Visual & Performing Arts Major

Visual & Performing Arts Major

IN THIS SECTION

Pursue your passion and prepare for a career in the arts.

The Visual and Performing Arts Major, one of the few interdisciplinary arts majors in the country, will give you a strong foundation in visual art, music, and theatre in addition to an understanding of how one art form can inform the others. You will study art history and design fundamentals, music history and aural skills, and script analysis and acting, and you will see what these artforms have in common and how they are performed and exhibited in the real world. Your core courses will help you develop your critical thinking skills and will prepare you to tackle your senior project. With this major, you have the flexibility to receive advising and get hands-on experience in the art form that most excites you.

WHAT YOU WILL DO

  • Get broad knowledge in art, music, and theatre
  • Complete coursework in the production, performance, critical study of creative work, or exhibits of your choice
  • Craft the major to fit your areas of interest
  • Complete a capstone / senior thesis project

Concentration in Visual and Performing Arts

Explore sample courses in this program.

AR-118 Global Art History

Surveys the outstanding visual art from all cultures beginning in the prehistoric era to the late 19th century.
3 credits

AR-123 Design Fundamentals

Design Fundamentals is a course combining 2 and 3 dimensional design. In this course students explore composition, space, and color along with planes, volumes, and environments. A variety of materials are used to create on surfaces and in actual space. Many projects are grounded in aspects of mathematical and geometrical systems, e.g., grids, tiling, Fibonacci series, fractals, and regular solids.
3 credits

MU-101 Fundamentals of Music and Aural Skills

An introduction to reading and writing conventional music notation, the fundamentals of music theory, and basic aural skills. Emphasis is placed on intervals, scales, chords, rhythmic values, sight-singing, melodic dictation, and aural recognition of intervals and chords.
3 credits

MU-280 History of Music

A general survey of western art music covering the historical periods of the medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and 20th century.
3 credits

TH-126 Script Analysis

Script analysis for theatre artists. How to take a script from initial reading to production.
3 credits

TH-145 Acting I

Introductory acting theory and practice. Students present brief monologues and scenes in class.
3 credits

VP-155 First Year Practicum

Students put into practice interdisciplinary concepts, ideas, and techniques at an experiential level.
1 credit

VP-200 Critical Thinking in the Arts

The experience of art, music, and theatre to develop individual critical thinking in the similarities and differences among the arts.
3 credits

VP-364 Interdisciplinary Arts Theory

An exploration of interdisciplinary art theory drawing on theories and critical writings from art, music, and theatre from a variety of historical periods.
3 credits

VP-365 Interdisciplinary Arts Practice

Examines examples of contemporary modes of interdisciplinary works of music, theatre, and visual art with the goal of developing an individual, creative aesthetic.
3 credits