Highlights

American Studies

Careers

Many art graduates secure employment as commissioned fine artists, creative directors, animators, architects, graphic designers, professors, historians and museum curators.

Hands-On Learning  

Internship opportunities include:

  • Metropolitan Museum of Art
  • Architect at Koch Hazard
  • Curator or archivist at the Center for Western Studies (CWS)
  • Graphic design at Fresh Produce
  • Art therapist at Sanford or Avera Health

Art students study away in:

  • India — focusing on religion, art, and sound with AU faculty
  • France — focusing on anthropology and rock art with AU faculty
  • London, England, or New York City, New York — focusing on art history with AU faculty
  • Worldwide through the Upper Midwest Association for Intercultural Education (UMAIE)

Augustana is a founding member of the Higher Education Consortium on Urban Affairs (HECUA), through which the university participates in rigorous off-campus learning through Art for Social Change.

Courses & Organizations

The program stresses foundations in drawing and design as a basis for all art-making processes, with strong components in community learning and peer critiques.

Undergraduate art majors can choose between a Bachelor of Fine Arts or Bachelor of Arts with multiple tracks:

  • Art education — prepare to teach at elementary and secondary levels
  • Art history — practice evaluating and reflecting on the ways of seeing and representing the world, dictated by culture and time period
  • Ceramics — shape, glaze and fire clay free-form and wheel-thrown forms
  • Drawing — establish conceptual framework and foundation for all other studio areas
  • Graphic design — design digitally with the latest Adobe software in the Mac lab
  • Painting — develop original expression in painting techniques
  • Photography — learn conceptual, aesthetic and visual tools of digital photography
  • Printmaking — master intaglio, lithography, screenprinting, woodcut and wood engraving
  • Sculpture — sculpt using modeling and mold-making in plaster and clay, carving, construction, assemblage, stone carving, bronze casting, welded metals, plastics and contemporary movements