Fine Art MFA – (M.A.)

The programme places a strong emphasis on student-centred learning - especially on your individual response to the divergent views you will experience in relation to your practice. Amongst other qualities, you are expected to contribute actively in tutorial and seminar discussions; to welcome and encourage sustained analysis of your practice by tutors and fellow students; to understand that the production of contemporary art takes place in a demanding and testing environment; and to take an independent path in developing your practice and its concerns.
Learning on the programme is primarily achieved through an appropriate combination of self-initiated and directed work in studio-practice and Critical Studies. Individual tutorials, seminars, lectures, and research laboratories support this work. All parts of the programme are mandatory for all students. There are no optional courses on the programme. Courses and assessments are structured similarly on both parts of the programme.
Studio Seminars
Seminars help you develop the confidence and ability to discuss your own work and the work of others, and to use the combined knowledge and experience of the group to assist in understanding and developing your own practice. This element of the programme is student-led with tutors responding to the needs and concerns of the participants. Studio seminars are organised by groups and take place weekly. Each student presents work for a seminar once in each term.
Tutorials
These develop your work as professional practice within contemporary art and current debate. You receive scheduled one-to-one tutorials with your group tutors and other staff from the study area. Two tutorials a term are scheduled with the core studio staff. In addition, you are expected to select a number of visiting professionals relevant to your practice for tutorials. These professionals are chosen in consultation with your group tutor, and cover a wide range of specialisms - discussion with them should further your understanding of your work in terms of professional practice. You are expected to write a report immediately after each tutorial, summarising what took place and recording your
considered responses to it.
Critical Studies
You are expected to identify and initiate the discussion of the critical concerns and interests of your practice. These concerns are developed through studio-based teaching and in discussions with your Critical Studies tutors and developed further through the Critical Studies seminar and the Essay. For this reason, and in contrast to many other programmes, Critical Studies for the MFA Fine Art at Goldsmiths does not offer a series of subjects taught and learnt through seminars, group reading and discussion, but bases the teaching and learning of critical studies primarily in relation to your own practice.
Lectures
These introduce and develop issues of critical significance in contemporary culture and fine art by presenting arguments and discursive frameworks for contemporary practice. Lectures run through the first two terms on a weekly basis. They provide an opportunity for you to critically engage with your own practice in terms of wider cultural debates with which they may be unfamiliar. The lectures also provide an occasion for all members of the postgraduate programmes to meet on a regular basis.