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Disciplines
Within the structure of the program's interdisciplinary approach, each student focuses on one primary form of expression for individual work. The student selects from the following six artistic fields:
Film/Video
This discipline emphasizes aesthetics and innovation, the art of cinema. It seeks filmmakers who want to work on personal, experimental, poetic, or documentary films, and leaves the blockbuster special-effects films and television docudramas to other schools.
The film/video discipline is housed in the Milton and Sally Avery Arts Center. Available video equipment includes mini DV camcorders and editing stations featuring Final Cut Pro. Video monitors and projectors are available for installations. There is also a Pro Tools LE sound lab, which allows for editing in Dolby 5.1 surround. Filmmakers will find a wide variety of 16mm equipment, including Arriflex cameras and an optical printer. A full range of sound and lighting equipment is available to support both digital and analog productions during the summer months.
Since the program is intensive and participatory, the best way for the student to make effective use of the summer session is to concentrate on postproduction. Shooting short films is possible, but time will be lost in sending the film out for processing. Focusing on postproduction gives the film student a chance to receive meaningful input from other artists.
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Music/Sound
This discipline is directed toward artists working with acoustic and/or electronic sound as music and audio art, including composers, improvisers, sound installation artists, sound sculptors, and musicians using acoustic, electronic, or computer-based resources. The aesthetics of the music/sound discipline grow out of the exploration and discovery of experimental music. The program is informed by the extraordinary conceptual and technological developments of the 20th century in parallel with similar developments in the visual arts, film/video, multimedia, and literature.
Music/sound is based in the Edith C. Blum Institute and the Milton and Sally Avery Center for the Arts, which together provide individual studios (some with pianos), a music performance area, recording studio, and an electronic music studio. Professional performers may be hired as resources for Master's Project presentations.
Bard's electronic music and recording studios offer state-of-the-art facilities for production and performance methods ranging from analog synthesis (Serge Modular) to MIDI and digital audio sequencing, digital recording, sampling, editing (Pro Tools), and Power Mac-based digital synthesis (MSP). An informal lab allows for the design and construction of electronics in many forms, from basic analog and circuitry to the programming of microcontrollers and sensors. The object-oriented programming environment MAX is available for live digital interaction and control.
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Painting
The painting discipline encourages students to engage with the shifting and expanding parameters of "painting culture," a deeply structured, historical aesthetic practice that embraces and extends beyond the contexts of the Western painting tradition. During their summer sessions, students are expected to initiate projects that can be implemented and altered in response to feedback from the intensive individual discussions with a broad range of faculty and from the group "crits" that arise from within the discipline Caucus and the larger community setting. The discipline emphasizes creating work as well as developing a critical vocabulary through reading and discussion.
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Photography
The photography discipline reflects the diversity of the medium, ranging from traditional to digital, from still to moving image, and from formally conventional approaches to more conceptual concerns. The discipline emphasizes a critical approach to image-based mediums, intended to help each student find and extend a personal approach and vision, to develop as fully as possible the ideas and directions within it, and to evaluate his/her position relative to contemporary critical ideas. Students are continually challenged to examine the personal and public meanings of their work in order to locate the work within the context of the issues addressed. The program is designed for students who are interested in engaging in art practice, and who have a practical command of photographic technique and a foundation in the history and criticism of the medium.
The photography facility, located in Woods Studio, contains individual and group darkrooms equipped for both black-and-white and color processing, a fully equipped shooting studio, and a state-of-the-art Macintosh digital lab for editing and large-format printing. Medium- and large-format cameras, tripods, and other equipment are available for student use during the summer session. Bard's library includes a strong collection of historical, contemporary, and rare books on photography as well as portfolios of original prints.
Bard also offers an MFA in photography through the International Center of Photography in New York City. Admission to this program is separate from the Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts. For more information on the ICP-Bard Program in Advanced Photographic Studies, contact Coco Lee Thurman, cthurman@icp.edu, 212-857-0063.
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Sculpture
The sculpture discipline encourages the diversity that is reflected in today's contemporary art world. In addition to traditional approaches to sculpture, the program welcomes installation, media, and other interactive or mixed genres. It seeks students who aim to develop a continuing artistic exploration that reflects their unique vision. Successful candidates are able to work independently in their studios and to join the community in active discussions of work in all disciplines. The limited time frame of the summer session requires students to create work than can be realized rapidly; more time-intensive projects can be completed during the 10-month independent study period.
Students are assigned individual studios in the Richard B. Fisher and Emily H. Fisher Studio Arts building. Large common areas for welding, woodworking, and printmaking are also available. Studios in the Fisher Studio Arts building have Internet access; extensive computer facilities are available elsewhere on campus.
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Writing
The interdisciplinary context of the M.F.A. program is ideal for writers, as it allows them to explore issues common to the other arts while they address those specific to writing. The program puts an emphasis on developing awareness of a variety of verbal, aural, and textual structures. Students are encouraged to find and develop an individual process of composition, as well as a critical understanding of their field. The structure and nature of the program make it most suitable for writers working with innovative forms of poetry, short fiction, sound, and mixed-media writing.
Faculty members are drawn from writers with a wide range of media, styles, and concerns, many of whom are known for addressing difficult social and cultural subjects through exploratory approaches to writing. Students work with this faculty and with faculty in the other disciplines on a one-to-one basis; these Conferences permit students and faculty within the discipline to meet and discuss works in progress as well as readings by authors outside the program.
When on campus, students are provided with individual studios and a communal photocopier. Students should bring their own computers and software. Printing and audio and video facilities are available in several campus media labs.
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