Refine Your Voice & Build Your Skills
The Creative Practices program embraces a diverse range of photographic approaches for innovative expression in an atmosphere of cooperative learning. Students are not only encouraged to explore and define their own goals, but also challenged to situate their work within the broader context of the cultural, artistic, sociopolitical, and psychological use of images.
Featuring an accelerated investigation into the history of photography, contemporary theory, and craft, the curriculum also boasts a large selection of electives. Through these varied offerings, students can let their curiosity and passions lead them in new directions, ranging from nontraditional documentary narrative to experimental image production to other media, including video, sound, performance, and installation. By solidifying each student’s technical skills and broadening their vision, we build a foundation for ongoing, meaningful, and content-driven individual and collective practice.
Program Structure
- Two Semesters: Fall (Aug-Dec) and Spring (Jan-May), 15 week/ semester
- Class Hours: 18 hours per week minimum
- Full-Time Commitment: Approximately 40 hours per week, including class hours
- Personalized Registration: One-on-one course registration with the Program Chair
- Course Offerings: Required courses, electives, and weekend and January workshops
Program Highlights
At ICP, students study with a diverse faculty of top practitioners and professionals in the field. Full-time students have access to ICP’s state-of-the-art facilities–including digital media labs, analog black-and-white and color darkrooms, lighting studios, and a wide range of equipment available through the Equipment Room. Over the course of the program term, students develop their personal vision and have the opportunity to work with ICP's museum, library, collection, and public programming to broaden their imagemaking knowledge while connecting with ICP's international photography community.
The year culminates in an end-of-year exhibition in ICP's museum and 1:1 portfolio reviews with key professionals in the field, including photo editors at major publications.
Creative Practices Courses
Required Courses
- Creative Practices Seminar
- Digital Workflows
- Photoshop and Printing
- Technical Seminar in Black-and-White Photography
- Technical Seminar in Color Photography
- Photo, Art, and Media: A History
- Technical Seminar in Colour PhotographyTechnical Seminar in Black and White Photography
- Digital Production Seminar
- Creative Practices Seminar
Weekend Workshops
- Views from Home
- Creative Practices: Mid-Year Reviews
- Writing to Images
- How to Make Friends & Use the Internet
- On The Wall: Exhibition Practices and Techniques
- The Art of The Handmade Photographic Artist's Book
- Demystifying Editorial Photo Assignments
Electives
- Light and Shadow
- The Experience of Place
- Intimacy and Distance
- The Hand and The Machine
- Let There Be Light
- Land of the Lost: Poetics and Practice of Video Making for Photographers
- Beyond the Land of the Lost: Further Explorations in Video Making for Photographers
- Large-Format Photography
- Music Over Truth
- Photo Zine as Narrative Platform
- A Study in Strobes
- The Loom: Weaving Media
- Alternative Processes
- Editorial Concepts Across Media Platforms
- Stereo Views (Online)
- Critical Writing for Artists
- Stories and Style: A Narrative Approach
- Recent Histories: A Survey of Contemporary Photo-Based Art
- The Art and Science of Experimental Photography
- A Study in Strobes
- Realms of The Field
- Independent Projects in Video/ Multi-Media
- The Surreal Self
- Alternative Processes: Non-Silver Printing
