master of fine arts

SFAI’s two-year Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program provides a compelling interdisciplinary context for emerging artists to develop and refine their work while engaging the historical, theoretical, socio-political, and creative concerns of the contemporary moment.

Founded on the principle that critical inquiry and experimentation are at the forefront of art making, the program encourages students to use their own questioning to generate a sustaining and vital creative practice. The program integrates both formal and conceptual aspects of production, while incorporating new technologies as tools for innovation.

Artists come to SFAI with a wide range of backgrounds and experiences, united by the desire to study with internationally recognized faculty in a vibrant city and community. Students maintain an independent studio practice at the Graduate Center in San Francisco’s Dogpatch neighborhood. In addition, students work one-on-one with faculty in tutorials; participate in discussion-based critique seminars; take critical studies and art history courses; engage with local and international artists through the Graduate Lecture Series and the Visiting Artists and Scholars Lecture Series; and participate in student-led collaborations, collectives, exhibitions, and curatorial initiatives at SFAI’s Swell Gallery, in the wider Bay Area, and beyond. This cross-disciplinary curriculum prepares students for the demands of art making in the globalized 21st century. Graduates have gone on to careers as award-winning artists, filmmakers, teachers, curators, entrepreneurs, and civic leaders.

The culmination of the MFA degree is the annual MFA Graduate Exhibition, which generates critical attention and scholarship, and is renowned for its intellectual rigor and diverse, cutting-edge creative output.

2013 Currency Catalogue

This catalogue showcases the emerging artists featured in Currency, the 2013 MFA Exhibition at San Francisco's Old Mint, and work created throughout the MFA and MA programs.

2012 MFA/MA Art and Ideas

This book showcases SFAI's graduate programs and the diverse, ambitious work by the next generation of artists from this celebrated school.