Art School - Was it helpful or worth it?

In My Humble Opinion
1
  1. Well, what is art school like?
  2. Did any of it help to further your knowledge of art or your techniques if you had a basic, intrinsic knowledge?
  3. How much academia was present/did you learn any higher level mathematics or sciences?
  4. What school did you go to? What years?
  5. MOST IMPORTANTLY: is it absolutely necessary for any career in art in today’s world?
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The following is not something that you have to read an order to answer my questions. It is just some background information that may help understand where I am coming from. ONLY READ IF NECESSARY!

I am at the inevitable point that every kid aiming towards college experiences:
what, exactly, to do. My problem is that I am diametrically opposed between hemispheres of my brain. One part of me wants rigorous academics. I absolutely love higher level mathematics and science regardless of the comprehension or aptitude I have. Some of my happiest moments in life have been spent learning chemistry, physics, and mathematics. If I was to find a school that would challenge me in these regards my passion for art and overall knowledge of it would definitely dwindle. Hardly any schools in North Carolina allow for a stimulation of both math and art, creating an inverse relationship. I could further pursue either one on my own but I feel that after awhile I will need that college education to get any progression. With that being said, art is second nature to me. There was never a time in my life where I could not be satisfied by drawing, sculpting, painting, or pratically any artistic medium. If I choose my love of art and go to an art school, chances are my mathematics and science education would dwindle. The easiest thing to do would choose between the two.

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Sorry to thinly veil advice on higher education but I genuinely want to know what I would expect from an art school. I am cognizent of every teenager going through this stage in their lives but try not badger me on my asking.

Thanks in advance, all!

2

1.Art school is intense but cool. Expect to forgoe free time in the name of art.

2.It certainly helps. It’s impossible to figure out how all the cool stuff out there was made on your own. Having an knowledge and appreciation of the theory and history of art helps too.

3.This depends on school, but a dedicated art college will only have a relatively small requirement and offering of non-art classes. I’ve been to ( but did not complete) the Academy of Art in San Fransisco. I think the curriculum was 30% or so non-directly art class. Not sure about any science classes, but I doubt it beyond generic stuff.

4.See above. Last year. It was a bit too expensive for me to stay once my grant ran out. Right now I’m rounding out my education at the local community college. You only get out of any school what you put into it.

  1. Can’t answer this one as I’m still in the student phase. If I had stayed at the Academy, I know they had a job-placement program. Whether or not I would have ever made back tuition is another matter.

As to your background info, you sound exactly like I did 10 years ago. I loved science, loved art…chose science at first. I went to school to become an engineer before I discovered that I really hated doing 30 hours of calculus a week. I dropped out and went into the Air Force, only recently getting out to go back into art.

If I had to do it all over again, I’d have gone directly into art and saved alot of detouring. I wouldn’t have to work so hard to get my skills back to where they were before I let them atrophy.

You’ll hav to make your own choices though. I personally want to go into making space art and sci-fi stuff, fusing my knowledge and love of both science and art into a usefull whole. Will it be profitable? I hope so… :dubious:

3

  1. Well, what is art school like?
    For me, it was a hell of a lot of work. All-nighters were common, especially during the freshman/foundations year. I was dirt-poor most of the time. I noticed two types of students: those kids whose muse prevented them from being anything but artists; and kids who were trying it on for size. Generally speaking, the kids who were trying it on for size didn’t last the four years. The graduating class size was always a mere fraction of the size of that same group’s freshman enrollment.

  2. Did any of it help to further your knowledge of art or your techniques if you had a basic, intrinsic knowledge?
    I think you get out of it as much as you put into it. In my case, yes, I had a basic intrinsic aptitude for design and it pushed me deeper into various disciplines and skills that are demanded in my field. Although, truth be told, my school didn’t push concept and theory as hard as they could have. I found that the greatest force that pushed me in school was keeping apace or besting the other top designers in my class.

Ultimately, there are examples of artists doing quite well without art school. Phillip Burke was a self-taught artist who landed a great job with Rolling Stone doing portraits for their magazine every month. In my opinion, to pull this off you need to be very good, very disciplined and very lucky.

  1. How much academia was present/did you learn any higher level mathematics or sciences?
    Academic credits are necessary for a BFA, but there was little to choose from and they were generally softball courses. Personally, I avoid math like the plague. In all honestly, I could have cared less about my academics: I was paying to have a killer portfolio, not a valedictorianship.

  2. What school did you go to? What years?
    Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design, 1989-1993. Not the top program in the field by any means, but not bad one either.

  3. MOST IMPORTANTLY: is it absolutely necessary for any career in art in today’s world?
    Absolutely necessary? No, of course not. A really good idea? Yes, of course it is. Given the background you’ve provided and the ridiculous cost of art school these days, I suggest you give art school a pass and go the traditional college route, enrolling in whatever art classes they make available.

4

ZebraShaSha and Thaumaturge, you sound exactly like me in high school. :slight_smile: I faced exactly the same choices: I didn’t want to abandon either my art or my maths and sciences. I chose to follow a path that I thought would make me a good career, instead of following my art, and I’ve regretted it ever since.

Instead of art school, I went to architecture school, flamed out, switched to electronics, actually graduated from that, and went to work in the industry. (I was the only student in electronics at Sheridan College with a sketchbook though.)

I was taking art classes after work at OCA (before they added the D to the name), and I very much would like to go back.

I actually did quit work to go to the classical animation program at Sheridan College, but it didn’t work out; even so, it was one of the most important experiences of my life.

Art school…

Art school gives you exposure to a wide variety of things that you’d never encounter on your own: techniques, materials, people. Especially the people. You will make cool creative friends.

Most art programs have you learning how to draw; it’s just so useful, even if you go on to painting or sculpture or whatever.

You take gesture drawing to get the quick sketch and the feel of something, the way it masses and moves. You can then scribble something that will irresistably capture the essence of your subject.

You take contour drawing to really look at something. This involves unhooking the preconceptions you sum things up with so that you can really see the colours, highlights and shadows, and shapes of your subject. Often what you really see isn’t what you think you see at all.

You take life drawing for the same purpose. Plus, after you’ve drawn enough still lifes of fruit and whatever, you get to draw nekkid people. :slight_smile:

Drawing nekkid people is an interesting experience for a number of reasons. One is that you learn how unusual the supermodel image is, compared to normal people. Another is that, when you’re really in your drawing, your surface mind vanishes and there is just the drawing flowing through you, in your eyes and out your hands. That this happens when dring something slightly outside the taboo, such as drawing naked models, shows how shallowly-constructed taboos can be.

The people who are the easiest to draw aren’t the supermodels either.

At traditional art school, you learn things like colour theory and how light and pigments mix.

You take quite a bit of anatomy so that you know how the human body goes together. It’s not uncommon for serious art students to buy anatomy books, and in the Sheridan library there’s a wall of books that consist of nothing but carefully-indexed posed photographs of naked people of all different sizes, shapes, and colours.

Animal anatomy uses the same principles as human anatomy; just the proportions of the components are different. And when you do animated characters, you have to know where the bones and muscles are so everyting pivots and moves properly.

You may take courses in the history of art, but that’s something of a specialty in its own right.

Regarding blending art and science:
I think that’s a lot easier now with the rise of computer-generated imagery. Three-dimensional modeling of humans and animals on computer is a big field right now; just google for things like Maya, 3DSMax, and Poser. 3D models are used in video games, advertising… and movies. Consider Gollum in the Lord of the Rings. They had anatomy and muscles and skin down to a science to make him so realistic.

At OCAD, there’s a course stream in the Faculty of Art for “Integrated Media”:

I wish they’d had something like this when I was in high school looking at what way to go. Looks like a great blend of Art and Science. Perhaps there’s something like this near you, ZebraShaSha.

5

A classmate in high school was very keen on science (especially biology), and also an accomplished artist. She went on to uni and majored in biology, minored in art, and now makes a tidy living illustrating biology textbooks and medical books. She is also able to pursue original paintings and exhibits and sells her drawings and paintings through a small gallery.

That may not be what you would like to do, of course, but it’s one way to combine two seemingly diverse interests.

Even if you don’t wish to combine them, I’m sure you could find a good school where you could double major, or major/minor.

One thing that drives me mad now as an adult where all the teachers who said I had to make a choice between history and music; no way could I manage both. I went without playing an instrument for 6 miserable years because of having that thought rattling around in the back of my brain – then I realised that one of the reasons I’d been so happy as an undergraduate was that I always kept my guitar handy and would take work breaks and play for a while, and I’d continued tuition and ensemble and music classes all through my BA.

In addition, I have been doing handwork since age 5 – the comments I used to get about that in grad school, too :rolleyes: I wanted to do my dissertation on a topic in mediaeval textiles, and my (male) advisor told me there wasn’t enough source material or artifacts to support a whole dissertation (:eek: – especially as I had attended a conference with him wherein the show stopping presentation was by a grad student who was preparing a dissertation study on a set of knock-out tapestries from a Spanish castle), and the (female) professor for whom I TA’d and turned to as a mentor said, ‘Hey, I like to sew clothes, but it’s unprofessonal to try to get a dissertation out of your hobby’ Crikey. I would love to send them a copy of my upcoming conference paper; I suspect the topic would make both of their heads explode.

As it turns out, the way things are going, people who matter are extremely interested in my background in music and textiles, and they’ve not only augmented my professional choices, but have always been a comfort and a source of relaxation and enrichment. :slight_smile:

So I’m positive you can somehow pursue both science and art, and if there are future teachers out there who say, ‘No, no, no, you must chose one; you can’t do both’ – it’s probably because they couldn’t imagine doing both.

6

1) Well, what is art school like?

I loved it. It was tough, very tough, but wonderful.

I’m a little different from some people, because I didn’t go to art school to get a degree. It was just too expensive at the time. I went to learn. I couldn’t bear it anymore. I had all these things I wanted to learn and the local Junior college and local classes were not cutting it anymore. I had the grades and the portfolio to get accepted into art school, but not the money.

It changed my life and was a very happy time in my life. There were some “gaps” in my education where I sorely needed more help—drawing anatomy was the biggest. And just a general overall focus on all techniques. I had drawn all my life. Art was and is a passion for me. I was doing okay on my own, mostly self-taught (had an oil painting teacher in my teen years that was wonderful, but she didn’t really teach serious anatomy, drawing or color theory). I was selling my work, sometimes semi-professionally, since I was in high school, but it wasn’t enough. I knew there was more I needed to learn. Art school helped me learn it.

2) Did any of it help to further your knowledge of art or your techniques if you had a basic, intrinsic knowledge?

Oh hell yes. And I’m not ashamed of the work I did before. I had a good solid technique in most mediums that I tried (except ink, which I mastered at art school). Could paint in oils, acrylics, watercolors, pencil, and so forth. I did take an airbrush class at art school that was nice. This may sound . . . arrogant (and I suppose it is), but things such as mastering pastels, oils, acrylics, pencil or markers or oils never were a problem for me. I usually just sat down and did it and it usually looked okay. I was just lucky that way.

However, I desperately needed to learn more about anatomy and figure drawing. The local Life Drawing class had given me all that it could. I could draw what I saw just fine, but I wanted to draw from my imagination, and I just couldn’t do it. (I could draw faces from my imagination, but not figures.) I needed more solid education on color theory. I had some innate ability for it, but I needed to know why certain colors worked the way they did. This gave me more control and confidence. And I learned other stuff like that.

*3) How much academia was present/did you learn any higher level mathematics or sciences? *

I didn’t go for a degree program but from what I recall, there was very little math or science in the art degree program. (Just a class or two at most.)

4) What school did you go to? What years?

Otis in Los Angeles, early-mid '80s.

5) MOST IMPORTANTLY: is it absolutely necessary for any career in art in today’s world?

I cannot say. It is MOST IMPORTANT to be GOOD at art to make any money at it, and art school helped me get a whole lot better. I would not have this level of success (such as it is) if it were not for my experience in art school. However, as others have said before, you get out of it what you put into it. I went there with a zeal and geeky desire to drain as much out of it as I could. It was wonderful for me. But I saw others around me who were more apathetic, “playing artist” but not wanting to put in much effort, and their work showed this. If they got a degree, it probably didn’t get them very far (with the exception of some jobs where any degree is required), because they SUCKED. SUCKED.

This is a story I always trot out during discussions such as this, and here it is again: A friend of mine went through a ceramics program in a large and famous Los Angeles college, and it was set up to be next to useless. The teachers running it had some high falutin’ notion of what ceramics was “supposed” to be, and apparently it wasn’t anything practical, like, you know, making pottery or anything. (The students didn’t learn how to use the equipment, didn’t learn how to use the materials, nothing. Just “expressed themselves.”) These students now have ceramic degrees, and many of them want to get into teaching. But who is going to hire a person for a ceramics teacher if they don’t know how to throw on the potter’s wheel, don’t know how to handle any of the materials, don’t know how to make anything that doesn’t blow up in the kiln?

So, my point there is, the degree is what it is. You have to put some effort into it, and you also have to pick your college program carefully. I have a hard time believing that all these ceramics students did not know before they got into ceramics that there was this thing called the “potters wheel” that many potters used, and perhaps they ought to learn it too. I can’t believe that all these students didn’t revolt when they made piece after piece that blew up in the kiln. I can’t believe that they just sat back and took it, in ignorance, without wondering why there wasn’t more. But apparently many of them did just sit back, pay their tuition, learn absolutely NOTHING, and came away with a degree that is, for most things, absoutely useless. They’ll never get a job teaching ceramics, that’s for sure.

As for myself, I never have had anyone ask me “Do you have a degree in art?” before accepting my work into their art show or gallery. This seems to be the experience of all the other artists I know too. Nobody ever asks. They ask to see your portfolio or samples of your work. They don’t care where you went to school. If you suck and they can’t sell your sucky work, it doesn’t matter where you went to school or whether or not you were at the top of your class. You make sucky work that people will not buy. That’s all that they will see. On the other hand, if your work is good and they think that they can sell it, they don’t care if you are self-taught or illiterate. You make work that is pleasing and will sell. They will want your work in their gallery. They won’t ask for your “qualifications.” Your qualifications are sitting in front of them, in the form of samples or a portfolio.

The others here who have talked about “self taught” artists have it right. I know of a whole lot of awesome self-taught artists. These people are great. They did it on their own. They worked damned hard. I compared them to many of the “play at art” types that littered my art school—snobby, spoiled types who liked the “idea” of art but didn’t have any passion for it, and it was obvious to me who was going to end up going somewhere with art. No matter what pedigree you have (or don’t have) in art, the bottom line is that you have to love it with a passion, and you have to work like hell at it. Anything less will make you mediocre, whether or not you went to the finest art school in the world.

7

Okay, I know a little about this one. But I haven’t actually been to art school. Truley my loss, I believe. I do have a Bachelor of Fine Arts from a reasonably competent university, and I’ve been working in various forms of advertising art for a good 30 years. Good jobs, bad jobs, but I’ve always been able to pretty much do something art related and get paid for it. That being said, it is my solid observation that of all the people I have worked with, the most elite are those who have gone to art school. By this I mean, they are the one’s who make the big bucks. Really. You didn’t say if you had a direction you were looking, and I only know advertising. The best design jobs tend to go to those with art school credentials. The connections help too.
Depends on what you’re looking for. The university degree is really valuble. My daughter is ready to start college and is thinking of a design field. I’d like her to do both. But I can’t help but favor the university.

8

Great resopnses so far. Exactly what I was looking for and what not. Just a question I would like to add: have any of you interested in both mathematics (not science so much) and art been able to study both or use both as a career? Unlike Thaumaturge, I would honestly have no trouble doing 30 hours of calculus a week. I really want to learn math way past this basic highschool trig, algebra, and entry level calculus and I think I would absolutely love math on a college level and setting. It seems like I can either get the art school experience or get the college level math experience but never really both at the same time. Is this a substantiated statement?

9

Math and art touch in so many places…

Leading-edge artists have frequently used the leading-edge math of their times. The big breakthrough in the Renaissance was the development of an accurate way of doing perspective… which involved 3D geometry… and that was the math that led to the jaw-dropping pictures of the time. (Google trompe l’oeil for examples.

To me, one obvious route to using math in your pursuit of art is through extending the art of computer simulation.

Look at the physics involved in photorealistically simulating the motion and appearance of, say, hair in CGI characters, and consider that the big movie studios typically customise and extend the simulationm software for each new blockbuster. To use your math and physics skills you’d have to learn about programming, but these days the materials for that are easily picked up. Read magazines like Cinefex for details.

There is also a breed of art that is algorithmically-generated. The artist writes a program that creates different pictures, and then chooses among the output. There’s a Japanese artist who does this, I don’t remember his name, but his artworks are strange and alien and unforgettable–perhaps because they were partly created outside the human mind.

(Continuing in this vein, you might also want to google for “artificial life”. It takes simulation one step further, and sets up systems of programs within the computer that reproduce and breed and evolve. Some of these techniques have been used in creating the vast fields of combatants in recent blockbusters’ battle scenes. Each combatant reacts to its surroundings and moves differently as time passes.)

There is Mathematica and the artworks it can produce. I’ve wanted to get my hands on that program for a long time.

There are the shamelessly-beautiful pictures of fractals.

There is a group of people who simulate four-dimensional raytracing and get photorealistic pictures of some very strange things.

And that’s just visual art. Music and sound are deeply mathematical, and that’s a whole other field.

ZebraShaSha, you may have to do your education in two phases, one for the math, and one for the art, simply because getting deeply into one may mean that one has to ease up on the other aside for a time, and use it as relaxation.

But by combining them you may ultimately end up doing something completely new and amazing.

10

A interesting page on “algorithmic art” (another good term to google for):
http://www.xahlee.org/Periodic_dosage_dir/t1/20040113_cmaci_larcu.html

11

Have you considered computer animation?

High emphasis on math and art.

12

The more “responsible” thing to do would be to go to college and focus on a scientifc pursuit and fit in as many art classes as you can. For the first couple years, you might only be able to get 1 art class per semester but by your junior/senior years, you might be able to work in 2 classes per semester or even do some “independent study” classes if you know the teachers by then.

The math/science is a much better fall back for getting a job out of college.

This sounds like a good route for you since you aren’t 100% gung ho about being an artist.

Also, my wife studied sociology as an undergrad but always had an interest in art. She got a crap job out of college while taking some jewelry making classes. She now has her own business designing/producing/selling her own line of jewelry. It’s not traditional art, but it is a very creative pursuit, using traditional concepts of materials/colors/textures.

The point is, there are art careers you can go into without a degree in art. That’s not so easy to do in math/science/programming.

13

I’m currently going through art/graphic design classes at a community college here in Kansas City (I hope to transfer when I’m done).

To me the classes haven’t really been super tough, but that’s because I’m not at an actual art school, like the Kansas City Art Institute. That and I’ve been taking the first level of classes so far. I’m now onto Computer Design II and that’s a bit tougher. It also depends on the teacher. Some teachers are way more challenging than others. Some accept “C” work and grade them as “A”, and others accept “C” work and grade them as “C” or “D” work. But maybe that’s just the community college enviroment (??).

Depending on where you go, art school can also be expensive, depending on which supplies the school offers or which ones you’ll have to go and buy.

14

ZebraShaSha , you remind me a lot of myself at your age, though for me it was music. I ended up majoring in engineering.

My automatic response to this question is you might want to think about studying architecture (though I don’t know you or what your interests truly are). It’s a hard degree, but it’s a lot of math and engineering mixed w/ a lot of drawing and design, even sculpting of models. I’m actually looking into moving my career into architecture to be able to combine my love of art with my engineering experience.

I always try to avoid posting personal advice on this board, but I’ll break my rule a little. If you do decide to focus on the hard-science majors, if you’re like me you will REALLY miss exploring your artistic side. Engineering majors, physics majors, chemistry majors, etc. often don’t know and don’t care about the arts very much (they are usually very masculine, emotionless fields, and art is an emotional experience). Because these majors don’t alow much room for exploring other fields in college (you’ll likely have at most 1 free elective per semester to take whatever you want), most of your time will be spent in those fields, and most of your peer group will be made of people in those fields. Once you graduate your peer group at work (where you’ll spend much of your waking life) will be much the same way. I’m really not trying to lead yuou one way or another, I just wish I had realized this stuff at your age.

I hope this helps. Good luck.

15

This is really important. I’m not horribly artistic but I do play music and write. My degree is in architectural engineering (not architecture, it’s really structural engineering) and I work in my field. I work with nice people but, wow, they’re boring. Almost all of them love Rush Limbaugh and are amazed that I read for entertainment. So when you’re thinking about a career, think about your working environment as well. If I was going to do it again, I’d realize that the nice but boring kids in my engineering classes were going to be my coworkers someday and maybe I’d have majored in something else…

16

I don’t have anything truly substantive to help you out, but can I commiserate? I’m a junior in high school and starting to consider colleges and careers. Right now, I’m divided between my longtime interest in design and my recent interest in public policy. Though I’m leaning towards the second, I really sympathize with your dilemma. I would echo the suggestion about architecture; I considered it as an extention of design, but decided it required too much math for me. Sounds pretty perfect for you. The computer/art combination is intriguing also, unless part of your pleasure in art comes from physically creating something. In my experience, computer art can fall kind of flat if that’s the case.

17

I read Zahava424’s post as “I’m in Junior High School” and I thought, "Damn, kids get started on degrees early!

Zahava, have you thought about industrial design?

18

I am not an art school grad (or even attendee), but a little trivia: The Talking Heads formed when all four members were students at the Rhode Island School of Art. So if nothing else, you might get into a famous and successful band!

Good luck with the post-secondary school adventure.

19

ZebraShaSha, I have a friend who went to UNC-Asheville and double-majored in art and biology. (He makes very cool sculptures of bugs.) I understand that UNCA has a good art department. I know a number of folks with BFAs from UNCA, and they seem to be doing okay career-wise. That may be an in-state option if it’s financially important for you to stay in North Carolina.

20

I can relate to this in a way. My degrees were in German (BA) and librarianship (MLS), and the first job I had after school was as a subject indexer for a publisher of insurance law books. Everybody there, practically, came from humanities backgrounds and was highly educated. The general qualification was that you had to have either a law degree or a librarianship degree, which in the U.S. means you have at least six years of higher education under your belt, and that, in turn, meant we usually had lively discussions about anything from the arts to politics, to linquistics, and anything in between.

Then I became a programmer–not so much of a leap as some people might think–and at that moment the quality of co-worker conversations plummeted forever. I wouldn’t call my fellow programmers boring. Most of them have a lot of enthusiasm…about programming! It’s not all bad, but I miss the free ranging colloquia we had at that indexing job.

On the balance though, I like the actual work of programming better than I did the indexing, though I suspect that if I had lived in NYC and stayed in publishing, I might have made it as an editor of fiction.

I have to admit, though, the pay at the publishing company was abysmal…something else I try to keep in mind.