boston: there and back again

after a five day whirlwind in boston i have returned inspired, refreshed, optimistic, and educated.

aside from a lovely host and lovely city, it was great to check out the museum school. i was supposed to arrive at 8:30 in the morning at the mission hill building that housed the grad studios and some offices. my interview was at 9 so i did not have a lot of time to check out many things, but the grad students had covered the walls of the main area with a lot of current work so it was good to get a feeling for the types of art that was being created.

at 9 i was walked to a conference room where i met with my interview committee. it consisted of two faculty (photo & film) and one current graduate student (painting among other endeavors). to my surprise only one of the faculty had seen my application so we proceeded to go through my projected slides as i explained the two bodies of work as well as my inspiration and sneaking in some commentary on my interest in the museum school's program. the conversation was laid back, fluid, and surprisingly friendly. more informal conversation than interview, i tried my best to speak clearly and with authority. there were a lot of questions being asked back and forth in relationship to different types of grant opportunities at the museum school, the critique process, and mostly the interdisciplinary nature of the program. the student that was in the interview with me was trained as a formal painter, but was recently reaching out and working in photo. when the slide show ended i was told that i had already covered most of the questions they wanted to ask, which i think was a good thing. we continued discussion about my interest in the museum school as well as the desire to study at the graduate level in general. the interview ended with them asking me if i had any questions for them. i was not as prepared for this question as the others so unfortunately i could only come up with some pretty dumb questions that i could have found the answers for on the website or in other literature, but i did probe about the opportunity in stepping outside of the art community and the desire to have a discussion with non-art faculty at other institutions. i think the faculty were really supportive of this idea and told me about how there is plenty of opportunity to either take courses at a variety of other institutions within the boston area or at least meet up with other faculty for studio visits etc. the friendly conversation ended and i said my thank yous and goodbyes and wished them luck with the following applicants.

returning to the main room i realized that i had just spent the entirety of my energy from 3 hours of sleep the night before. i was a zombie during the following events including checking out the museum of fine arts, touring the school/facilities, seeing two galleries in the boston area featuring a current thesis show and another of students work completed on a residency in Alaska, as well as a scenic tour of boston via bus. around five i could not keep my eyes open, but there was a drink/snack reception back in the main building with current faculty, students, applicants, and recently graduated alums. everyone was extremely nice and it was very interesting to see where people were working, what they were doing, and their thoughts on boston and the program. one intriguing observation was the amazing number of international students and applicants. of around 80 applicants asked to interview for around 25 spots, i interacted with a small small amount, yet discovered people from croatia, angola, thailand, hungary, colombia, and india. i think i came across two other west coasters.

in summary the museum school is in essence the antithesis of what i thought mfa programs were. its difficult not to imagine those cold, eastern schools that push traditional ways of art making and a critique environment that spawns the occasional crier. as i realized this is simply not the case. the museum school's program is about as free-form as you can get. whereas most programs have discipline specific programs i.e. 7 photo, 7 painting, 7 graphic design etc., the museum school admits about 25 students per year across all discplines. i have more research to do on actual class structure, but essentially you are free to do/make what you want as long as you can argue its validity. further, the school operates within a consortion of several other schools where you can cross register to take classes. opportunities range from enrolling at berklee college of music to tufts to occasionally teaming up with faculty in the MIT media lab. it is sort of scary to have such free reign, but at the same time with discipline and a willingness to collaborate and experiment, i think the museum school is validly capable of producing amazing graduates making amazing work.

the following day my host, liz and i were enjoying a panoramic view several stories up from her brothers roofdeck in the historic part of boston when i got a call letting me know i had been accepted to the program. i was a little blown away at the speed of it all, but nonetheless am extremely happy. i am still waiting to hear from several schools, but it would be incredible to enroll at the museum school next year. i will say it definitely paid off to be over prepared and it is unfortunate that so many schools do not offer interviews at all - i suppose because of the close knit, family-like nature of the grad program it makes sense why interviews are so important.

i hope you all found this informative about the interview process as well as what the museum school is all about - if i do end up there next year, we will all be getting an up close and personal view of the program thats for sure.