Art Degrees Online

The curriculum in studio art offers both a major (leading to a BA in art) and a minor. It also provides experiences for the liberal arts student who wishes to explore studio practices through elective courses.

The studio program consists of five areas of concentration: drawing, painting, sculpture, printmaking and graphic design. It is supported by a generous endowment: the Elsie Benensohn Rosefsky Visiting Artists Series.

The studio program is enhanced by events and activities in the Rosefsky Studio Art Gallery, which presents an ongoing series of exhibitions, including visiting artists, alumni artists, solo shows, lectures and seminars. It is also supported by the Art Student Co-op, a student-organized and operated source for art supplies.

For beginning and intermediate courses, the quality of work determines whether the student may repeat a course for further development. The decision for such action is a result of mutual consent of the student and the instructor. A repeated course receives credit and fulfills the major requirements.

Art majors and minors must declare an area of concentration and choose an appropriate adviser from among the faculty.

All courses used to satisfy departmental requirements must be taken under the normal grading option.

Beginning drawing is a prerequisite for the beginning courses in graphic design and printmaking, and recommended for all others.

Students must be in residence their last semester.

MICA approaches photography as a fine art medium; more than 100 years ago we had one of the first formal programs of photographic instruction in the world. Today, our curriculum thoroughly covers all areas of still and digital photography and offers students a strong background in the technical and aesthetic applications, history, and contemporary directions of this medium.

Basic and intermediate courses provide a solid technical foundation. Junior Seminar allows you to concentrate on an individual project and begin to establish a personal photographic vision. The intense, yearlong Senior Thesis seminar allows you to explore a specific personal photographic idea in depth and to produce a body of work that is intellectually and artistically integrated. Both junior and senior seminars incorporate ongoing critiques and expose students to a diverse group of outside artists and critics. Seniors have separate spaces to support work towards the required senior thesis project and the intensive, 6-credit senior thesis seminar. The seminar is team-taught by two faculty members and enhanced by a series of visiting artists and critics. Work on the senior thesis can incorporate a semester of study abroad or mobility, if that will be helpful in the exploration of an individual photographic direction.

Because we believe strongly in the value of professional development, all photography majors are required to complete at least one photorelated internship. A busy schedule of visiting artists connects students with many of the most important photographers working today, including, recently: Willie Doherty, audiovisual installation artist; Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison, collaborative surrealist photographers; Emmet Gowin, photography faculty, Princeton University. MICA alumni work in diverse photographic occupations such as studio, commercial illustration, medical, architectural, nature, magazine and newspaper photography; and as museum curators, teachers, digital photographers, and fine artists. Senior photography majors are eligible to apply for a $4,000 Meyer Photography Traveling Scholarship to finance a personal photographic project in the United States or abroad after graduation.
Faculty—Diverse Perspectives

The photography faculty at MICA represent a wide array of interests and creative focus—among them are Alex Heilner, whose work includes digital photography, video, and installation; Lynn Silverman, whose large-format photographs explore the intimate nature of inanimate things; internationally exhibited fine art photographer Regina DeLuise; chair Jack Wilgus, whose focus encompasses a broad array of explorations, from the camera obscura to archival digital printing; Connie Imboden, known for her stylized and sometimes surreal nudes; Tom Baird, whose work explores the history and roots of photography and who engages students to connect with community through social documentary photography.
Recent Internships

The required internship in photography is an opportunity to explore the wide range of career opportunities open to photography graduates. A few recent internship sites:
Oneira Graphics, Baltimore (product photography/custom snowboards)
Starworks, New York (logistics for advertising and fashion shoots)
Dock 25, Boston (digital commercial photography)
Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore (scanning & retouching historical images)
Baltimore Police Department Crime Lab (photography)
Library of Congress, Prints & Photographic Division, Washington, D.C. (curatorial & research projects)
Johns Hopkins Hospital, Pathology Division, Baltimore (biomedical photography)
The Baltimore Sun (editorial photography)
Jessica Wynne Studio, New York (editorial photography)
Facilities

MICA’s photographic darkrooms are well equipped with temperature-controlled sinks with excellent ventilation and proper silver recovery. Equipment includes: 50 enlargers and a separate film-processing lab; alternative process and graphic arts lab; a wheelchair-accessible darkroom; 10 well-equipped color darkrooms with two roller transport color processors that make prints up to 30” x 40”; a spacious studio with professional flash and quality lighting; a wide range of cameras, meters, scanners, and processing equipment; a dedicated photo-digital lab with 18 computer stations for digital imaging, photographic manipulation, and Web-related presentations.

The Simon’s Rock program in Photography considers technical knowledge, historical background, and critical and analytical skills to be key elements in the education of each photo student. Our curriculum is designed to foster a disciplined approach to independent, self-generated work in each course, whether it be the core studio or a Senior Thesis project. We provide a comprehensive facility with professional equipment, as well as exposure to working artists, historians, writers, and critics, to support the growth and development of each student photographer. We feel that photography by its very nature is a tool which promotes interdisciplinary study. Our program offers a wide range of courses that allow the exploration of the medium of photography by students with interests in the arts and humanities, the sciences, and the social sciences.

Students interested in this concentration should take the core course, Photography, in the first year. It provides each student with an introduction to basic camera and darkroom skills, a background in the history of photography, and a thorough exploration of image making. We recommend that Lower College students in this concentration also take two semesters of basic art history and at least one design module or course.
Curriculum
Three intermediate courses in Photography are required for the concentration. Students are introduced to a variety of photographic approaches and technical skills through courses such as the Writing and Photography Studio and Experiments in Photography and other intermediate visual arts courses that use photo media such as Intermedia Studio, Designing with Computers, Intaglio Printmaking and Silk Screen Printmaking. Either History of Photography, Theories of Photography, or Critical Issues in Contemporary Photography is required, and it is recommended that students in the concentration take two of these courses. Advanced courses include Color Photography Studio, Documentary Photography, Photographic Portrait/Self- Portrait, and the Artists’ Books Studio. Students are required to take at least three of these. The total minimum credits required to complete the Photography concentration is 24.