This two-section course is the academic component of the 1st year MFA Core curriculum. This second section is aimed to refine students understanding of the critical underpinnings that inform and drive the increasingly global environment of the art world. The course continues to allow students to integrate theoretical perspectives into their understanding of the field of art and consequently the assessment of their own art practices. This second section of the course builds on each student’s awareness of methodology and research in their own work and the multiple influences and existing cross-disciplinary dialogues in the field of art acquired in the first section of the class. Students learn about a variety of current and prevalent theoretical discussions in contemporary art and will be encouraged to share areas of specific cultural knowledge and to investigate ways of thinking that students bring into the classroom through their personal histories and cultural backgrounds. This focused acquisition of essential knowledge of relevant discourses coupled with the development of a self-critical and self-reflexive practice will enables students to contextualize and develop their studio practice in preparation for their careers as art practioners. Through lectures and collective study of core texts relevant to student’s studio practice from the field of cultural theory, philosophy and history as well as exercises in analytical writing about their own and each other’s work, students learn to integrate theory and criticism into their studio practices and contextualize and situate their own work and that of others discursively and productively within the larger discursive field of contemporary art.

This two-section course is the academic component of the 1st year MFA Core curriculum. This second section is aimed to refine students understanding of the critical underpinnings that inform and drive the increasingly global environment of the art world. The course continues to allow students to integrate theoretical perspectives into their understanding of the field of art and consequently the assessment of their own art practices. This second section of the course builds on each student’s awareness of methodology and research in their own work and the multiple influences and existing cross-disciplinary dialogues in the field of art acquired in the first section of the class. Students learn about a variety of current and prevalent theoretical discussions in contemporary art and will be encouraged to share areas of specific cultural knowledge and to investigate ways of thinking that students bring into the classroom through their personal histories and cultural backgrounds. This focused acquisition of essential knowledge of relevant discourses coupled with the development of a self-critical and self-reflexive practice will enables students to contextualize and develop their studio practice in preparation for their careers as art practioners. Through lectures and collective study of core texts relevant to student’s studio practice from the field of cultural theory, philosophy and history as well as exercises in analytical writing about their own and each other’s work, students learn to integrate theory and criticism into their studio practices and contextualize and situate their own work and that of others discursively and productively within the larger discursive field of contemporary art.