Visual Arts - Studio

Visual Arts - Studio

School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design

Mould your artistic style by casting, carving, painting, and printing across diverse mediums in Canada's premier arts creation facilities. The studio-based program prepares you for a career creating change across industries as a practicing artist, educator, curator, entrepreneur, or researcher. With guidance from world-renowned artists, display works at curated public art exhibitions on campus, across the City, and in downtown Toronto.    

The AMPD Advantage:  

  • Class size is capped at 25 students, promoting a personalized learning experience.   
  • Highest retention rate on campus with over 90% of entering students completing their degree.  
  • Professional Practices seminar course exploring grant writing, contracts, intellectual property, exhibition proposals, networking, documentation archive, marketing and business development.  

Program Structure  

Students in the Visual Arts - Studio (BFA) program complete a fundamentals studio course in their first term that introduces them to the visual arts studios, faculty members, and a spectrum of production methods addressing two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) elements of time in artmaking. An established theme provides students with a starting point for research, conceptualization, and the exploration of fundamental processes to visualize their creative ideas.  

After completing a common first year, students choose to specialize in one or more visual arts areas. In the fourth year, students complete a capstone studio course designed to allow senior-level students to develop an independent studio practice, furthering their creative, conceptual and technical skills in both an area-specific medium and an interdisciplinary focus.  Over the years, students develop a self-directed, cohesive body of work while making connections between their practice and a broader context of contemporary art and ideas.   

Featured Facilities

Students in the  Visual Arts - Studio (BFA) program explore and create in facilities unrivalled in any Canadian university, including the Joan Goldfarb Visual Arts Study Centre; the L. L. Odette Centre for Sculpture; spacious, state-of-the-art studios; five student-run exhibition galleries and the award-winning Art Gallery of York University.  

The Visual Arts - Studio Art (BFA) program offers high-quality, state-of-the-art visual arts facilities supported by technicians with extensive after-hours access offering access to dedicated studios in:   

  • Digital and analogue photography, printmaking (silkscreen, lithography, intaglio);  
  • Drawing (conceptual and life model);  
  • Painting (abstract and figurative);  
  • Time-based arts (video and performance); and   
  • Sculpture (metal, foundry, carving, modelling, wood, 3D printing, ceramics, etc.). 

 

Note: This program requires a supplementary application. Applicants must start their application through the Ontario University Application Centre (OUAC). A non-refundable supplementation fee of $20 CAD per application will be applied to the OUAC fee.

After completing the application through the OUAC, applicants will receive an email in two to five business days with steps on how to complete the supplementary application for the School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design (AMPD). Both the OUAC application and AMPD supplementary application must be completed before the application can be assessed for admission. Find out more: ampd.yorku.ca/apply

Program Details


Offered by

School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design


Offered at

  • Keele Campus

Degrees offered

BFA


Ways to study

Full-Time, Part-Time


Experiential Education

  • Practicum
  • Co-op or internship
  • Class-focused

Fall entry

Yes (first and upper year)


Winter entry

Yes (first and upper year)


Summer entry

Yes (first and upper year)