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Program Description

The Master of Fine Arts in New Media Art & Performance is a 60-credit, interdisciplinary, finished, professional degree that trains multi-media directors, designers, choreographers, filmmakers, critics, theorists and composers to build collaborative new works of performance for the stage, screen, web, gallery. Dance, Music, Theater, Motion Picture Capture, Opera, Film, Video, Digital Animation, Computer Graphic design for Stage and Screen, Sound Design, and Choreography for live and digitized bodies allows students to explore their own creative process taking one or more of the following 6 areas of specialty:

Areas of Artistic Specialty

Students can choose 1 or more of 6 Tracks:

  1. Multi-Media Direction
  2. Experimental Imaging
  3. Choreographing Moving Images
  4. Electronic & Live Composition
  5. History & Critical Theory of World Performance
  6. New Media Criticism

Download Admissions Requirements >>

Contacts

Aleskei Stevens
Interim Director, New Media Art Performance Studies
718-488-1000 Ext: 3031 Email:aleskei.stevens@liu.edu

John West
Recruitment Coordinator, 718-780-4314 john.west@liu.edu

Program Details

The Program is divided into three sections – a 36-credit core curriculum, a 12-credit bloc of electives, and a 12-credit thesis/performance project. The core curriculum is comprised of:

  • Creative Studio courses (4) Students Build Individual Projects
  • InterArts seminars (4) Students Build Collaborative Projects
  • Performance History & Theory Courses (3)
  • Urban Artist Internship (1)

All students will be required to participate in an artistic internship. Electives will be offered in the 6 areas of specialization – multimedia direction, experimental imaging and digital design, choreography for screen and stage, electronic composition, performance theory, and new media criticism. Students will be expected to undertake study in at least 2 specialization areas. The final component of the program is the production of a portfolio of written and performed work.

BROOKLYN’S CULTURAL CORRIDOR & AVANT-GARDE PERFORMANCE SITE

Our school is located in a culturally diverse district with a student body of first and second-generation citizens who are multi-lingual. New Media Performance will ask its students to incorporate personal cultural representations, along with that of fellow students, into a full artistic and academic program. For example, a Trinidad student who attends Carnaval may already know a great deal about costuming, stilt-walking, masking. We want to encourage students to explore the richness of their home environments on stage or on screen if this helps in creating an artistic experience of depth and community awareness. But, this, of course, will be up to the student.

BAM stands as a model of NewMedia design and performance. It produces multi-cultural and multi-media theater, opera, and dance companies from around the world. Further, with renowned artists such as Mark Morris joining the Urban Bush Women, Urban Glass, BRIC, and numerous other visual, film and video artists in the surrounding neighborhoods, LIU will benefit from the current trends in performance, critical thinking and programming that permeates art in Brooklyn.

THE FORT GREENE STUDIO PROJECT: T he Community claims the Artist

A vital portion of the NewMedia MFA will be the Fort Greene Studio Project, a directive from the LIU MFA faculty to involve graduate students—performance artists, directors, composers, sculptress, screenwriters, filmmakers, etc.—to share their growing knowledge about their medium and the place of the urban artist within a wider, cultural community. Students will use 3- 6 studio credits over two semesters (which can be separated), travel to various neighborhoods in Brooklyn—to churches, arts schools, theatres, community centers, arts centers, gallery spaces, museums, other artists’ studios—and teach their work. They will meet once a week with a moderating professor and other students whose work has taken them to satellite studios in the Fort Greene area, to discuss theoretical, practical and artist aspects of their personal engagement with the community-based artists. For example, some students may choose to shoot documentaries of, for example, the older people they interview in senior homes. Others, who may be musicians or dancers, may teach drumming and dancing to a group of middle school children or learn folk dance and history from church congregants for use in the creation of their own work. In all cases, students will share something of their artistic experience at LIU with the community and bring back artifacts—pieces of the community in which they are working.

COURSES

  • NMP 501: New Media Performance I
  • NMP 502: Issues & Methodology of New Media Performance
  • NMP 505: Urban Artist Apprenticeship (6)
  • NMP 506: Urban Artist Serving Community (6): 2007-2008 Rockefeller Digital Soundscapes New York State Music Fund Grant
  • NMP 515: Independent Study (3)
  • NMP 516: Independent Study (1)
  • NMP 604: Digital Archetypes (Banks)
  • NMP 605: Inter-Arts Seminar I
  • NMP 606: Creative Studio 2
  • NMP 607: Creative Studio 3: Stage Environments - Dynamic Multimedia Design w/ MAX/MSP/Jitter
  • NMP 608: Creative Studio 4
  • NMP 609: Inter-Arts Seminar II
  • NMP 610: Inter-Arts Seminar III: Directing, Designing & Choreographing New Media Stage Environments
  • NMP 611: Inter-Arts Seminar IV
  • NMP 612: Designing & Choreography the Digital Environment
  • NMP 705: Senior Thesis (Written & Performed: Individual Supervision)
  • NMP 706: New Media Production of Performance & Juried Work (Capstone—Group Supervision)

PERFORMANCE SPACES: Public Installation; Mainstage Theatre; Experimental Stage; Gallery Space; Community Space; Publication Space

Alternative Gallery & Performance Spaces

  • LIU’s entire indoor and outdoor campus
  • Salena Gallery
  • Kumble Foyer Gallery
  • BRIC
  • Paul Robeson
  • Mark Morris Dance Group
  • The Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church
  • D.U.M.B.O.
  • Williambsburg.
  • Red Hook—BWAC

FAQs

  1. Does the university offer housing and housing assistance? The university offers graduate housing just a few blocks from Campus. For more information, please see http://www.brooklyn.liu.edu/housing. Most students who need assistance finding roomates or apartments for off-campus housing use craigslist.org.
  2. Do I need to have an undergraduate degree in media arts or performance? What are the minimum requirements for admissions? You do not need an undergraduate degree in media arts or performance to apply for admissions. The minimum requirements for admissions is an undergraduate degree from an accredited college or university with a minmum 3.0 GPA and a portfolio that demonstrates artistic ability. For more information regarding the portfolio requirement, contact the department recruiter or program director.
  3. I'm not much of a performer but I am intertested in creating media work for the stage. Will I be required to perform? Performance is not required. Students may choose to work in another capacity or create installation pieces.
  4. I want experience teaching at the undergraduate level, is this built into the program? No. Many of our students have been able to get adjunct positions or run workshops in dance, theatre or media arts.
  5. What are the opportunities to present work? The department spronsors fall and spring shows with an array of advertising and support. Students are more than welcome to produce shows at any time but departmental resources are reserved for the fall and spring shows.
  6. What are the costs associated with producing work for the program? The department provides a great deal of support for student productions to keep production costs to an absolute minimum. Students should budget at least $500 a semester for production costs.
  7. I'm worried about the cost of tuition? Are there scholarships? Most graduate students invest in their education by getting an educational loan. The department has a very limited number of competitive Graduate Assistanceships that give tuition assistance. Please contact the program director for more information.
  8. Will I have an opportunity to take undergraduate dance/music/art classes to continue nurtuiring my abilities in these areas? Yes.

Faculty

  • Larry Banks Chair & Associate Professor of Media Arts Filmmaker, Director, Videography, Editing
  • Maya Ciarrocchi Adjunct Associate Professor Projection Design and New Media performance practices
  • Gloria Cooper Associate Professor of Music Vocal Jazz Improvisation & Music History
  • Stuart Fishelson Professor of Media Arts
  • Wally Glickman Professor of Physics, Acting
  • Wendall Harrington Guest Faculty Projection & Scenic Design
  • Kevin Lauth Professor of Media Artts Videography, Editing
  • Marjan Moghaddam Professor of Computer Art, Animation
  • Marina Rosenfeld Guest Digital Performance Composer
  • Aleksei Stevens Adjunct Associate Professor Digital Sound
  • Japhy Weideman Technical Director/ Lighting Designer

Guest Rockefeller & Digital Media Artists & Scholars 2006 - 2008

  • Meredith Monk/The House
  • Theo Bleckmann
  • Katie Geisssinger
  • DJ Spooky
  • Ping Chong
  • Ralph Lemon
  • Raven Chacon
  • Jeffrey Stolet
  • Marina Rosenfeld
  • Blondell Cummings
  • David Lang
  • Phil Kline
  • Reggie Wilson
  • Rennie Harris
  • Claudia Robles
  • Barbara Browning
  • Paul Scolieri
  • Tommy de Frantz
  • Larry Lavender
  • Kim Arrow
  • Sharon Friedler
  • Johannes Birringer

New Media Art & Performance Mission Statement

The mission of the M.F.A. in New Media Art & Performance is to train artists: open-minded, well-versed directors, designers, choreographers, film/video/photo documenters/essayists, critics, and performers whose year-round final projects explore connections between media and art, culture and history. We accept independent, driven students whose interest in in the interface between Live Performance & Digital New Media leads them to work collaboratively with one another while understanding the Theory, Ethnography & History of the mediums they are exploring. New Media students will be directed to

  • Produce semester-by-semester projects that explore connections between culture and history, art and technology, using the meccas of Fort Greene, Red Hook, Dumbo, Williamsburg, Chelsea, Soho, the East Village, as open space laboratories for new ideas.
  • Explore issues of cultural diversity from personal and aesthetic perspectives and to use their own experiences as immigrants or Americans in their work.
  • Perform fieldwork and hold internships at local community centers, churches, arts collectives, and theatres.

Artistic, Pedagogical Partnerships

Brooklyn's Cultural Corridor & Avant-Garde Performance Site

LIU Fort Greene is located in a culturally diverse district with a student body of first and second-generation citizens who are multi-lingual. New Media Performance will ask its students to incorporate personal cultural representations, along with that of fellow students, into a full artistic and academic program. For example, a Trinidad student who attends Carnival may already know a great deal about costuming, stilt-walking, masking. We want to encourage students to explore the richness of their home environments on stage or on screen if this helps in creating an artistic experience of depth and community awareness. But, this, of course, will be up to the student. BAM stands as a model of NewMedia design and performance. It produces multi-cultural and multi-media theater, opera, and dance companies from around the world. Further, with renowned artists such as Mark Morris joining the Urban Bush Women, Urban Glass, BRIC, and numerous other visual, film and video artists in the surrounding neighborhoods, LIU will benefit from the current trends in performance, critical thinking and programming that permeates art in Brooklyn.


Directions to the Brooklyn Campus Long Island University

MFA in New Media Art & Performance Program
1 University Plaza
Brooklyn New York 11201-8423

Web Directions

Subway :

  • 2, 3, 4 or 5 trains to Nevins Street Station
  • B, M, Q, or R trains to DeKalb Avenue Station
  • A, C, or G trains to Hoyt-Schermerhorn Street Station

Train:

The Flatbush Avenue terminal of the Long Island Rail Road is four blocks away.

Automobile:

From Queens Take the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway west to the Tillary Street Exit. Follow Tillary Street to Flatbush Avenue. Make a left onto Flatbush Avenue. The Brooklyn Campus is on the corner of Flatbush and DeKalb Avenues.

From Staten Island or Brooklyn Take the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway east to Cadman Plaza West. Follow Cadman Plaza West to Tillary Street. Turn right on Tillary Street and then right on Flatbush Avenue. The Brooklyn Campus is on the left. Municipal Parking is available on Flatbush Avenue, directly across from the University.

New Media Art & Performance Calendar


NMP Rehearsal Space Studio Calendar