Admission

Students are admitted to Yale’s MFA for the Fall semester of each year only. Applicants are notified of the admission committee’s decisions on preliminary selections in February, and final decisions in early March. No information about decisions will be given over the phone or advance of the batch written release to all finalists. To apply for more than one area of concentration, separate applications, fees, and supporting documentation must be submitted. The work submitted should be representative of the applicant’s experience in that particular field. Applying to more than one program does not increase an applicant’s chances of selection.

Please note: Yale School of Art does not practice admission deferment; An offer of admission for Fall 2021 is valid only for enrollment for that year regardless of the in-residence conditions of the Yale campus at that time. Applicants who are offered admission but choose not to enroll are welcome to reapply to the School in a future cycle.

APPLICATION DEADLINE: Online applications for programs beginning in the 2020–2021 academic year must be uploaded no later than 11:59:59 PM EST on January 5, 2021. Applicants will not be allowed to submit materials or applications after the deadline has passed. Please note that when many applicants are uploading simultaneously near the deadline, it is possible that lengthier processing times will be experienced. To avoid this, please consider submitting prior to the deadline day.

Admission Procedures for Preliminary Selection

Instructions for All Applicants

An application to the School of Art requires forethought and planning. It is important to read all of the application instructions carefully. Following these instructions will ensure that your application is viewed to best advantage.

The Yale School of Art application for the 2020–2021 academic year is available online at https://apply.art.yale.edu/apply. The information that follows will assist you in filing the application online. For an explanation of specific requirements for each area of study, please refer to the departmental sections that follow.

Application materials:

The following materials are required for consideration of your application for admission:

Submit the online application. Application portal opens on October 1 and may be worked until the January 5 deadline. As it generally takes several weeks to complete an application, it is strongly recommended that applicants prepare their materials early to ensure completion by the deadline.

Please note that the School of Art is NOT part of the Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and it is not possible to apply by using application materials found on the Graduate School’s Web site.

Nonrefundable application fee of $100. Please follow payment instructions at https://apply.art.yale.edu/apply/. Forms of payment include credit card and checking account.

Yale School of Art, in our commitment to equity and access, practices “need blind admission”; meaning that, candidate financial need or ability is never disclosed to the admission committee during review of MFA applications. For this reason, and because the processing and careful review of each individual application demands great time and human resources, we regret that the School does not waive the application fee under any circumstances.

A one-page statement that addresses inﬂuences, interests, current work direction, brief life history (as it relates to art/design practice), and reasons for applying to graduate school at this time. Statements should be limited to one page or no more than 500 words.

Applicants to the Painting/Printmaking program should make reference in their statements to the “representative work” in the portfolio; this is not critical for the other programs.

References from three persons practicing or teaching in the field in which application is made, attesting to the applicant’s ability and competence in that field.

NOTE: The admissions committee reviews applications shortly after the deadline. While it is not uncommon for letters of recommendation to come in past the January 5th deadline, please impress upon on those who will be writing on your behalf, that late submission of supporting documentation may risk exclusion from the review. Applicants can always view the receipt status of reference requests on the application status page.

Transcripts of academic record for the bachelor’s degree and/or professional art schools attended. Student/unofficial copies may be uploaded to the application for the preliminary jury. Official transcripts will ONLY be required for applicants invited to interview. If invited to interview, official transcripts should be mailed to: Yale School of Art Admissions, POB 208339, New Haven, CT 06520-8339. Neither junior college transcripts nor Graduate Record Examination (GRE) scores are required. Portfolio of work. Applicants who fail to upload a portfolio as outlined by the stated deadline will NOT be considered. The portfolio should represent images of your best work, indicate your current direction, and demonstrate your ability. At least half of the images should represent work done within the last twelve months, and all should be from within the last three years. Chronological order of year is embedded in our system, and you will not be able to override it. The application system used by Yale requires that one image from the portfolio be designated as a “representative work.” This selection is simply the default image for the cover page of each application file. As such, applicants have historically selected the piece which most strongly represents ideas central to their current body of work.

Do not include more than one image on the screen, nor embed other pages of a publication or video within the images you place in your portfolio. Do not include detail photos of work in your portfolio unless you consider them absolutely necessary. Under no circumstances should more than two detail shots be included. Portfolio requirements differ depending upon area of concentration; be sure to follow the instructions for the area to which you are applying. We strongly recommend that you review your images on a Mac OS to be certain that they are accurately represented.

NOTE: All supporting documents that are submitted as a requirement for admission become a part of the official file and cannot be returned to the applicant or forwarded to another institution either in copy or original form.