What Can You Do With a Studio Art Degree?

Making the work is only part of building a creative career. You also need opportunities to show it, talk about it, sell it, build a portfolio and discover where your creative strengths could take you.

You don’t have to know yet what kind of creative career you want. At Transylvania, you can start figuring that out before you graduate through internships, juried exhibitions, the Makers Market and funded independent projects. A studio art degree can open paths into fine art, design, education, creative businesses and digital media.

See Where Studio Art Can Lead

There isn’t one way to build a creative career. Transylvania art alumni have taken their work in different directions, from specialized artistic practice to digital creative fields.

Claire Selby became a master goldsmith, jewelry designer and artist in Hanau, Germany. Her path shows how an education grounded in making, experimentation and creative problem-solving can develop into a specialized professional practice.

Kristen Frost works as an independent video game designer in Lexington. Her career reflects the range of directions a studio art background can support as art, design and emerging technologies increasingly overlap.

Other Transylvania art alumni have built careers in painting, ceramics, photography, illustration, graphic and web design, printmaking, tattoo art, higher education and independent creative businesses.

Build Professional Experience Before You Graduate

Your creative career can start taking shape while you’re still a student. Intern, submit your work to an outside juror, sell something you made or pursue funding for an independent project. Each experience gives you another way to learn what it takes to move creative work beyond the classroom.

Internships

Take your creative skills into a professional setting through a for-credit internship. Studio art students have completed internships in graphic design, game design, film production, gallery sales and exhibition preparation.

I came in interested in graphic design, but I’ve also taken computer science, music technology, video production and website design. I’ve used all of those skills in my internship.
— Ellie Thornsbury

Ellie’s internship with Mediocre Creative led to a job with the company after graduation. Other students have also turned internship experiences into longer-term employment.

Exhibit Your Work

A professional artistic practice also means knowing how to select, prepare, submit and present your work.

Each year, Morlan Gallery hosts the Juried Student Art Show. Students submit work for consideration by a guest expert juror from the art and art history field through a process modeled on juried exhibitions in the professional art world.

Selected work is exhibited in Morlan Gallery, and the event includes awards, cash prizes and purchases. You’ll experience a process professional artists use throughout their careers: deciding what to submit, preparing the work and putting it in front of a juror and an audience.

Sell What You Make

Making the work is one skill. Learning how to sell it is another.

At Transylvania’s Makers Market, you can sell artwork and creative products alongside local artists and alumni. Held in collaboration with the Center for Entrepreneurship and Morlan Gallery, the event lets you practice pricing and promoting your work, creating inventory and managing the practical side of selling what you make.

You’ll also work alongside people already putting their creative work into the world, creating natural opportunities to make connections with local artists and alumni.

Fund an Idea

Some ideas need more than studio time. University grants can help you take an independent creative or scholarly project further.

One student received funding to create artwork on-site in Romania — it was later included in an exhibition on campus.

Careers With a Studio Art Degree

Depending on your interests, experience and additional training, career fields related to studio art can include:

You can also build your own path as an independent artist, designer or creative entrepreneur.

Prepare for Graduate Study

If graduate study is part of your plan, your studio art coursework and senior exhibition can help you build the portfolio and body of work you’ll need for applications and advanced study.

Transylvania art and art history alumni have continued their education at institutions including:

• Rochester Institute of Technology
• Savannah College of Art and Design
• School of the Art Institute of Chicago
• Syracuse University
• New York University
• University of Cincinnati
• University of Edinburgh
• University of Michigan

Faculty mentors can help you identify graduate programs that fit the work you want to pursue and prepare for your next step.

Take the Next Step

Where could your work take you? Explore studio art at Transylvania and see how the work you make in college could shape what you do next.