Art Portfolios for applications?

College Majors Visual Arts and Film Majors
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<p>“The actual interviews and live portfolio reviews were rare and my impression was that these reviews were as much about selling the school to the applicant as the reverse.”</p>

<p>Except for SAIC which is known for accepting/approving a portfolio at an interview and/or Portfolio Day. Which basically guarantees admission, you just need to go through the process of filing the remainder of the paperwork. So if you’re interested in SAIC that process can be very important. If they don’t accept you at that point it does not mean you will not get in but it’s sort of like an early admission. So don’t be disheartened if you want to go there and they don’t accept your portfolio at that point, just take their suggestions and fix the portfolio up. But it sure takes some pressure off if they do accept it early on.</p>

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<p>except when your mom is THE fammom.
it backfired for famfamily - how could they just let the kid in like that if they are serious and supposedly good artschool, not just wanting to rack up willing paying customer, eh?
thus this beautiful journey have started, and… who knows where and how far away the famkid is now at this moment.</p>

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<p>“how could they just let the kid in like that if they are serious and supposedly good artschool”
Uhhhh because the admissions is based on the quality of the portfolio and in some cases they see the portfolio and find it more than acceptable???
You still have to submit the paperwork and I suppose if the grades, etc. and application essay are really lacking there could be a problem but since they are basing admissions on quality of work I don’t think this reflect negatively at all on a school. The same people who will decide on admissions when looking at portfolios in the regular process are looking at portfolios during interviews and Portfolio days.</p>

<p>And just because they accept your portfolio you don’t have to commit, it leaves the door open for other admissons that you might be waiting for which is in some ways a better situation than early admissions where you’re locked in.</p>

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<p>GET YOUR PORTFOLIO PHOTOGRAPHED now…</p>

<p>EXCELLENT ADVICE!!!</p>

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<p>smarty, are you saying NPD schools would send out equally legit admission people evenly to Canada, Florida, NY, Iowa Louisiana etc?
I know the fact SAIC in particular doesn’t.
I am not saying it means nothing if you get accepted on the spot, like the earlier reply I did in this thread, just that really no reason to jump up and down and feel validated of your talent and brag around neighbors.</p>

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<p>Bears
Are you cranky today???
“no reason to jump up and down and feel validated of your talent and brag around neighbors.”</p>

<p>The only reason I brought this up was so kids would know that there was that possibility at the NPD days and during interviews at SAIC. Doesn’t always happen but it makes visting SAIC if you’re interested in the school a very good idea either for an interview or at NPD (besides the fact that you get advice as to how to arrange your portfolio). </p>

<p>And it’s not a matter of anyone who this happens to “bragging” or feeling validated, it’s a possibility to keep in mind because if by chance this happens to a kid they then have that school “settled” without having to commit to from their end (as you would in early decision).</p>

<p>And the fact that SAIC does occasionally do this doesn’t reflect on the quality of the school at all, it’s just that they see a portfolio that is strong enough that they give a nod. Still contingent as far as I know on grades, etc. You seemed to think it reflected badly on the school, I don’t, if they were doing this just to rack up paying customers they wouldn’t even bother looking at the portfolios or they do it more often or all the time.</p>

<p>I didn’t know they did this until a parent on a tour at another school said they had accepted his kid at NPD, or rather accepted the portfolio. Like I said, I don’t know what they do if they okay the portfolio and the your grades or SAT turns out to be low. Maybe they ask at the review before okaying the portfolio, don’t know.</p>

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<p>it will be interesting to follow the upcoming year of students applying to art schools to see if the impressions from this past year hold true. based on what I saw during the 2009-10 application season, the portfolio is clearly important for admissions as well as passing grades and above 25% SATs in HS–BUT getting into art school is not terribly tough with the exception of the Coopers Union, RISD, MICA. WUSTL and CMU do emphasize grades/SATs but they still accept over half of art school applicants who probably self select anyway as more “academic” type of art students. Almost all other schools accept over 50% of applicants and the stats show that most are average students in terms of scores/grades. …the tough part is getting merit and financial aid to offset the very high cost of a BFA, particularly at private art schools and colleges/universities. Student experiences at NPD seems to be a poor predictor of outcomes. This past year seems to indicate that effusive and supportive comments at NPD did not translate into scholarships or even admissions in a couple of cases. Rather cold/unenthusiastic comments at NPD seemed also to have little predictive value–witness my S with a so-so response at NPD by SAIC and yet admitted on the spot in Chicago during an admissions interview with a moderate merit aid offer later. Kids who had a relatively long (3 years+) serious commitment to art, art classes in HS and summer portfolio or summer programs all seemed to get accepted to great programs so they probably had well developed portfolios. However, it seemed that kids with very high SATs/grades seemed to get better merit aid offers but it is impossible to tell if the portfolios were better than the kids who had disappointing merit offers. There was general disappointment with the level of financial aid since no school with a top ranked art program promises to meet financial need fully (except Yale). </p>

<p>so…as a non artist observing last year’s process…keep the importance of portfolio in perspective…make sure you show your best work, it is well documented and photographed…it is not anime…get those letters of rec ready and some basic artsy essays and try to enjoy your senior year. the most important thing to do is analyze what it is that you want/expect to get out of the next 4 years of your education and talk to your parents very very frankly about finances and their expectations. Focusing on the portfolio as the only or even most important factor in admission or merit/financial aid is a mistake… the art schools are out there to make money, (again, except for coopers and Yale) they will take anyone they think have a shot at it both artistically and academically, they will offer some merit aid to those they think are better than the average applicant but it will not be enough to offset the very high cost of the BFA…so think hard about whether you really want this…</p>

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<p>hey fammom you beat me while I was fixin’ spelling ( see I am trying)
smarty, no, I was just remembering what been said by different people that works for the same school who reviewed my kid’s nearly identical portfolio in few years stretch, and wanderd if it was the lunch they ate or how tight their shoes were…
you seem pro SAIC, Ooooo is that your secret?</p>

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<p>I’m not pro anywhere, just trying to pass on some information. Famom is right about Cooper and Yale, although with Cooper it’s a given that you’ll get the full ride of course, not so with Yale. But of course both are long shots for most kids.</p>

<p>I think different schools fit different personalities and then of course the location can matter too, city vs. country, etc. so it’s kind of pointless to be pro or con. And actually, of the art schools, all of them have turned out “famous” artists or well known people working in their fields. So there isn’t one that is the magic bullet for an art track to success, it’s really what you do with it and where the chips fall. My suspicion is that they all probably have about the same percentage of “successes” and “failures” if one defines that by being known in the field.</p>

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<p>BandD is right…I should share my son’s portfolio but the link is not working well…will check with him what’s up with that. His videos are on youtube so you can see his animations, games and video that was in the portfolio<br>
[YouTube</a> - 0hNoes’s Channel](<a href=“http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=0hNoes#g/u]YouTube”>http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=0hNoes#g/u)</p>

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<p>woot woot woot</p>

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<p>Excellent take on the situation, Fineartsmom. That was a good post. I wish I had known a bit more than I do now – particularly about the financial aid part of it. We were surprised that our kid didn’t get more, but I blame her for not dutifully completing all the scholarship applications that I gave her as she was supposed to. Syracuse and LCAD accepted her portfolio at NPD and she got scholarship offers from both institutions. Frankly we were surprised with Syracuse because since her portfolio was accepted at NPD, she never had to send one in to the school as she did with the other schools. Weird.</p>

<p>Anyway, your post was great. I think photographing the pieces as you go along is a really good idea. I know we were scrambling to get her Cooper and RISD hometests photographed before she submitted the originals as well. We ended up keeping a little mini photo studio set up in the house for a couple of months. It just made things easier to photograph those last pieces as we went along. </p>

<p>And yes, the different requests she got from schools at NPD was a bit nervewracking. The Pratt Illustration guy wanted situation drawings, RISD wanted more conceptual pieces, Cleveland wanted more botanicals. Keep notes at NPD, they are really useful for portfolio editing at the end stage.</p>

<p>I did want to add that sometimes there are schools that are more difficult to get into even though they’re not ‘top tier’ art schools, like SUNY Purchase. They offer BFA and BS starting this year, but they’re admission rate is fairly low and they can be just as selective as some of the bigger schools because of the finance part of the game.</p>

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<p>Glutenmom, your daughter will be at MICA right? They offer scholarships to returning students. I noticed the deadlines on their calendar. Make sure she notices too!</p>

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<p>GOod point about SUNY PUrchase. It is true for VCU also. Such a strong program with much lower cost of attendance means that they can and are more selective than many of the more well known private art schools. And it is true about MICA giving money to returning students. They do have a pretty high attrition rate and perhaps some money is freed up. I was shocked, really shocked to find out that the ringer from my son’'s school (with a free ride from MICA) from last year has dropped out of MICA (3 golds over two years at scholastics, congressional art winner, etc). The kid from the year before that also very gifted, took a year of absence after freshman year and I am not sure if he will be back in September. He also had a very generous aid offer so perhaps this means they redistribute some of that to current students. I don’t think the problem was the art program at MICA…just distracted by other things in their lives.</p>

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<p>MICA gotten yet another grant. Let’s hope it trickle down to all student body.
<a href=“http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=39435[/url]”>http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=39435&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>the idea of a home studio sounds thrilling! how did you set it up? what do you think is the optimum set up for a good shoot of the origional works?</p>

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<p>LoL, Greenwitch – I told her she should stop painting Johnny Depp and work on some pieces that would be suitable for the ‘Continuing Students’ scholarships… she looked at me blankly and said “But I’ll be a Freshman”…I actually had to tell her that that competition was for students who were already at MICA and who could win money for the following year. Sometimes she’s a little clueless.</p>

<p>Now we have the stand-off with the roomies. One sent her a three line email asking kid to tell about herself. Kid repllies with a three line email basically echoing the roomie’s version of the info her roomie sent her. Silly thing. It consisted of where she’s from, what her major will be and when she will get to Baltimore. She’s so darn INTROVERTED. She needs to tell them about her celiac disease <em>she already nixed my purchase of gluten free stickers to put on her food</em> and how that will impact their living arrangements… but whatever. I suspect she will just have to learn the hard way. She has got to do these things for herself. I sent her the email address for the chef who assurred me in April that they can deal with gluten free meals, but I need her to step up to the plate and make sure that they will have something for her to eat at all the Orientation hullabaloo. I keep telling myself ‘its her problem its her problem its her problem’. Lol, just like spending money she was supposed to earn with her non-existant job. I swear I look at her and see a train wreck waiting to happen.</p>

<p>Thirty two days to go until she’s outta here! She’s in the commons, so at least she was happy about that.</p>

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<p>We just had an area in our family room with a wall that needs repainting (so it was temporarily ‘clear’) and put up a nail to hang stuff on and the two lights and the camera on a tripod. You need to be careful about distortion in your photos, so you really need a tripod that lets you get the same angle to the lens as what you have with the piece (but in our case it was up on the wall) and you have to use the two lights (we used a work lamp from the garage and a clamp on art lamp) in order to keep glare off the art. Ideally we were told to photograph outside on a cloudy day, but I was always battling shadows and/or wind and it turned out to be easiest to just leave everything set up in doors for a couple of months - especially when we were racing to get those hometests in the mail in the dead of winter.</p>

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<p>hello everyone! just thought i’d pop in and share my thoughts on art portfolios for admissions to all types of schools. i’m heading off to college this fall and probably will study art in some form or another, so here goes.</p>

<ol>
<li><p>the portfolio to the art school: i was accepted at risd, so i hope that legitimizes my advice. these schools are looking for all types and styles. your main work can be as un-observational and un-realistic and messy and whatever as you want. an EXTREMELY good way to get a sense of the accepted students’ work is to join the facebook groups for the admitted classes, and there are tons of photos of the work they submitted. while acceptance rates can be 20% - 50%, it’s really much more selective, as only students who have interest and talent are applying. warning: the applicant pool is highly self-selective and filled with superstars, and art itself is so subjective, so it can seem like a crapshoot. however, sharp technical skill is essentially quantitative and is a solid boost to your portfolio, as goes for great observational drawings. but do not feel the need to stuff your portfolio with these, as the home tests usually allow for good room for observational and technical things (think RISD bike and 3 perspective drawings).</p></li>
<li><p>the portfolio to the small schools (i.e. small LACs): from my experience, applying and being accepted to tiny schools like swarthmore, pomona, etc., your portfolio is almost always considered if you’re a decent applicant. these schools have smaller applicant pools than big universities, and they still need to diversify their class, meaning they’re looking and will seek after people interested in and talented in the arts. many small LACs come with forms that you send in with your art portfolio that are actually the rating forms, so you can see how they grade it (usually on a number scale with optional comments). generally, if you submit a great portfolio (remember, technically proficient and observational drawings are key) then you’ll get some kind of boost, but if you really stand out the LAC could send you a likely letter or something. always, always, submit a portfolio to these schools–it usually helps.</p></li>
<li><p>the portfolio to ivies, stanford, mit, etc.: submitting portfolios to these schools seem to be the next big hype, but as someone accepted to ivies including yale and harvard with them noting positive things on my portfolio, i hope i can offer some valid advice. these schools review only a small portion of the art supplements simply because there are too many. there is a way, though, to almost guarantee that your portfolio is reviewed: convince them that you’re interested in art. you also must be academically decent (i’d say there probably is no “cutoff” to review supplements, but try to get your SAT over 2000 and GPA over 3.5). whether that be writing an essay, your teachers mentioning your passion, having years of workshops and lessons, you must first and foremost demonstrate an interest for them to go out of their way to review your supplement. do note that most of them reviewed are deemed as average, and sending in something average could potentially be detrimental, as most of these schools specifically tell you that they are looking for exceptional talent. from personal experience and seeing many successful applicants who submitted portfolios, they all had mega technical skill, observational drawings, and a solid body of work (10-15 pieces). i’m talking about very lifelike and accurate portraits, advanced still lifes, diversity in media, etc. i think the most important factor here is to have a very solid technical background and being able to acutely transfer what you see to paper. reconsider sending in a portfolio if you’re just doing it for the sake of having a supplement.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>ultimately, overall, if you’re interested in art, you don’t always have to have a killer portfolio. sometimes the most talented kids don’t do anything with their talent, so if your portfolio isn’t great but you still love it–then show it. do something in your community with art, teach lessons, start a club. those actions will ultimately do more for a university than the university having the next van gogh huddled up in a clammy studio all day; i know of plenty of talented artists, actors, design kids, film kids, who didn’t even submit portfolios and were accepted to the most competitive schools. </p>

<p>feel free to PM me (i must admit many people on this forum helped me with my art supplements, so i’d like to re-pay the favor) with anything: suggestions on portfolios, questions, etc. i’m glad to help.</p>

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<p>dear chair (hey redbug, do they rhyme?)
how you been? so yale, it is eh, how you feel? (how about “yale” and “feel”?)
Do you think you can give advice to the CA manga kid in the other thread?
why is that some parents of our lot say just NO WAY to private schoos while some insists HYSP SWA?
Is $ any of the factor in your case?
You will go far, you worked so very very hard.</p>