Description:

The MA program in modern and contemporary art, criticism, and theory offers a unique and interdisciplinary program that centers engagement with art—as a material, critical, and social practice—in a curriculum designed to train scholars, artists, and museum and gallery professionals in the analytical skills, historical perspective, and theoretical fluency necessary for cultural workers today. Our students learn how art and its institutions have developed over time and acquire the tools to reimagine what they could become.

The program provides an intensive study of contemporary critical and theoretical issues surrounding 20th- and 21st-century artistic practices. During weekly first-year colloquia, students are also introduced to the work of some of the most prominent critics, artists, curators, and historians in the field today. Many courses are supplemented by field trips to museums and art galleries in New York City, just 20 miles south of the Purchase campus. The college’s Neuberger Museum of Art is also a major resource.

Updated 9-24-20

Requirements:

Requirements for the master’s degree in art history include eight courses (32 credits), proficiency in one foreign language, and an 8-credit thesis. A minimum 3.0 (B) cumulative GPA must be earned at Purchase College. The total 40 credit requirement can be completed on a full-time two-year program or part-time three-year program.

MA Required Courses:

  • ARH 5101/Proseminar: Method and Theory in Art History
  • ARH 5325/Master’s Colloquium I
  • ARH 5326/Master’s Colloquium II
  • ARH 5—/One course dealing with art before 1950
  • Four elective courses in art history
  • ARH 5990/Master’s Thesis I: 4 credits
  • ARH 5991/Master’s Thesis II: 4 credits

*Foreign Language proficiency is not a prerequisite and can be completed at Purchase College.

Museum + Curatorial Studies (M+) Option

The Museum + Curatorial (M+) track engages students in object-based research and the study of critical histories of museums and museum practices with an underlying commitment to cultivating more inclusive and accessible institutions and notions of exhibition-making. Building on the required courses for the MA degree in art history, required courses for M+ students include, in the first year, Museology (fall semester) and Critical Curatorial Studies (spring semester). In the second year, students’ coursework will be augmented by workshops, on- and off-campus internships, and the development of an exhibition series based in the Neuberger Museum.

M+ Required Courses:

  • ARH 5101/Proseminar: Method and Theory in Art History
  • ARH 5325/Master’s Colloquium I
  • ARH 5326/Master’s Colloquium II
  • ARH 5—/One course dealing with art before 1950
  • ARH5035/Museology
  • ARH5037/ Critical Curatorial Studies
  • ARH 5025—/Exhibition I*
  • ARH5026—/Exhibition II*
  • ARH 5990/Master’s Thesis I
  • ARH 5991/Master’s Thesis II

*Note: For Academic Year 23-24, students can substitute ARH5065/Curatorial Writing Intensive and ARH5066/Curatorial Digital Literacy for Exhibition I and II.

MA/MFA Academic Requirements

In most cases, obtaining both an MA in Art History (through the School of Humanities) and an MFA in visual arts (through the School of Art & Design) at Purchase College requires three years of in-residence study with a total course load of 98 credits. For successful progress through the program, a 3.0 (B) GPA must be maintained.

First Year: 32 credits

Second Year: 34 credits

Third Year: 32 credits

Notes:

Students must take VIS 5760/Graduate Critical Topics two times.


Faculty

  • Professor of Art History
    • BA, University of California, Santa Barbara
    • MA, PhD, Stanford University
  • Associate Professor of Painting and Drawing
    • BA, Princeton University
    • MA, Chelsea College of Art and Design, London
    • MFA, Rhode Island School of Design
  • Associate Professor of Art History
    • BA, Oberlin College
    • MA, University of Iowa
    • PhD, University of Southern California
  • Assistant Professor of Art History
    • BA, Fordham University
    • MA, City of College of New York
    • PhD, University of Pennsylvania
  • Lecturer of Art History
    • BA, MBA, PhD, New York University
  • Professor of Art History
    • BS, Wheelock College
    • MDiv, Harvard University
    • PhD, Emory University
  • Assistant Professor of Art History
    • BA, Harvard University
    • PhD, Graduate Center, City University of New York

Contributing Faculty

  • Alex Gordon Curator of Art of the Americas, Neuberger Museum of Art
    • MA, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico
    • BA, MA, PhD, University of Montreal
  • Associate Professor of Painting and Drawing
    • BA, Princeton University
    • MA, Chelsea College of Art and Design, London
    • MFA, Rhode Island School of Design

Courses