Art

Castleton University offers a bachelor’s degree in Art that nurtures your natural curiosity and inspires a fascination with discovery.

You will gain practical skills that are crucial in today’s complex world and learn the language of art and design to cultivate your creativity. 

Through studio experiments, you will learn to sharpen your senses of perception. Creating artwork means distilling your observations, ideas, and dreams into a physical form. Along the way, the materials, technologies, and methods you use will challenge you to make complex decisions and come up with original solutions.

As a Castleton art student, you will gain the insight and self-confidence to describe your own place in the contemporary world, culminating with a senior show.

Highlights of the Art Program

• The Art Department offers many travel opportunities to major art centers on the East Coast. Additionally, studying abroad allows you to experience art from other countries and cultures.
• Concentrations in Art Education, Art History, Photography, and Studio Art.
• Understanding today’s visual culture is essential to designing for the future. By investigating art of the past and present, you will gain an understanding of how people throughout history and across cultures have created a visual record of their own societies.
• An excellent student-to-faculty ratio allows for a great deal of one-on-one instruction.

Internship Opportunities in Art

Students are encouraged to pursue internships while completing their Art degree at Castleton.

Castleton students have been awarded internships in the following work settings, as well as opportunities to work alongside nationally recognized artists living in the area.

• Art Organizations
• Public Relation Firms
• Graphic Design Firms
• Chaffee Art Gallery
• Bank Gallery
• Gallery in the Woods
• Glen Campbell Foundry
• Carving Studio & Sculpture Center

Beyond the Art Studio

The proximity of Castleton University to major art centers, such as Boston, Montreal, and New York City makes it easy to gain firsthand knowledge of original, historic, and contemporary works of art.

There are also multiple museums and galleries, such as Hood Museum, Williams College Museum, Clark Museum, Mass MOCA, Middlebury College Museum, and Fleming Museum, which are all within easy reach of the campus.

In nearby Rutland, The Castleton University Bank Gallery exhibits faculty and student shows and showcases regional and national artists. The Christine Price Gallery presents the work of both professional and student artists.

The student run Art Club sponsors visiting artists, film series, studio visits, collaborative projects, and trips.

Art Program Facilities

The creative epicenter of Castleton is the Fine Arts Center on the main campus. The Art Department shares this dynamic space with the Theater Arts Department and Music Department.

The Art Department has five major studio workspaces in the Fine Arts Center:

• Printmaking Studio
• Painting Studio
• Sculpture/Ceramics Studio
• Drawing/Multi-purpose Studio Space
• Photography Darkroom

Additionally, Wooldridge House holds the woodshop, welding area, carving benches, outdoor space for sculptural installations, and upstairs studio space for art majors. Students also have access to a state-of-the-art computer lab for graphic design and digital photography.