<p>I know this thread is very old but maybe people still look at it… Please pay attention to the graduation rate as people have mentioned! The graduate school is competitive and prestigious, the undergraduate school is a money-maker. Look at the cost of attendance, it compares to Ivy League schools, but think about the debt and the job possibilities after graduation. I know students who owe $500 per month in interest alone…this is not easy to manage with a fine arts degree. Pay attention to your finances please.</p>
That professor overstated the quality of SAIC. What SAIC’s program seems to do in reality is maintain a very, very narrow view of art. It’s a view where the artist statement is more important than the visual - where a long intellectual narrative is important but the work really isn’t. And where conceptualization trumps quality. Certainly, it’s possible to make a career out of that art.
But they don’t have a strong track record of graduates doing phenomenal later. O’Keefe attended…for a year. Disney took a few night classes.
In fact, they have a stronger track record of re-hiring their own graduates to teach there. Most universities limit that practice because it leads to an incestuous bubble that hurts a program pretty badly - because it restricts the introduction of new ideas. (From what we can see, they do NOT want new ideas - just students who crank out the intellectual work.)
What seems true is: They focus on a very limited view of art. Perhaps 20% of students do well considering that view and they really don’t care about the rest.
As a professional in commercial art married to a fine artist and friends with many, many more, that means their students do not graduate ready to make their way as visual art professionals.
So I’d be very careful around SAIC. IF highly intellectualized art is what you’re interested in, then SAIC could be a great fit. But if you want a core education from which to launch a career in visual art, don’t do it.
This thread is fairly old but obviously keeps coming back.
I can’t believe I was reading some older forums about SAIC this very afternoon and everyone backed up your statements.