New York Studio Program

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The New York Studio Program (NYSP) is a project of the Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design (AICAD). It is a thirteen-credit program for undergraduate art and design students in New York City, a model of art education that combines learning with location as an important ingredient, and is built on diversity, self-motivation, and discourse.

[edit] History

The New York Studio Program, or NYSP, was founded in 1985 in the Tribeca artist neighborhood in lower Manhattan as an inspired initiative of Jeff Nesin, then an administrator and faculty at the School of Visual Arts, now the president of Memphis College of Art and the chair of the New York Studio Program Committee of AICAD. From 1985 to 1992 the NYSP was administered independently as an AICAD program with the participation of eight art and design schools at first then eventually as many as 12. In Fall 1992 Parsons the New School for Design, began to administer the program for the 35 affiliated AICAD schools. In the summer of 2007 the NYSP moved to new facilities in the vibrant DUMBO riverside cultural district of Brooklyn.

The director, John Tomlinson, with 20 years experience as an instructor of drawing in the Parsons the New School for Design Fine Arts Department, has been shaping the program since 1992 into a successful experience for the 20 students who come from one of 36 independent schools of art and design in the United States and 4 in Canada to experience a semester of living/studying in New York. Several of the students come to work as interns in design, photography, and publication.

The loft style facility includes individual art studios, a seminar room, a wood shop, a computer room, and a kitchen. Students find their own living accommodations. Numerous art events taking place in the city are posted so that students new to New York can take advantage of them. The `24/7' environment of New York City becomes an extension of the studio. The emphasis is on independent studio work, critique sessions with art faculty and seminars with critics, and weekly visiting artists who talk about their own work and critique the students. The four faculty members consist of two art critic/writers and two artists, with a man and woman in each group. There is a studio manager for the facility as well who works with the director and the students. The students are partners in this experience in that they decide on the work they make, share in the daily use and care of the space, and learn about each other and how to live as an artist in New York City.

The semester ends with a one-night exhibition of their work and a closing celebration with music and refreshments, attended by a large public consisting of family and the friends they made during the semester, artists, critics, collectors, and former alumni of the program. The students decide on a show title, design the exhibition and announcement card, and install the work in the show, facilitated by the director and the studio manager.

The New York Studio Program is a hybrid of structure and flexibility, which results in a meaningful experience and bonding within a diverse community of young artists. The contact with their peers and other artists who are active professionally creates a community that is location-based as well as informational. The New York Studio Program is a transitional space for a community of peers that provides both support and the taste of independent living as artists in the world beyond academia. The work in the exhibition has a freshness and authenticity that reflects this formula of challenge and support. Although the medium, style, and content of the work is individual, the show as a whole is an important indicator of how young artists are experiencing the world as expressed in their artwork.