Ignite Innovation with Creative Freedom by Earning an MFA in Graphic Design with Liberty
There is nothing like creating a piece of art that so vividly expresses your mind, soul, and heart. Let your talent and passion for art propel you into a rewarding career in digital design. Earning Liberty’s Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Graphic Design will offer you invaluable resources and credentials to take your profession and earning potential further.
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 among Niche.com’s Top 3 college campuses in America. 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 Graphic Design?
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 skill and craft, an MFA is the way to go.
By obtaining your MFA from Liberty, you are not only receiving a prestigious degree, but you are also walking away with a professional resume like no other. Train under degreed faculty with years of industry experience. At Liberty, we are a teaching university, which means your professors are in the classroom with you every week, providing vital input as you complete various projects.
How you direct your studies is largely up to you! If your career goals involve photography, pick out courses specific to digital photography to gain the skills you’ll need to succeed. At this level of academics, we want to provide you with as much creative license as possible to create pieces that are exciting and meaningful to you.
Study at Liberty and enjoy an environment that stimulates innovation and artistic excellence through community evaluation, critique, and open creative exchange. Edify your work and personal integrity by pursuing your MFA from a nonprofit, Christian university. Your courses will not only set you up for professional recognition and success, but they will also set you apart with your strong code of ethics.
What Will You Learn in Our Graphic Design MFA Degree Program?
Many of the courses in our MFA program encourage individual direction and creative freedom, while still stressing advanced design workmanship in all elements of piece completion. At this level of scholarship, we allow our students much more flexibility in choosing courses and projects. Your courses can be as unique as you are! Choose 10 courses out of a list of 20 that are specific to your core in graphic design. 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 515 – Issues in Contemporary Art
ARTS 532 – Vector Illustration
ARTS 540 – Publication Design
ARTS 780 – Art and Design Research Methodologies
Master of Fine Arts in Graphic Design Degree Information
- Residential
- 60 total credit hours
- Transfer in up to 50% of your credits
- This program falls under the School of Communication and the Arts
- View the Degree Completion Plan
- Check out our course catalog
Potential Career Opportunities for Graphic Design MFA Graduates
- Art Director
- Creative Director
- Illustrator
- Professor
- User Interface Designer
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
- A 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 Graphic Design 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.
- Our department seeks out the newest equipment for our graphic design students to use. This includes innovative software in character creation, 3D modeling, and virtual reality.
- 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.
