25 Fine Arts MA Degree Programs in USA

The MA in Fine Arts can be completed with an emphasis in Drawing and Painting. This degree program provides students with the creative and technical skills needed to thrive in today’s art world. Students will leave with professional-level portfolios and an understanding of the business of art.

Develop a mastery of skills to experiment, create, and critique within a supportive, diverse environment devoted to individual growth.

The MA program provides students an opportunity to work in 2D Animation & Stop Motion, 3D Animation, 3D Modeling, or Visual Effects, while focusing on storytelling with an emphasis on exhibiting technical skills and eliciting emotional responses.

The Master's of Fine Arts in Studio Art is a full-time, three-year, 90 quarter-unit terminal degree (after Fall 2020 it will be a 60 semester-unit degree), with courses that embrace the multiplicity of artistic expression, augmented with graduate-level critical art theory seminars. Students can work in any medium or range of materials and approaches they choose, and we actively encourage experimentation. High level art history and contemporary art theory classes, as well as many visiting artists, critics, curators, and other arts professionals, plus field trips and exhibition opportunities also contribute to the curriculum.

SFAI’s two-year Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program provides a dynamic interdisciplinary context for students to advance their work while being exposed to the current theoretical and sociopolitical context for contemporary art. Questions, dialogue, and invention drive students through the curriculum, which instructs in the skills and practices needed to sustain a lifelong practice in the arts. The concept is emphasized alongside technical proficiency and skill, and artists are encouraged to experiment widely across media. Students may choose an area of emphasis, or maintain breadth in their studies.

Situated within Minneapolis’s vibrant art-and-design scene, MCAD's Master of Fine Arts is a rigorous four-semester program designed to expand your thinking and promote experimentation in your practice. As a diverse, international community of makers, thinkers, researchers, and professionals, students explore social, cultural, and professional needs.

Offered by the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University, the Master of Fine Arts in Studio Art is a rigorous interdisciplinary program that prepares graduate students for a career as professional artists grounded in artistic innovation and creativity.

The Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing is a limited-enrollment, academically rigorous, low residency two-year course of graduate studies for those aspiring to recover a faithful, theologically rich approach to the creative arts, particularly writing.

Art Center’s graduate program in Media Design Practices offers a two- or three-year Master of Fine Arts curriculum that helps ambitious designers from a variety of backgrounds become design leaders and researchers in emerging fields.

The MA in Studio Art is offered as part of the Art MFA in Studio Art program. Applicants who are interested in pursuing an MA in Studio Art must apply to the Art MFA program.

The MFA Fine Arts Program is open, inclusive, and interdisciplinary. We are looking for advanced artists who are engaged and committed to exploring an art practice in its various forms, traditions, and contexts. We emphasize interdisciplinary critical dialogue and lifelong learning within our intimate community. Our Art + Social Practice emphasis is an optional concentration that explores and encourages collaboration and builds skills to work in the social field. You will be simultaneously supported and challenged. In Critique, you will learn to discuss your own and others’ work and attempt to locate it within wider cultural debates. Individual studio meetings with faculty will offer you one-on-one conversations on work in progress, ideas, readings, or plans. In Art History and Theory seminars, you will read, write, discuss, and consider various histories, methodologies, and frames of thought. Professional Practices will prepare you to sustain a lifelong practice. Our Visiting Artist Lecture Series brings distinguished artists, curators, and thinkers into close dialogue with students. Studies culminate in a written thesis and final MFA exhibition. All full-time graduates work in their own individual studios located at the graduate campus in Culver City. Residencies in Paris, Mexico City, and Anderson Ranch in Colorado are exclusively reserved for Otis graduate students and alums. A fellowship with the Armory Center for the Arts in Pasadena is also available to Otis graduates.

The Master of Fine Arts in Art program is a two-year, full-time, studio-based program located in the center of Los Angeles. The expansive city is home to a vital local art community and international gallery and museum scene with five arts districts: Downtown, Culver City, Mid-Wilshire, Hollywood, and Chinatown. With a select cohort enrolled each year, the program provides a unique experience that focuses on interdisciplinary and wide-ranging experimental, creative, and intellectual exploration.

Maximize your critical and artistic development through a rigorous, multidisciplinary studio practice. In a close-knit community of peers, faculty, and visiting artists, your practice will evolve in exciting new directions. Mills offers a master of fine arts (MFA) degree in studio art led by a distinguished faculty of internationally known artists.

UVA’s unique 2-year Master of Fine Arts program allows students to customize their course of study, linked to their individual career goals. Students are encouraged to experiment both inside and outside of their discipline, and engage in rigorous conceptual research in order to make the most well-informed and impactful artwork.

The Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing is a low residency graduate program, which requires two weeks of residency every summer in Eastern Oregon and completing online courses and individualized study with MFA faculty the rest of the two-year curriculum.