The School of Fine Arts, the oldest art school in New York, offers a full range of instruction for professional artists and talented amateurs. Modeled after London's Royal Academy and the great art academies of Europe, the school emphasizes traditional instruction in the fine arts, including paintings, sculpture, drawing, anatomy, perspective, and printmaking. The faculty is drawn from the ranks of New York's most accomplished artists, many of whom are members of the National Academy of Design. At the heart of the school program is the studio experience where students most often work from the model but also from antique casts and still life. Full time classes meet five days a week in three-hour sessions.
Instructors attend full time classes two days a week to give instruction and criticism.
In fair weather landscape sessions are held outdoors in Central Park and other locations throughout the city. It is only by spending as much time as possible in the studio that students develop the necessary skills, which combined with individual creativity, lead to genuine artistic expression. The studio experience is augmented by lectures, seminars, critiques, workshops, and visits to museums and artists' studios. The School year is divided into four quarters of eight weeks duration. Unless otherwise noted, daytime classes meet five days per week for three hours per day.