About the Department

A Wide Range of Classes

The Studio Art department offers a variety of classes in both artistic style and content which emphasize strong skill and conceptual development. This range can be seen in faculty work and student work. The classes offered include a variety of approaches to drawing, painting, photography, printmaking, sculpture, digital imaging, video, and installation art.

Low Student-Faculty Ratio

We have six faculty members in the studio area (and four in art history). For the number of students on campus, this means beginning studio classes usually have 15-24 students, intermediate classes are 12-15 and advanced classes have no more than 10 students in them.

Professional Faculty

All are actively-exhibiting artists who have the professional experience to help students understand the larger culture and art world. The examples on our website are just the tip of the iceberg of work they have produced.

Excellent Students

Our students have curiosity and intelligence fueled by their liberal arts background. They bring all this to the discipline of expressive visual and kinesthetic processing producing work that is full of variety and depth.

Good Facilities

The college offers a wide array of facilities to accomodate every artistic medium, and new facilities are still being added to suit the needs and talents of our art students. Facilities in current use include a new state-of-the-art digital imaging classroom and drawing and painting studios in Bexley Hall, a historic building at Kenyon. Kenyon also maintains a well-equipped sculpture shop with wood, metal, clay and plaster capabilities and a large photo and printmaking area in the Mayer Art Center. All of these studios are accessible by art students. In addition, a craft center run by the Student Affairs Center with facilities for weaving, stained glass, ceramics, photography, and woodworking sits next to the art barn and serves the entire student population with weekly (non-accredited) classes.

Space for Non-Majors in Classes

You certainly don't have to be a major to get into art classes. The true liberal arts nature of Kenyon is at its best when those in creative writing, science, music, or other disciplines connect in an art class.

Senior Studios

If you choose to major in Studio Art you will have a semi-private studio in your senior year to help you concentrate on your projects. This is unusual in an undergraduate liberal arts college.

Advanced Studio Seminar

All senior majors work on individual projects in whatever media they choose for a full year and learn to critique across media. This seminar also encourages an intellectual understanding of one's work in relationship to the wider contemporary art world.

Senior Shows

As a senior major, you will have a focused, small group show with a body of cohesive work that you will present to the campus. A short written and oral component add to the strength of this senior cumulative experience that our majors applaud as the most important event of their art education here. We consider it your first professional exhibition. Many similar schools have a large group show, or a less thematically focused show, without the writing and speaking requirement.