Ph.D. Concentration in Art Practice
Transdisciplinary Research in the Arts
The Department of Visual Arts at the University of California, San Diego is pleased to invite applications to the Art Practice concentration in the Ph.D. program in Art and Media History, Theory, and Criticism. (Please see Ph.D. information). http://va-grad2.ucsd.edu/~gd2/phd-program-0
The concentration is designed for artists who wish to pursue their work in an environment geared towards doctoral study, and to produce studio work alongside a written dissertation. It is especially well-suited for artists whose practice employs, critiques or otherwise engages research methodologies and disciplinary protocols from the humanities, social sciences and sciences. This is a concentration within an existing art and media history Ph.D. program rather than an independent art practice doctorate. As a result, art practice candidates are required to fulfill the same academic requirements as other Ph.D. students, including two to three years of graduate level course work in art and media history, theory and criticism, language exams, passage of a formal qualifying exam, and submission of a dissertation prospectus. Their dissertations, however, combine a shorter written component with a completed art project (film, video, exhibition, installation, public project, etc.). Applicants should have some academic or professional background in art and media history, theory and criticism as well an established and sustained research-based art practice.
A Unique Program
The concentration takes advantage of the Visual Art's Departments long history as a center for experimentation in visual art practice and theory. Today the UCSD Visual Arts Department is recognized as one of the preeminent centers for contemporary art and media practice in the country, combining a vibrant MFA program with an exciting new Ph.D. program in Art History, Theory and Criticism. The Ph.D. program, which accepted its first students in 2002, has rapidly become a magnet for ambitious scholars committed to historical and theoretical research into contemporary art and media. The addition of a concentration in art practice was a natural outgrowth of the reciprocal relationship between history, theory and artistic production as a field of intellectual practice in the Visual Arts department. Rather than segregating art practice and history in different departments, or even different schools, UCSD’s Visual Arts Department brings practitioners, theorists and historians together to encourage innovative work at the boundaries of disciplines, discourses, and methodologies.
Admissions
Students entering the Art Practice concentration need to already have a master’s degree (M.F.A., M.A.) or a bachelor’s degree (B.A, B.F.A., B.S.). Applicants must submit academic transcripts, GRE scores, three letters of recommendation, a statement of purpose, a CV, a sample of scholarly writing in art or media history and theory (20 pages minimum), and a portfolio or other representation of their art practice by January 11, 2013 for Fall quarter of 2013. Please refer to our application procedure for application submission instructions. The statement of purpose should describe in detail the aims and methods of the applicant’s research, and explain how the work of research and their work in studio may be understood to form a single, integrated whole. The statement of purpose should also describe the applicant’s past work and its relationship to art and media history and theory, their goals in the Ph.D. program, and how they plan to make use of the resources offered by the Visual Arts Department and the University as a whole. Students in the Ph.D. in Art Practice concentration will be required to demonstrate reading knowledge of two foreign languages related to their field of research, the first of which will be tested for upon beginning the program. For further information contact:
Faculty
Amy Adler-- Drawing, photography, painting and performance
Amy Alexander -- Digital media and visual performance
Sheldon Brown -- Augmented reality and computer games
Norman Bryson -- Western art since 1700, Modernity and d visual culture in Asia, critical theory, contemporary art and art writing
Jordan Crandall -- Media art and theory
Teddy Cruz -- Public Culture, architecture and urbanism practice and theory
Ricardo Dominguez -- New media art, performance art, hacktivism, artivism and nanoculture
Steve Fagin -- Video, film and curatorial practice
Jean-Pierre Gorin -- Film, film theory, criticism, writing
Jack Greenstein -- Renaissance art history and theory
Louis Hock -- Public art, installation art and media practice and history
Grant Kester -- Contemporary art history and theory, history of photography, history and theory of social movements
Fred Lonidier -- Photography
Kim MacConnel -- Painting
Babette Mangolte -- Film, photography, writing
Lev Manovich -- New media theory, history and art practice
Elizabeth Newsome -- Ancient to Contemporary Native North American art history, the Southwest and Mesoamerica, Ethnoaesthetics and philosophy of art
Sheldon Nodelman -- Classical antiquity and twentieth-century art history and theory
Rubén Ortiz-Torres -- Photography, painting, sculpture, video and installation
Kyong Park -- Architecture, art, urban theory and activism
Jennifer Pastor -- Sculpture, installation, drawing and painting
Kuiyi Shen -- Modern and contemporary Chinese and Japanese Art
Ernest Silva -- Painting, drawing and sculpture
Susan Smith -- Late medieval and northern Renaissance art history
Brett Stalbaum -- New media environmental performance Art
Haim Steinbach -- The Object: concept, context, sculpture
Lesley Stern -- Film history and theory, writing, cultural history of gardens
Michael Trigilio -- Film, video, installation and radio Mariana Wardwell -- Modern / Contemporary Latino American Art History and Film John Welchman -- Modern art history and theory, criticism, visual-cultural studies The PHD Concentration in Art Practice Poster (PDF, 248 KB) 1. Bruce Nauman, Vices and Virtues (1988) and Alexis Smith, Snakepath (1992), Stuart Collection, University of California, San Diego. Photograph by Phillip Scholz Ritterman. All other photographs by Grant Kester.
View the poster
