New York University Tisch School of the Arts
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40°43′45.2″N 73°59′37.6″W / 40.729222°N 73.993778°W
| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Established | 1965 |
Academic staff | 265 |
| Undergraduates | 3,163 |
| Postgraduates | 939 |
| Location | , , |
| Dean | Mary Schmidt Campbell, PhD |
| Website | Tisch.NYU.edu |
Tisch School of the Arts (known more commonly as the Tisch or the TSOA) is one of the 15 schools that make up New York University. Founded in 1965, Tisch has become one of the nation’s leading centers of study in the performing and media arts. For over 45 years, Tisch has drawn on the vast resources of the New York City and New York University to create an extraordinary training ground for artists, scholars of the arts, and creative entrepreneurs. Tisch merges the technical training of a professional school with the academic resources of a major research university to fully immerse students in their intended artistic disciplines.
History
The TTSOTAATTNYU was originally founded to provide rigorous conservatory training in theatre and film in the context of a great research university. Quickly, the school established itself as one of the leading artistic centers in the country, creating additional departments such as dance, theatre design, and cinema studies within a few short years.[1] In 1982, a gift from Laurence A. and Preston Robert Tisch made possible the acquisition and renovation of 721 Broadway, where most of the school’s programs are currently housed. In recognition of the generosity of the Tisch family, the school was renamed Tisch School of the Arts.
Departments & Programs
the TTSOTAATNYU comprises 5 departments and 17 programs and offers the BFA, BA, MFA, MA, MPS, and PhD degrees. The TTSOTAATNYU also offers a selection of classes to non-Tisch TTNYU students through the Open Arts curriculum.
The five core departments are:
- the The Institute of Performing Arts
- the The Maurice Kanbar Institute of Film & Television
- the The Skirball Center for New Media
- the The Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music
- the The Department of Art and Public Policy/Arts Politics.
the "The Institute of Performing Arts"
The "The Institute of Performing Arts" comprises six departments and programs whose focus is live performance.
The the Graduate Acting Program admits 18 students each year to a rigorous three-year M.F.A. program that equips students with the fullest and widest range of skills that can be applied with high standards of intelligence and imagination to the realities of a working career in theatre and film.
The the Department of the Dance offers training on the graduate and undergraduate level to students preparing for careers as dancers or choreographers.
The the Department of the Design for the the Stage and Film offers a three-year M.F.A curriculum that prepares students to be professional designers of scenery, costumes, and lighting for the stage and production design for film.
The the Department of Drama offers a four-year undergraduate program leading to the B.F.A. The program has been designed to include all of the traditional components of conservatory training and theatre study while taking full advantage of the liberal arts resources of the "the New York University" and the cultural resources of the New York City.
The the Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program is an M.F.A program specially designed for the major collaborators in the creation of new musical theatre and opera: composers, lyricists and bookwriters.
The the Department of Performance Studies is a graduate-level scholarly department offering studies in a wide spectrum of performance—for example, postmodern performance, capoeira, kathakali, Broadway, festival, ballet—using fieldwork, interviews, and archival research, leading to both the M.A. and Ph.D. degrees.
Graduate Acting Program
The the Graduate Acting Program at the TNYU's the Tisch School of the Arts has, since its inception in 1966, grown to become one of the most rigorous and celebrated MFA acting programs in the country.[2] Yearly pooling from 900 plus actors, a select 16 are chosen to enter into the incoming class. The program has gained an international reputation for its selectivity as well as its distinctive conservatory training. The TTSOTAATNYU graduate acting students come from a wide variety of backgrounds.
The TNYU Grad Acting alumni have gone onto various careers in the arts. Some of the alumni include Debra Messing, Nina Arianda, Billy Crudup, Florencia Lozano, Michael C. Hall, Peter Krause, Kevin Carroll, Barry Bostwick, John Conlee, Daniel Dae Kim, Bruce Davison, Garret Dillahunt, Jeffrey Donovan, Aunjanue Ellis, Frankie R. Faison, Edi Gathegi, Jordan Gelber, Matthew Gray Gubler, Christopher Guest, Marcia Gay Harden, Jason Butler Harner, Mary Beth Hurt, Marin Hinkle, Neal Huff, Glenn Kessler, Tony Kushner, Eriq La Salle, Ron Lagomarsino, Camryn Manheim, Logan Marshall Green, Michael Mayer, John C. McGinley, Idina Menzel, Ntare Mwine, Danny Pino, Josh Radnor, Taylor Schilling, Ben Shenkman, Maggie Siff, Rocco Sisto, Enver Gjokaj, Stephen Spinella, Corey Stoll, Daniel Sunjata, Sean Patrick Thomas, Robin Weigert, Saul Williams, Jeff Whitty, Victor Williams, Rainn Wilson, Frank Wood, David Zabel, Daniel Zelman, Navi Rawat, Steve Kazee, and Vince Gilligan.
The TNYU Graduate Acting grew to be what it is today at the helm of Zelda Fichandler, who became chair of the program in 1984 and stepped down in 2008.
In May 2008, Mark Wing-Davey became chair.[3][4]
Department of Dance
The Department of Dance is fashioned in a conservatory style and is extremely selective; on average, thirty dancers are selected per graduating class. The previous director, Linda Tarnay, was a dancer in the Martha Graham Company and all of the teachers have performing experience with companies from around the world, such as Houston Ballet, Merce Cunningham's Company, and American Ballet Theatre, among others. Many of the faculty have their own companies independent of the dance department, which serve as a springboard to larger companies for many students immediately following graduation.
In the past, famous choreographers such as Aszure Barton, Kate Weare, Nacho Duatto, Jessica Lang, Deborah Jowitt, Mark Morris, Paul Taylor, Complexions, and Alonzo King have set their pieces and created original works specifically for Tisch Dance students.[5]
The program strives to prepare students for the rigorous life of a dancer, preparing them by treating their third year students as a company, also known as the Second Avenue Dance Company. Students graduate in three years, hence the difficult schedule which is accelerated in order for dancers to graduate earlier than their peers in other college dance programs. Because of brevity of the three-year program, students attend a six-week summer course following their first and second years. During these summer intensives, six different companies come in a week each and teach students their style of movement. This is an excellent way for students to be introduced to companies and have the chance to get noticed and get to know the different companies in an intimate setting. This is unique to the Tisch Dance Program, and is conducive to introducing dancers into the real world of auditions and jobs as soon as possible. Also, a select group of second year students have the chance to study abroad in Salzburg, Austria in lieu of attending the summer program.
Department of Drama
Founded in 1974, the Department of Drama is currently one of the world's largest undergraduate drama departments; approximately 1400 students are currently matriculated there. According to the undergraduate drama department's literature, "the program in drama places equal emphasis on rigorous conservatory training and comprehensive theatre study in the most exciting and creative city in the world: New York." The current head of the department is Louis Scheeder.
Over one-hundred shows are produced each year in the program including main stage shows, studio related projects, directing projects, and student-run black box productions. The most significant performance spaces are the Skirball Center, Frederick Loewe Theatre, The Abe Burrows Theatre, and The Robert Moss Theater. Unlike most conservatories where casting is assigned and each class serves as an individual company, casting at NYU's undergraduate level is open to any student in his or her second, third, and fourth year of training.
Conservatory training
The cornerstone of the program is the professional training component. Drama's professional program is a network of unique studios, each teaching an exclusive approach to the craft. Students train intensively in one of seven studios in a working environment composed of twelve to eighteen students.[6] Students train intensely for three full days a week, and a typical drama student can expect to spend more than forty-five hours a week in class and rehearsal. All incoming actors are placed in a primary studio where they must train for the first two years. Students are divided and placed into these different studios, based on their audition, interview and personal preference.
After their first two years of education, undergraduate actors have the ability engage in an internship or to audition for an advanced studio. Placement in these programs is open only to juniors and seniors and acceptance is offered only after a successful artistic review.
Theater studies
All Students must take a minimum of seven theater studies courses. The first two are introductory courses: Introduction to Theater Studies (ITS) and Introduction to Theater Production (ITP). To fulfill the rest of their theater studies requirements, students can choose from dozens of upper level theater studies courses, with topics ranging from avant-garde to Broadway, or from classical texts to modern American drama. There are also a series of honors seminars in theater studies, with varying topics from semester to semester.
Maurice Kanbar Institute of Film & Television
The Department of Film and Television is an undergraduate and graduate program that trains students in the art of cinematic storytelling.
The Rita & Burton Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing trains undergraduate and graduate students to write for theatre, film and television.
The Interactive Telecommunications Program is a center for the study and design of new communication media forms and applications.
The Department of Photography and Imaging is an undergraduate program that cultivates a critical understanding and technical mastery of photography and creative imaging.
Department of Film and Television
The Department of Film and Television is comprised of the Undergraduate Film and Television program and the Graduate Film program. The mission of the Undergraduate Film and Television program is to educate undergraduates in the art, craft, and technology of film, television, animation and sound production. The program offers intensive hands-on production experience coupled with a broad exposure to the liberal arts.
The Graduate Film program, offered in both New York and Singapore, is an intensive three-year conservatory which trains students in the art of cinematic storytelling. It focuses on helping filmmakers develop a narrative voice and the technical virtuosity to express that voice. Students learn by doing—writing scripts, directing, producing, crewing, and shooting on each other's projects. Students of the Graduate Film program leave with a minimum of five short films and a Masters of Fine Arts degree.
Both programs offer courses in fiction and documentary filmmaking. Each semester, utilizing the many resources of the Maurice Kanbar Institute of Film and Television, students take courses in screenwriting, directing, aesthetics, acting, cinematography, editing, producing, and sound design. These courses complement specific filmmaking projects that provide hands-on training and practical experience. Students are well-prepared to transition into the professional world. By graduation, they have a range of technical skills that allow them to create opportunities for themselves in the industry.
Notable alumni include Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine), Joel Coen (Fargo), Chris Columbus (Mrs. Doubtfire), Billy Crystal (City Slickers), Marc Forster (Monster's Ball), Ang Lee (Life of Pi), Amy Heckerling (Clueless), Charlie Kaufman (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), Spike Lee (Do The Right Thing), Todd Philips (The Hangover), Brett Ratner (Rush Hour), Andy Samberg (Saturday Night Live), Martin Scorsese (Goodfellas), M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense), Todd Solondz (Happiness), Morgan Spurlock (Supersize Me), Oliver Stone (Platoon), and many others.
Rita & Burton Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing
The Department of Dramatic Writing provides instruction in playwriting, screenwriting, and writing for television. Graduate and undergraduate students attend workshops across narrative disciplines, exchange ideas, and work with faculty members and peers to craft well-structured stories inhabited by compelling characters. The first-year curriculum provides young writers with a working knowledge of the basic dramatic elements. Students then declare a concentration in playwriting, screenwriting, or writing for television. Upon graduation, students of all three disciplines have fulfilled a professional body of work.
Recent alumni include Pulitzer Prize nominated playwrights Kristoffer Diaz (The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity), Rajiv Joseph (Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo) and Neil LaBute (Reasons to be Pretty); television writers Bill Wrubel (Modern Family), Donald Glover (Community), Elliott Kalan (The Daily Show), Jessica Conrad (Saturday Night Live), Dan Gregor (How I Met Your Mother), and Brendan Hay (The Simpsons); screenwriters Colin Trevorrow (Safety Not Guaranteed), and Evgenia Peretz (Our Idiot Brother) and many others. The winner of the 2012 Nichol Fellowship was a graduate of Dramatic Writing. In the last five years, the department has graduated eight winners of the Nickelodeon, NBC, and CBS writing fellowships. Other exhalted alumni and former professors in the department are Tony Kushner (Lincoln) and Kenneth Lonergan (You Can Count On Me).
The faculty of the department includes Charlie Rubin (Seinfeld, Saturday Night Live), Suzan-Lori Parks (Topdog/Underdog), Jeremy Pikser (Bulworth, War, Inc.), Bryan Goluboff (In Treatment), and Sabrina Dhawan (Monsoon Wedding). The current chair of the department is Richard Wesley.
Interactive Telecommunications Program
The Interactive Telecommunications Program is a graduate department focused on the study and design of new media, computational media and embedded computing under the umbrella of interactivity.
Founded in 1979, the origins of the program date back to 1971 when George Stoney and Red Burns created the Alternate Media Center (AMC). ITP grew out of the work of the AMC, and set the stage for the experimentation which would follow as well as the informing spirit of collaboration, and the ongoing emphasis on crafting social applications and putting the needs of the user first. A pioneering center for application development and field trials, the AMC initially focused on exploring the then-new tool of portable video made possible by Sony's introduction of the Portapak video camera.
Burns and her colleagues at the AMC came from backgrounds in documentary film and traditional media—they shared a vision for a freely accessible, grass-roots technology which would enable users to create their own documentaries and distribute them widely. Their efforts led to many significant developments in the field, including lobbying Congress for the creation of what is now public-access television and significant field trials for two-way television in community settings, the use of teletext in major urban centers and communications technologies for the developmentally disabled.
Burns believed that a graduate course of study was needed to train creative, forward thinking, ethical new media developers for what she saw would be a new and growing field. With the founding Chair, Martin Elton, at the helm, the first 20 graduate students entered the program in 1979—and it grew quickly from there. In 1983 Burns turned her full attention from AMC to ITP and was appointed Chair of the department, taking over from then Chair Mitchell Moss, a position she has held until she stepped down in 2011. Currently she holds the title of Chief Collaborations Officer at ITP. In 1996, she was awarded the Tokyo Broadcasting Systems Chair. Under her leadership the department has become a center for scholars and practitioners who are eager to engage the newest technologies and put them in the hands of media-makers.
Michael Mills, former full-time faculty member of ITP, went on to Apple Computer. He contributed to the group that developed the original prototypes that later became QuickTime. Current ITP chair Dan O'Sullivan, during his student years, served as an intern at Apple and created the prototype for the first navigable interactive video movies—a parallel effort to what was going on in ATG's 3-D graphics group at the time. O'Sullivan also introduced the first widely used interactive television application in NYC, produced and broadcast directly from ITP by way of Manhattan Cable Public Access.
Industry leaders, artists and visionaries who have lectured at ITP over the years include Academy-Award winner, Chairman and CEO of R/Greenberg Associates Digital Studios Robert M. Greenberg, musician and pioneer of immersive virtual reality Jaron Lanier, multimedia artist Vito Acconci, multimedia artist & musician Laurie Anderson, Ethernet creator Bob Metcalfe, CEO of New York Times Digital Martin Nisenholtz, artist Toshio Iwai, and Masamichi Udagawa and Sigi Moeslinger of Antenna Design, to name but a few.
Current ITP faculty members are known for their contributions to the new media field -- Daniel Rozin, Chrysler Design Award-Winning Artist in Residence, has had his work shown in major museums around the world, most recently at the Israel Museum; Dan O'Sullivan and Tom Igoe have just published the authoritative text on physical computing; Jean-Marc Gauthier is the author of several books on interactive 3D applications, and his art installations have been seen internationally; Douglas Rushkoff and Clay Shirky are widely published critics, authors and journalists; Marianne Petit is an artist known for her interactive stories as well as her work in assistive technologies and social applications; Red Burns has served on many boards and is regularly an invited speaker at industry events—she is also the recipient of a Chrysler Design Award, for "Design Champion," a leadership award from the New York Hall of Science, the educator award from the Art Directors Club, Crain's All Star Award, the NYC Mayor's Award for science and technology and was the first recipient of the Matrix Award.
The online magazine Digital Performance describes ITP as
"An oversized Greenwich Village loft houses the computer labs, rotating exhibitions, and production workshops that are ITP — the Interactive Telecommunications Program. Founded in 1979 as the first graduate education program in alternative media, ITP has grown into a living community of technologists, theorists, engineers, designers, and artists uniquely dedicated to pushing the boundaries of interactivity in the real and digital worlds. A hands-on approach to experimentation, production and risk-taking make this hi-tech fun house a creative home not only to its 230 students, but also to an extended network of the technology industry’s most daring and prolific practitioners."
Department of Photography and Imaging
The Department of Photography and Imaging teaches students how to make and understand images, while exploring photo-based imagery as personal and cultural expression. Studies include both the intensive focus of an arts curriculum that consists of studio/production and photo history and criticism and a serious and broad grounding in the liberal arts. The department embraces multiple perspectives, and students work in virtually all modes of photo-based image-making, using both analog and digital technologies. Students take courses in studio/production, photo history and criticism, liberal arts, and elective areas.
The Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music
The Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, or ReMu, trains undergraduates in the production, business, and history of popular music, with a special focus on creative music entrepreneurship in pop, rock, r&b, and hip hop. It is the only department at any university to offer a BFA degree in Recorded Music.
ReMu was established in 2003 on a $5 million donation from music executive Clive Davis, an NYU alumnus. Initially, the program was designed to educate those who wished to produce and market recordings—as Tisch Dean Mary Schmidt Campbell explained to The New York Times, "The basic premise of the department is that recorded music is an art form separate and distinct from live music, that the creative producer who identifies and oversees the construction of the artist's image is as much artist as the person who creates the music."[7] But with the growing financial instability of established record labels and the trend towards democratization in the creation and distribution of music, the program shifted focus to fostering creative entrepreneurs.
The program is currently led by Chair Jeff Rabhan, a prominent artist manager and former music industry executive, as well as journalist/cultural critic Jason King who serves as the program's Artistic Director and helped launch the program. Other faculty include the department's original chair Jim Anderson, a nine-time Grammy Award-winning engineer; Jonathan Finegold, the former A&R Director at Island Records and founder of Fine Gold Music, a consulting company; Errol Kolosine, former General Manager of Astralwerks; Bob Power, the multi-platinum, Grammy-winning hip-hop producer/mixer; recording artist/producer Richard Barone, and the self-appointed "Dean of American Rock Critics" Robert Christgau.
Notable alumni include Carter Matschullat, who founded indie label Dovecote Records while a student, and Bo Pericic of the trance duo Filo & Peri. MBK Entertainment/RCA Recording artist Elle Varner also graduated from the department.
Skirball Center for New Media
The Skirball Center for New Media includes the Department of Cinema Studies, and the Moving Image Archiving and Preservation (MIAP) program. The MIAP program is a 2-year graduate program, founded and led by Howard Besser, during which students study and prepare for careers in moving image archiving and preservation. The Department of Cinema Studies has both graduate and undergraduate programs, and is chaired by Richard Allen.
Tisch School of the Arts, Asia
NYU's first branch campus abroad was the result of a partnership with Singapore Government agencies under Singapore's Global Schoolhouse program. Tisch Asia was also Singapore’s first graduate arts school and offered Master of Fine Arts degrees in animation and digital arts, dramatic writing, film and international media producing. Summer programs included professional workshops and non-credit certificate courses.
The campus opened in fall 2007 on the former Ministry of Education & Republic Polytechnic grounds at 3 Kay Siang Road, Singapore, with the intention to enroll approximately 250 students.[8] The anticipated enrolment figures were not achieved, financial irregularities were alleged and Tisch Asia President Pari Sara Shirazi was dismissed from her post by NYU in November 2011.[9] She subsequently announced her decision to commence legal proceedings in the New York State Supreme Court against her former employers alleging wrongful termination and defamation.[10]
In a letter to the Tisch Asia community dated 8 November 2012, Dean Mary Schmidt Campbell announced that the campus would close after 2014 with recruitment and admission of new students suspended with immediate effect. While celebrating the creative and academic achievements at the Singapore campus, she cited financial challenges as the reason for the closure decision. Schmidt-Campbell pledged that NYU would honour commitments to existing students and staff.[11] The letter quoted support from Singapore's Economic Development Board stating that it remained open to future collaboration with NYU.
See also
- Laurence Tisch
- List of NYU Tisch People
- Tisch School of the Arts alumni
- List of New York University People
References
- ^ "History: Tisch School of the Arts". Tisch School of the Arts. Retrieved 23 June 2012.
- ^ "Tisch Graduate Acting Overview". Tisch School of the Arts. Retrieved 23 June 2012.
- ^ NYU Today
- ^ Graduate Acting: Tisch School of the Arts at NYU
- ^ "Courses and Faculty: Tisch Dance". Tisch School of the Arts. Retrieved 23 June 2012.
- ^ "Studios - How does the studio system? work". Tisch School of the Arts. Retrieved 20 February 2012.
- ^ McKinley, Jesse (2002-10-30). "To See Recorded Music as an Art Form". The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-05-25.
- ^ "NYU's Tisch School Of The Arts opens its first campus in Singapore". Retrieved 2008-08-22.
- ^ "Tisch Asia in a flux following president's removal". Retrieved 2012-11-09.
- ^ "Ex-Tisch Asia president takes NYU to court". Retrieved 2012-11-09.
- ^ "'The Future Of Tisch Asia (Memo from Office of the Dean to Tisch Asia Community". Retrieved 2012-11-09.