Foundation Program
I’m excited to begin my creative career with my other artists and designers.
A Year Of Exploration
Explore processes, connect ideas, develop compelling visual narratives, and approach your work with confidence and originality. You’ll spend the year taking risks and experimenting with unfamiliar materials, techniques and concepts while building the foundation for your education. And the best part is you get to work with your peers across a variety of disciplines and majors.
The City Is Your Studio
University Circle and Cleveland will be a source of inspiration and your extended studio. You’ll spend time in the Cleveland Botanical Gardens and Natural History Museum capturing the beauty you see and practicing the skills you learn in the classroom.
Studio Discovery
This is an opportunity to explore, discover interests, and investigate new concepts. By the end of the semester, you’ll have a better understanding of the wide range of offerings at CIA. This is one of the best classes during your first year!
You will take courses in life drawing, observational drawing, 2D design, 3D design, and digital techniques. These allow you to explore different mediums and stretch your creative skills while building the foundation for the rest of your time at CIA.
Learning Outcomes
- Conduct visual and written research for studio projects using school and community resources.
- Explore, experiment, and develop multiple ideas and approaches to a given problem.
- Manipulate elements and utilize principles of visual organization and basic color theory to create cohesive and impactful compositions.
- Demonstrate observational drawing skills across a range of subject matter.
- Organize formal compositional relationships between materials, structure, and space.
- Link subject, form, content, to create compelling visual relationships.
- Execute projects with technical proficiency across analog and digital making.
- Identify core aspects, skills, and career possibilities of various majors in art and design.
- Communicate ideas (visual, verbal, written) in a professional manner.
- Demonstrate critical analysis and the use of art and design terminology.
Meet Faculty
Nicole Condon-Shih
Associate Professor + Division ChairNicole Condon-Shih is an artist, educator, and academic leader exploring the intersection of art, science, and technology. Her research-based studio practice examines the dichotomy between the microscopic versus the macroscopic…
View profileRachel Ferber
Assistant ProfessorRachel Ferber is an interdisciplinary artist, designer, and educator based in Cleveland, OH. Her work explores the sticky sides of power, performance and sustainability through the lens of commodified private…
View profileJoey Goergen
Visiting Assistant ProfessorJoey Goergen is an artist from Buffalo, New York. He is currently a visiting professor at the Cleveland Institute of art. Goergen attended the University At Buffalo for his MFA…
View profileScott Goss
Assistant ProfessorScott Goss is an interdisciplinary artist whose work explores various mediums including public art, sculpture, interactive installations, and glass. His work has been exhibited nationally and is represented by galleries…
View profileKevin Kautenburger
ProfessorKautenburger’s sculpture functions to contain sensations of the natural environment, housing and presenting natural phenomena as an invitation for anyone so inclined to poetic ponderance. Work often involves insect habitats…
View profileScott Ligon
Associate ProfessorScott Ligon has written a book about creating digital fine art in Photoshop, “Digital Art Revolution”, published by Random House. His animated short film, “Escape Velocity,” has played in festivals…
View profileLaura Medina
AICAD Post-Graduate FellowLaura Camila Medina (1995) is an interdisciplinary artist born in Bogotá, Colombia. Her practice is deeply inspired by the kisses between mountains and sky of her birthplace intertwined with the…
View profile