oil Painting sub-department.) There are also departments for Mural Painting and Experimental Art, among many others. Despite its wide variety of specializations, CAFA is highly selective, turning away 90 percent of its applicants every year.
EMILY CARR UNIVERSITY OF ART AND DESIGN
LOCATION: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
NOTABLE FACULTY: Paul Mathieu, Richard Clements, Keri Smith, Julie York
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Terence Koh, Michael Snow, Neko Case, Stan Douglas
TIME TO DEGREE: 2 years
SELLING POINTS: Of Canada’s four standalone art and design universities, Emily Carr has received the highest number of major awards for students and alumnus across Canada over the past five years. The school (the namesake of artist Emily Carr was formerly known as the Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts) offers Masters of Applied Arts programs in Visual Arts (subdivided into Animation, Film/Video, Illustration, Visual Arts, General Fine Arts, and Photography), Design, and Media.
ÉCOLE NATIONALE SUPÉRIEURE DES BEAUX-ARTS
LOCATION: Paris, France
NOTABLE FACULTY: Christian Boltanski, Marina Abramovic, Richard Deacon, Jean-Marc Bustamante, Annette Messager
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Bernard Buffet, Edgar Degas, Henri Matisse, Pierre-August Renoir, Hubert de Givenchy, Ouattara Watts
TIME TO DEGREE: 3 years
SELLING POINTS: Of the many Écoles des Beaux-Arts across France, Paris’s is the original. You’d be hard-pressed to find an institution with a catalogue of alumni comparable to the École’s, which includes many of the foundational figures of European Modernism as well as major figures in the fashion and contemporary art worlds spanning its 350-year history.
UNIVERSITY OF THE WITWATERSAND SCHOOL OF THE ARTS
LOCATION: Johannesburg, South Africa
NOTABLE FACULTY: Jo Ratcliffe, Donna Kukama, David Andrew
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Robyn Nesbitt, Kendell Geers, Sandile Zulu
TIME TO DEGREE: 1-2 years
SELLING POINTS: As part of South Africa’s University of the Witwatersand, located in the industrial and commercial heartland of South Africa, Wits School of the Arts (as it’s known) is a major hub for artistic development across the country, the continent, and internationally. The school offers graduate programs in the digital, dramatic, and fine arts.