The B.A. degree in art provides a comprehensive liberal arts education coupled with professional resident instruction in art. Depending on each student’s objectives and course choices, this degree provides preparation for a professional career, a foundation for graduate studies, or a liberal arts education in art. Each student must select an area of concentration from one of the following: ceramic arts, drawing and painting, new media, photography, printmaking, or sculpture. The bachelor of arts degree requires thorough preparation and is intended to develop a level of competence that will enable persons who wish to pursue professional careers in art to prepare themselves for specialized graduate studies, specialized professional training, and/or immediate participation in creative work.
Students have many resources available for developing a broad base of experiences to inform their work. Field trips to Philadelphia, New York, and Washington, DC, support contemporary views of artists working today. International studies through art department embedded study abroad help to broaden students’ perspectives and develop mentoring relationships with art faculty. Visiting artists, critiques, workshops, and exhibition opportunities on campus all support students’ preparedness for professional life as an artist.
Led by faculty members who are practicing visual artists and scholars of contemporary art, the program additionally is accredited by NASAD.
Media Concentrations
The Art major at Penn State Abington offers six areas of concentration:
- Drawing & Painting is dedicated to an interdisciplinary, multimedia approach that embraces painting, drawing, installation, and computer-generated image-making.
- Printmaking classes cover work in relief (linoleum and woodcut), etching, monotype, and collagraph. Advanced projects include color, photo processes, large-scale printing, and digital printmaking.
- Sculpture includes classes on the figure as well as work in: wood, metal, molding, casting, carving.
- Ceramics welcomes both functional and sculptural approaches to the art form, with work in: pottery, clay, wheel throwing, hand-building.
- newMedia is visual art crafted with digital tools with work in: physical computing, fabrication, design, web, graphic, interactive, 3D modeling, animation.
- Photography combines chemical darkroom and digital imaging techniques with a wide range of camera exploration.
You also can combine the Art curriculum with a minor to enrich your program and give you flexibility in career choices.