Courses

Course Descriptions

• ARTMD-GH 5001 Graduate Seminar I (4 Credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  This seminar is dedicated to the discussion of theoretical texts to be explored in relation to the student’s developing research-based art practice. Students will be introduced to a diverse range of writers that have informed contemporary art practices, including questions of representation, materiality, memory, our relation to objects and questions posed by writers on the characteristics of our late capitalist condition. What do this mean for art making today? How do artists position themselves and make work in world which increasingly dominated by politics of aesthetics and speed in the consumption of images in which art works require different temporality of contemplation and haptic experiences. Students will be required to critically engage with readings and explore their relevancy to their own art practice, through presentations, weekly journal entries, the development of an annotated bibliography and a final research paper.  Students will have the opportunity to understand concerns and practices of local and regional artists and institutions and how this may inform their own practices and research.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: Yes
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Required
• ARTMD-GH 5002 Graduate Seminar II (4 Credits)

  Typically offered spring semester

  This seminar is dedicated to the artistic discussion and critique of institutions, art markets and the art eco-system. Students will be introduced to a diverse range of theoretical and philosophical positions and approaches by key thinkers from a global perspective. The course focuses on the subject of the art eco-system, curation, pedagogy, markets, labor and economies during which students will gain insights into the context of art practice in the contemporary art world so as to situate their art practice within a global perspective. Students will be required to articulate their ideas and processes developing a robust artistic research agenda which will result in the creation of an annotated bibliography and a research paper in 2nd stage of preparation for thesis exhibition project and paper in the 2nd year. In this course students will be introduced to theoretical debates as well as exploring the global art context within which they will be creating and exhibiting their work.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: Yes
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Required
• ARTMD-GH 5003 Graduate Seminar III (4 Credits)

  Typically offered fall or spring semester

  This course focuses on articulating in-depth and conceptually rigorous research methodologies for the realization of a creative practice. The course will focus on methodologies of art practice research and professional practice scaffolding students skills for the thesis exhibition and project. Students develop the ability to employ advanced critical research methodologies in art practice to produce a major body of work to a standard of academic and professional excellence for their thesis exhibition. Students will test the knowledge and skills, pushing both materials and concepts into new terrains accompanied by in-depth consideration of methods of presentation, spatial context and audience. Through critique sessions, readings, written paper students evolve a synergy between theory and practice and define and articulate in visual and written form their research practice for which is an integral part of their thesis exhibition and paper in the final semester. The course also focuses on the development of a variety of professional development skills to prepare students for careers as art practitioners in the art eco-systems.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Required
• ARTMD-GH 5051 Individual Studio Practice and Critique I (4 Credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  This course focuses on the development of the MFA student’s individual art practice, establishing a general framework for the direction of their work and research, and developing a sustained and imaginative experimental approach. Students will meet regularly with their faculty advisor, providing a platform to present work, discuss the aesthetic, technical, and expressive concepts underlying it, and receive extensive, rigorous feedback. Students will also have opportunities for studio visits with external visitors, including artists, curators, and art historians, and periodically participate in group critiques with their MFA peers. Critiques offer constructive assessment of work-in-progress in relation to contemporary and historical practice, social and cultural issues, technical and formal concerns, and related interdisciplinary interests. Outside of these critiques, students will dedicate the class hours to art making in their studios. Students will develop the ability to analyze, interpret and critically reflect upon their work and others, in order to continually develop ideas and recognize opportunities during the work process. Students will increase their capacity to select and deploy materials, mediums and methods with sophistication and innovation, pushing into new terrains through a sustained ability to critically apply in-depth knowledge gained from a range of sources and contexts.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Required
• ARTMD-GH 5052 Individual Studio Practice and Critique II (4 Credits)

  Typically offered spring semester

  This course focuses on the MFA student’s individual art practice, in which they will test the boundaries of their knowledge and skills, and push both materials and concepts into new terrains. Students will develop their art practice with consideration of methods of presentation, spatial context, and audience in preparation for their mid program review presentation and exhibition. Students will develop the practical and theoretical complexities of their art practice by exploring how their ideas can be communicated through their chosen mediums, applying knowledge gained from a range of sources and contexts. This course is composed of one-on-one studio critiques with NYUAD faculty and visiting artists, as well as external artists and museum and gallery professionals. The class provides a platform for the students to present their work and the aesthetic, technical, and expressive concepts underlying it, and will also include group critiques with their MFA peers. Outside of these critiques, students will dedicate the class hours to art-making in their studios.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: ARTMD-GH 5051

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Required
• ARTMD-GH 5053 Individual Studio Practice and Critique III (4 Credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  This course focuses on the MFA student’s individual art practice, in which they will formulate a thorough and well-developed rationale and articulate in-depth and conceptually rigorous research methodologies for undertaking their studio practice. They will manage and oversee their project from conception to realization, informed by relevant knowledge, and use of appropriate techniques, materials, and forms. Students will work to conceptualize and find innovative solutions for the production and presentation of their work, in preparation for their thesis exhibition. This course is composed of one-on-one weekly studio critiques with visiting artists, scholars, curators, and critics, and dedicated art-making time in the MFA studios. Studio visitors will include arts professionals working in the museum and gallery sector, along with established artists and arts faculty from other UAE institutions and beyond. Critiques offer constructive assessment of the students’ work-in-progress in relation to contemporary and historical practice, social and cultural issues, technical and formal concerns, and related interdisciplinary interests. Students are also required to independently schedule and conduct a minimum of three visits to the studios of professional artists living and working in the UAE. Outside of these individual critiques and external studio visits, students will dedicate the class hours to art making in their studios.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: ARTMD-GH 5052

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Required
• ARTMD-GH 6000 MFA Mid-Program Review (0 Credits)

  Typically offered spring semester

  The Mid-Program Review consists of a presentation of the student’s work, (a verbal and written presentation by the student), and a question and answer session led by the MFA faculty committee. The Mid-Program review is considered a candidacy review, which a student is required to pass in order to progress to the second and final year of the program. The MFA Mid-Program Review is completed in a 40 minute session, conducted with MFA faculty The review consists of a short 15-minute oral presentation by the candidate followed by a question-and-answer session conducted by the faculty. These reviews most commonly take place in the exhibition space of the 1 st Year Exhibition. Work presented in the review should represent ongoing in-depth investigations in the artist’s medium(s). After the reviews are completed, the MFA faculty committee meets to discuss the work and vote on each candidate. This is considered a formal review of any concerns or issues that have arisen over the year. At this time, the committee members discuss the student’s progress and communicate any concerns relating to her/his good standing in the MFA Program.

  Grading: Graduate Abu Dhabi Pass/Fail
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Review/Seminar/Project
• ARTMD-GH 6005 Thesis Project and Exhibition (8 Credits)

  Typically offered spring semester

  During the spring semester of their second year, MFA students will mount a public presentation of artworks, demonstrating the achievements in the student’s area of specialization. The candidate, in consultation with their Graduate Faculty Advisor, is responsible for selecting the content and curating the exhibition. Students will produce an extensive (ca. 5,000-8,000 word) written exposition describing the specific artistic inquiries that generated the body of work. This means offering context about their process and tracing their evolution of thought by critically reflecting on the artists and disciplines that have influenced their practice during their MFA. Critical reflection entails making connections between research and practice. Students should describe concepts and ideas from their academic or field research that they adapt or translate into their work, noting specific formal techniques, uses of materials, and engagements of viewers that convey their artistic inquiry. If other art is a component of research, they should describe how formal elements convey artistic, cultural, social, or thematic inquiries. Most significantly, students should convey a method (i.e., a critical lens onto the artistic inquiry) to their arts practice and foreground how their work contributes to broader debates, not necessarily one limited to art, but at large in the world. They should reflect upon their intuitions in making for how they might be further developed to elicit or evoke particular responses from particular audiences. The paper will explain how their thinking and research helped them with the making. This statement must also include a discussion of the methods, media, and format used. It will also pay attention to the relationship between the student's work to cultural, historical, and social context, as well as other issues (such as social or psychological questions) of relevance. Basically, how will their work be in conversation with what has come before? Finally, the statement should also address the future, with respect to how to sustain oneself as an artist, and what ideas are in place to do exactly that, from the pragmatic (for example, a day job as a painter)  to the idealistic (for example, a five-year towards critical acclaim). With permission, the written exposition could be a hybrid submission, a trans-disciplinary and/or trans-genre work, such as a video essay. The objective remains the same, to use language to get at why the work has been made.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student and enrolled in ARTMD-GH 6050.

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Review/Seminar/Project
• ARTMD 5060 Writing for Artists: The Observer (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall or spring semester

  1] Secrets. Is it possible to have them in the age of street cams, search engines, and smart tech? 2] Consequences. What happens to the creative practitioner in hyper-surveilled environments? 3] Invention/Convention. How does censorship and/or self-censorship affect either in monitored spaces? 4] Finally, Fear. Throughout history, across disciplines, how have artists negotiated their fears? This is a course that will use these four questions as starting points to have conversations about thinking up, making, perhaps even discarding work. We will read, listen to, watch, and be speaking with practitioners who have grappled with variations of these questions with care, vision, and verve. And as we speak as a collective, we will make and share work about the lives of others, and perhaps ourselves, which may hit these registers that we are curious/concerned about. Signed, The Observer.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: None.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Required
• ARTMD-GH 5132 Ethnography and the Arts (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  This course is about ethnographic research that engages art production and art that employs ethnographic methods. It associates theory with practice by adopting a combined seminar/ studio format. Students will be introduced to contemporary practices of ethnographic field design and research to develop their critical and artistic ethnographic research and practice. They will learn about precursors to art/anthropology work in relation to feminist and critical

  interpretive reactions to positivist ethnography. They will study recent collaborations between artists and anthropologists and carry out hands-on experiments in ethnography using a wide variety of media, such as writing, drawing, photography, painting, audio and video recording. They will practice interview techniques and devise performances and participatory works. A series of experiments across diverse media and modalities will be paired with readings and discussions that will examine ideas of “experience” and “truth” as well as introduce students to methodologies for art/ethnographic work. As they develop individually and collaboratively authored works through their ethnographic research, students will examine issues of authority, power and the ethics of diverse modes of engaging collaborators and participants. In their final project they will draw on their research using ethnographic design methods to curate a site-specific exhibition and/or performance on the campus.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio Elective
• ARTMD-GH 5730 Archives Methods and Screens (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  This course focuses on practice-led research and research-led practice as methodologies for thinking about art and media in relation to archives and screens. Its central argument is that making and studying are not separate activities that corrupt one another, but instead entwined and mutually constitutive activities that augment creativity and curiosity. Assignments encourage students to understand differences between making and studying in non-hierarchical and non-sequential ways. By emphasizing feminist, postcolonial, transnational, indigenous, and posthuman approaches, the course shifts attention from dominant modes, such as flat-on-the-screen, time-based commercial films as entertainment to immersive, interactive, locative, auto-generative, mobile, nonlinear, and tactical modes for producing research through arts practice and producing arts practice through research.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio Elective
• ARTMD-GH 5122 Time and Memory (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  This studio-based course explores questions of time and memory in several mediums including photography and video, public art, time-based media, fiber arts, 2D and 3D. The representation of time and memory has been a theme that artists across centuries and cultures have engaged with and continues to be addressed in contemporary art practice, Students explore various questions in relation to time and memory, including collective and personal memory; memory, place, and architecture;  documentation of time; deterioration and decay; archives; and time and process in art making using theoretical texts and examples of artists’ practices to the inform their different projects. Students engage with the approaches, processes and methods in the different mediums to explore aspects of time and memory that are in dialogue with their art practice. Students further develop advanced skills and various techniques enabling them to give form to their research-based art practice. Students advance their ability to place their own work in the context of different advanced processes and conceptual approaches in relation to the subject of the course. The course includes workshops by guest artists.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio Elective
• ARTMD-GH 5120 Repetition, Degeneration and Imprint (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  Repetition, Degeneration, and Imprint is a course designed to provide students with comprehensive understanding of the techniques and processes involved in creating artist books. Students will explore a variety of materials and methods for producing unique, one-of-a-kind books that combine text, image, and form. The course emphasizes hands-on studio work, critical analysis of contemporary artist book practices, and advanced research skills.

  The course promotes a self-motivated studio research course in an open studio environment. In this course, you will have the opportunity to expand, experiment, and build upon your existing 2D skills and knowledge of materials. The program encourages students to cultivate a hybrid methodology among the disciplines of printmaking, papermaking, bookbinding, and letterpress printing — exploring text as well as image, the temporal as well as the spatial, the three-dimensional as well as the two-dimensional and the traditional, as well as the experimental This rigorous course centers upon a tutorial, workshop atmosphere and, is structured to include presentations, discussions, critiques, and studio time.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYU-AD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio Elective
• ARTMD-GH 5133 Walls: Cultural Witness, Social Catalyst (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  Walls are at once a border, a witness, and an archive holding relationships with people, time and culture. Many walls hold significance in the grand narratives of our history. In preserving them nation-states imbue walls with a distinct political charge. What happens when we shift our focus to walls in the margins? Such as everyday walls from our neighborhoods, or walls demolished and forgotten. This course will examine walls from a range of approaches - including the art historical and the anthropological - and sensitize students to the material, political, aesthetic and philosophical resonances that a wall carries. The course will also engage with notions of ‘locality’ and develop pathways towards community engagement. This inquiry will be further informed by contemporary theory, urban art practice and ethnographic engagement. The course will conclude with students employing multi-disciplinary research methodologies towards articulating ‘minor histories’ of their chosen wall from their communities to create an artwork they will produce in the studio using traditional visual media, performance, installation, film, and text.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio Elective
• ARTMD-GH 5112 Teaching, Learning and Pedagogy for the Arts (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  This course is for MFA students interested in teaching as a professional path for the development of their artistic practice. The course is also designed for students who are interested in a TA position during their time at NYUAD, for which it is mandatory to take this course. focuses on four main areas: thinkers on art pedagogy, critique techniques, teaching observation, and professional development. We ask questions about the traditions of teaching studio art practice and what can be learned from these to be applied to interdisciplinary programming in diversity, equity, and inclusion in art-making. The class explores diverse perspectives and actively builds their toolkits of pedagogies, they will use, share, combine, and discuss texts from teachers that made an essential contribution to art education, e.g., Mike Bal, bell hooks, Joseph Albers, and Paulo Freire. The students explore the multiplicity of visions and existing formats of teaching art practice and how to stimulate art-making in a diverse student body. This is a studio course with the emphasis placed on practice.

  Grading: Graduate Abu Dhabi Pass/Fail
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio Elective
• ARTMD-GH 5075 Social and Public Works (4 credits)

  Typically offered fall semester

  Can public works invite us to collectively imagine and potentially build new spaces of togetherness? How can we understand the relationship between ethics and aesthetics in the context of what we call public works? This course explores the social turn in the public art as a discursive field of encounters and synergies, where poetic and imaginary forms of solidarity, empowerment and emancipation can arise.  We will critically analyze contemporary models of socially engaged art in their interrelation with the politics of public space drawing on an extensive program of exhibition visits, guest lectures, screenings and theoretical readings from a wide range of disciplines including art history, critical theory, philosophy, urban and curatorial studies. Students will engage with the work of major artists such as Otobong Nkanga, Michael Rakowitz, Maria Thereza Alves, Trevor Paglen, Emily Jacir, Tintin Wulia, Jennifer Allora & Guillermo Calzadilla, Marwa Arsanios, Hiwa K., Regina Jose Galindo, Postcommodity, Mounira Al Solh, Raqs Media Collective, Studio CAMP, The Otolith Group, Desire Machine Collective. 

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio/Special Topics Electives
• ARTMD-GH 5072 Art Practice in the Anthropocene (4 credits)

  Typically offered spring semester

  We are living in an age where human life acts as an agent of geologic impact. First coined “the anthropocene” by Paul J Crutzen (2000), the term has caught on swiftly, much like the rapid pace characterizing this epoch. From population booms to accelerated ecological collapse, from rising sea waters and temperatures to mass extinctions, the anthropocene’s many crises demand our attention—and our scholarship, creativity, and action. The course investigates the anthropocene from diverse perspectives and studies the art practices that exemplify them (see weekly subheadings). Ultimately, students will create research-based projects that contribute to artistic discourse about the unique challenges and potentials of our time.

  Grading: Grad Abu Dhabi Graded
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student.  

  • Bulletin Categories: Art Media MFA: Studio  Electives
• ARTMD-GH 6050 MFA Thesis Defense

  Typically offered occasionally

  The MFA Thesis experience will culminate with a 90-minute oral defense in the gallery before a faculty panel. The Oral Examination is conducted while the candidate's exhibition is hanging. This examination has three purposes: one, to assess the extent to which technical and expressive objectives of graduate study have been met; two, to assess the candidate's ability to communicate and explore the means and meanings of the graduate exhibition in light of aesthetic goals, expressive intent and contemporary art concepts; and three, to engage in positive critical dialogue about the presented work.

  Grading: Graduate Abu Dhabi Pass/Fail
  Repeatable for additional credit: No
  Prerequisites: Declared NYUAD Art & Media MFA student and enrolled in ARTMD-GH 6005.

  • Bulletin Categories: Art & Media MFA: Review/Seminar/Project