It is always an exciting time to be in Houston and a particularly fortuitous time to be a part of the University of Houston School of Art. We have new and dynamic programs, a wealth of dazzling minds, a generous and supportive administration, visionary patronage, and a city known for its spirit and innovation.
Three years ago, the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts was created to foment cross-disciplinary innovation in Art, Creative Writing, Music, Theater and Dance, and in the University Museum. This $20 million endowment makes possible new, hybrid projects and parallels the strategies of the School of Art: cross pollination, collaboration, and experimentation.
We have taken careful stock of the considerable and unique resources available to us, as well as the amplified territories within which art is practiced. With artists today creating genetically novel life forms, one can easily discern the need for cooperative, flexible, cross-disciplinary, education. Rather than attempting to forecast and dictate where students’ interests will be, we support them, one at a time, with mentorship, facilities and academic innovation.
Creative research requires focus, support, and occasionally, inspiration. As educators, we encourage the agility necessary to navigate new ground, and the understanding that connects the poetry, context, concept, medium and strategy of artistic practice.
I hope that you will explore this website – it will give you a better sense of the extraordinary people and programs that makes our school a vibrant center for the study of art, design, theory and art history.
John Reed
Director, School of Art