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Program Highlights

Art Bachelor’s Degree Program Highlights

As a visual arts major in McNeese’s NASAD-accredited Bachelor of Arts degree program in visual arts, you will explore your talents and potential as a creative artist or future art educator within a liberal arts framework. While developing your technical skills, you’ll also explore how the history of art has evolved in the context of contemporary culture.

Visual arts degree program options

Choose from studio concentrations in ceramics, drawing, graphic design, photography, painting or printmaking, with the option to add a secondary concentration in art education grades K–12 to earn your teaching certification. Whichever path you choose, the visual arts undergraduate degree culminates in a senior portfolio exhibition, and you’ll graduate with a high level of accomplishment in current media-specific concepts, techniques, materials, software and equipment.

At a Glance

Degree Type: Bachelor of Arts (B.A.)

Program Length: 4 years (120 credit hours)

Availability: In person

Catalog Overview
Program overview

Explore More for Art Majors

Make McNeese your top choice for an art bachelor’s degree, and you’ll benefit from a breadth of opportunities and experiences such as these.

Financial aid and scholarships:

In addition to affordable tuition, competitive scholarships are available for students majoring in art. Learn more from the Office of Financial Aid.

Studio space:

In the Department of Visual Arts’ media-specific studio labs, you’ll gain hands-on experience with world-class equipment and facilities while learning about the study and production of visual art.

Applied learning:

At McNeese, you’ll have opportunities for immersive learning through internships in professional settings in the community and study abroad programs, which expand your cultural understanding of the visual arts in a global context. Students interested in pursuing teaching certification will also have the chance to observe classrooms at local schools and participate in student teaching.

Program faculty:

Highly skilled and knowledgeable in a wide range of media forms, faculty and studio instructors provide personal attention to guide you in developing your own style in the craft of your choice. Nationally recognized for their research, faculty are active in their own fields of artistic production and have works featured in regional, national and international exhibitions.

Visiting artists, exhibitions and workshops:

Work side-by-side with a variety of professional artists who visit campus each term to conduct lectures, workshops and exhibitions. The Abercrombie and Grand galleries provide year-round exhibition spaces.

Excellence with a personal touch:

With small class sizes, each student receives individual guidance and direction. The department also maintains close, cooperative relationships with alumni and members of the local community, providing additional opportunities for partnerships, networking and resources for art majors during and beyond graduation.

Learn More

Art Bachelor’s Degree Program Concentrations

Ceramics

With a concentration in ceramics, you’ll investigate the full range of functional and sculptural ceramic production methods and techniques, clay and glaze formulation and kiln firing methodology. Emphasis is placed on historical and contemporary concepts in ceramics to help you develop your own personal voice within the medium.

Ceramics
Drawing

Explore representational and innovative imagery with a concentration in drawing. You’ll learn the handling of various tools, materials and techniques in the rendering of still life, landscape and the figure, experiment with areas such as book structures and papermaking and study historical and contemporary approaches to drawing.

Drawing
Graphic Design

A concentration in graphic design will develop your ability to communicate ideas that inspire, inform and captivate consumers through visual elements, typography and graphics. You will learn to apply knowledge, research and problem-solving skills to computer-generated or hand-drawn visual concept designs that meet marketing needs, including logos, posters, annual reports, magazines, packaging and other delivery methods. Course content options also include illustration, digital and emerging media and screen printing.

Graphic Design
Painting

Develop your understanding of design, color, composition and the conceptual aspects of painting with a concentration in painting. With this program, you will become familiar with contemporary developments and historical traditions in painting. Through the creation of a series of works, you will also develop your technical skills and your unique artistic voice in the medium.

Painting
Photography

Through the photography concentration, you'll learn the tools, techniques, processes and technologies in digital, traditional silver darkroom and alternative process photography. Course work focuses on the formal and conceptual development of imagery, informed by the history and critical theory of the photograph.

Photography
Printmaking

A concentration in printmaking will build your knowledge and skills in the traditional and alternative print processes of monotype, relief, silkscreen, intaglio and lithography. You will learn how to develop ideas from imagery to finished print editions, as well as other concepts in printmaking, including contemporary and historical theories.

Printmaking
Careers and Opportunities

What Can You Do with an Art Degree?

Majoring in art at McNeese is a great way to develop your talent and potential as a creative artist or future art educator within a liberal arts framework, as well as prepare for graduate art school programs across the country.

Graduate Schools or Programs

  • Master of Arts in Visual Arts
  • Master of Fine Arts in Visual Arts

Potential Job Titles or Employers

  • Art and Creative Agencies
  • Art Gallery Assistant
  • Craft and Fine Artists
  • Community Arts Organizer
  • Freelance Photographer
  • Graphic Artist
  • K-12 Arts Educator
  • Muralist
  • Production Artist
  • Studio Artist
  • Screen Printer

High School Portfolio Day

Each year, high school juniors and seniors, as well as parents and teachers, from Southwest Louisiana, Southeast Texas and across the country are invited to campus for a department tour and portfolio review. After the event, merit-based Distinguished Achievement Awards in Art, ranging in value up to $500, are given to select seniors who are already admitted as visual arts majors to McNeese.

Visual Arts Programming

The Department of Visual Arts presents annual and special events throughout the academic year that are open and free to all, including visiting artist lectures, workshops and gallery exhibitions.

Student Art Association

Participate in social and artistic events on campus such as the Annual Holiday Art Sale and Gumbowl Fundraiser, which raise money to send undergraduate students to national conferences and events.

Art

Programs Related to the Bachelor’s in Art

Not sure if the art bachelor’s program is right for you? Check out these other undergraduate degree programs at McNeese and talk about your options with a recruiter.

Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education

Bachelor of Arts in English

Bachelor of Science in Engineering

Bachelor of Science in Computer Science

Bachelor of Science in Marketing

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Program Contact

Lynn Reynolds - Department Head
337-475-5060

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