California Institute of the Arts - Overview
Cross-Pollination in The Arts
California Institute of the Arts was founded with the intent to bring different art forms together and allow them to cross-pollinate, in the process fostering collaboration and sparking innovation. As an internationally recognized school for the performing and visual arts -- film, art, animation, dance, music, theater, and writing -- the CalArts artistic philosophy places an emphasis on an exploration of new paths beyond conventional boundaries.
Intimate Learning Environment
The CalArts educational philosophy is based on close collegial interaction between teachers and students -- in class, in production, and in one-to-one mentoring. The student to faculty member ratio of CalArts is 8/1 and each student is assigned a faculty mentor. This approach combines rigorous instruction with individualized attention, a process that empowers students to define their own personal objectives -- and to develop and refine their own distinctive artistic voices. Given more creative freedom than at traditional art schools and conservatories, the institute's students, in turn, are self-motivated, passionate, and deeply committed to their work. They are accepted into CalArts primarily on the basis of their artistic abilities; once here, they produce art from day one.
24-Hour Campus
Thirty miles north of downtown Los Angeles, the CalArts 24-hour campus occupies 60 acres on the hills of Valencia CA. The campus is surrounded by the Tehachapi Mountains to the north, the San Gabriels to the east, and the Santa Susannas to the west. The center of campus life is a sprawling 5-level, 500,000-square-foot building, where different artistic disciplines share space under one roof. This structure houses classrooms, art studios, animation studios, music rehearsal rooms, and dance studios; galleries, theaters for drama, dance, and film, along with a music hall; costume, scenery, and machine shops; photo labs, computer and media labs, editing suites for film and video, and a digital recording studio; a library, and a cafeteria.
Other buildings on the CalArts campus include the Chouinard dormitory, the Ahmanson apartment complex, the Eli and Edythe Broad graduate art studios, and several annexes filled with additional classrooms, studios, a writing lab, and other facilities. Tennis courts and an outdoor swimming pool are available throughout the year, while spacious lawns dotted with shade trees, open fields, and sloping hillsides allow for quiet reading or casual sports.
Professional Practice
The institute's various ensembles, productions and publications, its extensive visiting artist roster, and its art and performance venue in downtown Los Angeles -- the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater (REDCAT) -- connect the institute with professional creative communities at the national and international levels. Students also regularly take part in festivals, conferences and exchanges around the world. Closer to home, the widely emulated Community Arts Partnership (CAP), a partnership between CalArts and scores of community groups and public schools, delivers arts education programs to Los Angeles youth while at the same time providing its students with valuable teaching experience and an additional source of income.
"Curate Your Own Life"
Through its "Curating Your Own Life: Transitioning to a Career after CalArts" program, students are exposed to a range of careers in the arts; opportunities to participate in career-related courses and internships; consultations with guest artists to gain familiarity with entrepreneurial approaches to their own work; and Third Year Experiences featuring career mentoring for all students. The institute's goal is to provide students with the tools to shape careers that fit their individual talents and ambitions.
School of Art
The School of Art offers BFA and MFA programs for the professional training of fine artists, graphic designers, and photographers. It actively promotes both the creative environment and the intellectual context for artistic experimentation. The school's programs prepare graduates to thoughtfully challenge the prevailing conventions of artistic expression, develop new forms, and become innovators and leaders in their chosen fields.
School of Critical Studies
The School of Critical Studies offers 2 graduate programs: the Master of Fine Arts (MFA) Writing Program and the Master of Arts (MA) Aesthetics and Politics Program. In both programs, the expertise of the faculty is complemented with an extensive series of readings, lectures, workshops, and longer-term residencies by a diverse range of visiting writers, theorists and artists. The institute's graduate students also benefit greatly from the dynamic, highly multidisciplinary creative environment of CalArts, where different branches of the arts freely commingle. In addition, the School of Critical Studies provides a robust liberal arts education for Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) candidates.
Sharon Disney Lund School of Dance
The Sharon Disney Lund School of Dance, one of the nation's premiere colleges for the professional training of contemporary dance artists, offers BFA and MFA programs. Technical excellence and innovative artistry are the hallmarks of the undergraduate and graduate programs. Concentrated production seasons of aesthetically diverse work thrive in an atmosphere of creative exchange between professionally motivated students and a faculty of practicing artists. Personal creativity, combined with mastery of traditional and contemporary styles, prepares students for exciting careers in the field of dance.
School of Film/Video
The School of Film/Video at CalArts offers a BFA program in Character Animation, a BFA and MFA in Experimental Animation and Film and Video, and an MFA in Film Directing. The school is especially unique in that it promotes the studies of all major types of filmmaking: dramatic narrative, documentary, experimental live-action, character-based animation, experimental animation, multimedia, and installation. Each of the 4 programs offers specialized curriculum focusing on specific areas in filmmaking. At the same time, all 4 share an ethos in combining rigorous practical training with theoretical inquiry, and hands-on production with aesthetic reflection.
Herb Alpert School of Music
The Herb Alpert School of Music at CalArts offers rigorous training in an unrivaled variety of musical styles and cultures. This vibrant mix helps each student to acquire the musical fluency to work across conventional boundaries, expand his or her artistic and cultural horizons, and develop a global creative vision. CalArts offers programs leading to the Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) and Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in the areas of Composition, Jazz Studies, Musical Arts, Music Technology, Performer-Composer, and Performance. Additionally, the institute offers a Performer- Composer Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA) degree.
School of Theater
As one of the preeminent theater training programs in the country, the School of Theater is dedicated to the development of new voices and new forms. The training provided is designed to educate the whole person and to prepare fully equipped theater artists to enter and transform the field. With the practical conditions for theater artists constantly evolving, the institute's training gives students the flexibility, skill, and ingenuity to navigate a rapidly changing environment and to pursue their dreams with maximum agency. The School offers BFA and MFA performance programs in acting, directing, writing for performance, as well as BFA and MFA programs in Design and Production comprise scene, costume, lighting and sound design, technical direction, and management. Within the Programs in Design and Production are further specializations, or supplemental courses of study, in producing, production management, stage management, scene painting, and video for performance.