The Academy Certificate

A tradition for over 200 years

Please don’t let the recent excitement about the Academy BFA distract you from the one program for which the Academy is most famous—the four-year Certificate. As one of the nation’s oldest traditions in fine art education, the Academy Certificate is the single and premier program of its kind.

In the first two years, Academy students receive a thorough training in traditional and contemporary techniques of painting, drawing, sculpture, and printmaking. Under the mentorship of master artists, students take classes in drawing from the cast collection, life drawing and painting, anatomy, color, still life, figure modeling, perspective, etching, woodcut, and art history. In their second year, students choose to focus study in the majors of drawing, painting, sculpture, or printmaking. Third- and fourth-year students receive private studios while continuing an intensive mentoring relationship with critics chosen from a large faculty of professional working artists, representing a wide range of aesthetic viewpoints. Throughout the program, Certificate students also take several art history courses to complete their fine arts education.

The Certificate program emphasizes excellence in studio art-making skills and abilities, and drawing is a requirement at all levels of the curriculum. All students attend critiques and lectures given by visiting artists and critics, and are in daily contact with the Academy’s outstanding collection of American art. At the conclusion of their studies, students mount a thesis exhibition within the galleries of the Samuel M.V. Hamilton Building.

Contact us for additional information.

Joseph Lozano
— Certificate ’07, MFA ’09