The Ithaca College low-residency
Image Text MFA is a unique terminal degree program focused at the
intersection of writing and photography. Students in our
exploratory, flexible and innovative twenty-five month program work
directly with faculty and visiting artists during three annual
month-long summer sessions in Ithaca, New York and in two annual
week-long winter sessions in a major international cultural
capital. During the fall and spring academic terms, students pursue
independent study in close consultation with their faculty
mentors.
Integrating theoretical and conceptual studies with intensive
creative practice, the program seeks to create a community that
brings lens-based media and writing into a shared arena of
discussion, including cross-disciplinary and collaborative
work.
The current explosion of independent creative publishing is
saturated with hybrid image-text works, and in journalistic and
editorial work, writers are increasingly expected to photograph and
photographers to write. The Image-Text MFA is the first program in
the country to specifically focus on this vital and expanding
intersection of creative and professional practice.
Students have the opportunity to work with the Image Text
Ithaca Press. Modeled on contemporary photographic and literary
small presses, the ITI Press publishes innovative works by national
and international writers and artists.
This program seeks to prepare accomplished and original
artists to make substantial contributions to literary and media
arts fields, including print and online publication and exhibition,
and encompassing experimental fiction, documentary and journalistic
practices.
We welcome applicants with backgrounds in writing,
photography and other lens-based media, and artists working across
these forms and disciplines. Experience in both text and
image-making is not required, but applicants must submit a
portfolio that demonstrates sustained work in at least one of these
areas, if not both.
