Master of Fine Arts in Graphic Design

Two Graphic Design Programs,
One Goal: Career Fulfillment.

Develop your technical and conceptual skills to advance your graphic design career in one of our on-campus, rigorous design programs. The Master of Fine Arts and Certificate in Graphic Design programs at Boston University School of Visual Arts (BU SVA) are studio-based programs, giving you the tools to have an edge in the field. BU’s graphic design faculty offer a broad range of professional experience to students, from interactive to experience design to expertise in editorial design and typography. Five full-time faculty and a cohort of visiting experts and critics are innovators who will work closely with you to help you to think and work creatively and strategically.

Both Graphic Design Programs Provide:

• Professional experience in globally informed design practice.
• Work with advanced and emerging design technologies.
• Artistic collaboration in small classes averaging 15 to 20 students.
• The best facilities: Individual workstations in a large, open studio, excellent presentation rooms, RISO printer and Visual Arts Resource and Research Library.
• Exposure to the professional world through events and symposia, trips to New York and to design studios, and internationally renowned visiting artists and designers who share ideas and offer critiques.
• Professional graphic designers and innovators on faculty.
• Connectivity with a large graduate cohort across five MFA degrees.

Master of Fine Arts Degree in Graphic Design

If you want to expand your knowledge, skills, and networks, and take your work to the next level, this is the program for you. Working closely with faculty mentors in the Master of Fine Arts in Graphic Design program, you will connect with a community of professionals and peers to help get you there. The MFA degree is a recognized and sought-after terminal graduate degree, and at BU you will learn to master key principles of design, conduct research, and utilize current technology. With an emphasis on process and critical design thinking, the MFA program sets itself apart as a maker-based design department located within an art school that is supported by the resources of a major research university. Our MFA provides a sequenced studio approach to advanced design thinking and problem-solving for visual communication and professional skill building. You will have a choice of electives within and beyond design allowing you to take advantage of a large art school at a leading research university. Become part of a vibrant, supportive community of practitioners that include our large alumni network across the globe.

Our MFA provides a sequenced studio approach to advanced design thinking and problem-solving for visual communication and professional skill building. 

MFA Student Spotlight

An inside look at the MFA in Graphic Design with Anvi Sarin.

Certificate in Graphic Design

New to design or want to develop career building skills in a shorter program? BU’s one-year Certificate in Graphic Design is perfect for you. The program includes a core studio with one-on-one attention from faculty, a course with MFA students on the history of design across cultures, typography, and a range of electives in the second semester. Choose your path based on your interests and career goals. After Certificate completion, graduates often apply to enter our MFA program.

One of the Best Academic Design Spaces in the Nation

Recently built facilities in the Graphic Design program include large graduate student classrooms, two very spacious open studios, LCD projectors and critique spaces, dedicated graduate printing, and shared facilities including a RISO and a seminar room with views over the Charles River. The College of Fine Arts is home to two professional galleries along with student exhibition spaces and opportunities to collaborate with campus partners such as BUild Lab and the BU Libraries.

Unique Career Enhancement Opportunities

Your experiences in either program will provide great opportunities for experiential learning that help propel your career. MFA students design an exhibition as part of the second year thesis exhibition hosted in one of CFA’s professional galleries. Public events like Multiple Formats Art Book Fair and Symposium and Design Week give students presentation experience and bring peers and professionals to campus. Most students have the option to obtain an internship for credit, work with the Computing and Data Science program Spark! or work closely with faculty on professional projects. There are many ways to gain valuable experience in the field, including travel for credit to leading design studios in Amsterdam each Spring.

You will meet visiting critics and guest lecturers such as Odette England, Mattie Lubchansky, Anna Conway, Thomas Castro, Nyeema Morgan, Mario Moore, Tammy Nguyen, Victoria Roth and Jonathan Mildenberg.

Access to Graduate Student Resources

MFA and Certificate students have 24-hour access to the dedicated graphic design workspace, and, with coursework, access to nearby focused-use studios for printmaking and photography, including silkscreen. With training throughout the program in both digital and analog approaches, students learn to expand the boundaries and professionalism of how they create, disseminate, and document their work. Students in the program are supported by the following College of Fine Arts and SVA resources along with other BU labs and centers:

• Individual space in our 10,000 sq foot graphic design studio dedicated exclusively to graduate graphic design. 
• A variety of industry standard printing capabilities. 
• A three-color RISO printer with a large array of color drums for limitless color potential.
• Access to courses in printmaking along with state-of-the-art print facilities that include lithography, etching, relief, digital printmaking, and silkscreen.
• The School of Visual Arts Research & Resource Library. 
• Proximity to 100 graduate students across art education, painting, sculpture, visual narrative, and print media and photography.

• The BUild Lab IDG Capital Student Innovation Center is home to people, programs, and collaboration space that helps all BU students and recent alumni transform their ideas into something real and develop innovation skills, an entrepreneurial mindset, and a strong community along the way.
• The Boston University Center for Antiracist Research, whose mission it is to convene researchers and practitioners from various disciplines to figure out novel and practical ways to understand, explain, and solve seemingly intractable problems of racial inequity and injustice.
• Boston University Libraries, including the African American Library, the Krasker Film/Video Library, the Mugar Memorial Library, the Music Library, and the Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center, which captures and documents history by collecting the manuscripts from individuals who play a significant part in the fields of journalism, poetry, literature and criticism, dance, music, theater, film, television, political and religious movements.