Tailor Your MFA in Studio Arts Degree to Best Meet Your Needs
Pursue the highest degree possible in fine arts with Liberty’s MFA in Studio Art! Our program was designed with you in mind. From choosing your own projects to creating a unique Degree Completion Plan that fits your goals, we want your artistic potential to be untethered.
Interested in 3D design? Choose the 3D area of study and take classes that advance your expertise in that particular field. Looking to work with jewelry, wood sculpture, or ceramics? Pick courses that correlate to those specific art forms.
Award-Winning Campus
At Liberty, you’ll find an affordable, high-quality education that equips students like you for the real world. Our commitment to excellence helped us rank as the #4 Best College Campus in America by Niche.com. Earning your degree from a nonprofit university with state-of-the-art resources like ours can help set you apart from your peers.
Why Choose Liberty’s Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Studio Art Degree?
You deserve to study in a creative atmosphere, one that promotes your professional growth with courses, seminars, internships, exhibits, and real-world learning experiences that correlate with your art specialty. If you want to perfect your craft as a creative professional and advance your understanding of the theory and meaning behind visual imagery then our Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Studio Art provides the training you need while allowing you to focus on the art style that interests you most.
Earning a Master of Fine Arts degree is an incredible achievement. An MFA is a terminal degree, which means it is the highest degree awarded in its field. If you are looking for a way to stand out to employers, increase your earning potential, or perfect your art medium, an MFA is the way to go.
Allow your artistic innovation to blossom unhindered. At Liberty, the type of projects you work on as a student are up to you. Choose courses that fit your career goals. Your coursework provides creative freedom in the pieces you design, with industry leaders monitoring your work and providing invaluable input throughout the process.
What Will You Learn in Our Studio Art MFA Degree Program?
Students of our MFA in Studio Art learn how to analyze visual imagery in a much more advanced and precise manner. Courses focus on equipping our students with the ability to articulate underlying meanings behind pieces, as well as demonstrate a mastery of advanced concepts in visualization, ideation, and creation of visual imagery, using both traditional and digital practices.
At this level of scholarship, we allow our students more flexibility in choosing courses and projects. Your courses can be as unique as you are! Within the core courses of this degree, you have the choice of ten courses in either a 2D or 3D area of study. You also have options to take specific art history classes that interest you, from medieval art studies to the arts of East Asia.
Choose which field experiences you want to pursue! From a teaching art course to practicum and internship classes, we want to give you more choices to help you create a more specialized degree that can match your skillset and career goals.
View the Degree Completion Plan, and check out our featured courses below for more information.
Featured Courses
ARTS 511 – Graduate Drawing Topics
ARTS 531 – Advanced Sculpture Topics
ARTS 566 – Mixed Media
ARTS 598 – Practicum
Master of Fine Arts in Studio Art Degree Information
- Residential
- 60 total credit hours
- Transfer in up to 50% of your credits
- This program falls under the School of Communication & the Arts
- View the Degree Completion Plan
- Check out our course catalog
Career Opportunities for Studio Art MFA Graduates
- Art Director
- Exhibition Designer
- Gallery Owner or Director
- Illustrator
- Museum Services Specialist
- Professor
Admission Requirements for Graduate Degrees
Every application is reviewed on a case-by-case basis, and all applicants must submit the following documents and meet the minimum requirements for admission:
- Admission application
- Self-certification form (for students who are in the final term of their bachelor’s degree)
- Current Liberty undergraduate students seeking preliminary acceptance into a graduate program must complete a degree completion application through their ASIST account
- A regionally or nationally accredited bachelor’s degree with at least a 3.0 GPA for admission in good standing. A GPA of 2.5 to 2.99 may grant admission on caution.
- Artist Statement (typed) – must include your artistic background, area(s) of specialty, and the intended direction of your work provides context for your art and design. Must be submitted through SlideRoom in conjuncture with the portfolio
Personal Portfolio must include:
- No fewer than 20 images that best depict your abilities and interests in either Graphic Design or Studio Art
- Submitted images must be professionally photographed/composed and “client” ready
- Neat and professional presentation, layout, and image quality
- Submitted work samples must clearly demonstrate your strong technical skills, aesthetic style, fundamental knowledge, and potential for success in the program
- All submitted images must be original creative artifacts designed by you
- Credit must be given when collaborative works are included
- Portfolio must be submitted via SlideRoom, which has a $10 non-refundable fee
- Provide 20 items
- Images (up to 5MB each)
- Video (up to 250MB each)
- PDFs (up to 10MB each)
- Models (Sketchfab)
Highlights of Our MFA in Studio Art Degree
- Our faculty are all professionals in the industry, with advanced degrees to match their field experience.
- Liberty’s studio arts students have won more graphic design awards as part of the American Advertising Federation (AAF) than all of the other schools in Virginia and North Carolina combined.
- You will get the chance to pursue an internship and practicum hours during your time as a student, which will further develop your professional portfolio.
- Our students have interned with major companies like ESPN and Disney.
- Our alumni have gone on to work for organizations like Motion Picture Association of America, Hallmark, Lord & Taylor, and Capital One.