Programmes

The Department of Fine Arts began offering a two-year MVA degree in Art History and Visual Studies in 2010, to complement and strengthen the strong Art Practice disciplines of our existing program.  It is meant for students with a BFA/BVA degree, who wish to continue to pursue their interests in the historical, textual, critical and theoretical dimensions of artistic practices and traditions.  In addition to the core and elective courses in the curriculum (which also includes an art practice component), students are introduced, as much as possible, to ongoing and related issues in areas such as Museum and Heritage studies, Aesthetics, Historiography, and Curatorial Practices. 

The program is conceived as a rigorous inter-disciplinary academic initiative that seeks to develop close and nuanced understandings of local aesthetic traditions, heritage and conservation efforts in India, with reference to the city and environs of Hyderabad. It is designed to initiate and facilitate close engagements with the realities and challenges of contested claims, un-resolved disputes that embed architectural and built spaces in our vicinity. In a city that is increasingly marked by wholesale expansions and rapid urbanization, such a focus enables us to deal with the real-world implications of the rights and limits of collective ownership and community participation.  The program strives to become increasingly and actively connected to the networks of scholars, institutions, and organizations that are involved in these fields and spaces.

The MVA in Painting, Printmaking, and Sculpture with Expanded Media is a two-year, full-time postgraduate program designed to support students in developing a critically engaged, materially grounded, and contextually articulated art practice. Rooted in historically known methods of drawing, painting, printmaking, and sculpture, the program encourages students to question, unlearn, relearn, and reconstruct their understanding of image-making and form in the expanded field of contemporary art.

This program is structured for students who hold a BFA/BVA degree and are ready to explore and develop their personal voice as artists and art professionals. Through close mentorship, rigorous studio engagement, and reflective dialogue, students learn to position themselves meaningfully within the wider discourse of contemporary Indian and global art practices. The pedagogical approach understands art not only as personal expression but also as a mode of inquiry, listening, resistance, storytelling, and social transformation.

50% of the total credits are dedicated to studio-based practice, where students work closely, often one-on-one, with faculty from their respective disciplines. The studio is not treated merely as a site of production, but as a space of critical inquiry where personal narratives are linked to larger social, cultural, environmental, ecological, and political contexts. Materials are approached not as neutral tools, but as active collaborators, carrying histories, labour, memory, and meaning. Emphasis is placed on process as a form of thinking, and on developing a sustained, reflective, and experimental studio practice.

Studio-based learning is supported throughout the academic year through slide lectures by faculty and visiting artists and scholars, workshops on traditional and contemporary techniques, site visits, collaborative fieldwork, peer critiques, individual studio reviews, and thematic research presentations. These engagements enable students to critically reflect on their work, ask difficult questions, and develop bodies of work that speak with urgency, sincerity, and conceptual clarity.

Recognizing the interdisciplinary nature of contemporary art practice, the program actively encourages exploration across the expanded field. Students may pursue elective courses in disciplines such as Drawing, Painting, Printmaking, Sculpture, Installation, Site-specific and Sound Art, Performance Art, Land and Ecological Art, Photography, Moving Image, Book Art, Ceramics, and Digital and New Media Practices. Electives are undertaken under the guidance of faculty from the concerned disciplines, and students are responsible for ensuring that expectations and requirements are clearly understood and approved (in writing) by faculty prior to the commencement of the elective course.

In addition to Department Specific Core (DSC) courses, students are required to complete Faculty Specific Electives (FSC), Subject Specific Electives (SSE), Open Electives (OE), General Education Courses (GEC), and Internship programs as part of their degree requirements. Details regarding course types and credit structures are outlined in the University of Hyderabad syllabus, and students are responsible for understanding and fulfilling all academic and studio requirements.