Program Overview
UC Riverside's Master of Fine Arts in Experimental Choreography fosters experimentation and interdisciplinary practice in dance making, performance, and embodied practices. The program equips students with a deep understanding of the field, critical analysis skills, and the ability to develop innovative final projects that address urgent questions in dance. Students benefit from close collaboration with faculty, access to diverse venues, and the vibrant cultural landscape of Riverside, CA.
Program Outline
Degree Overview:
UC Riverside’s Master of Fine Arts in Experimental Choreography offers emerging and established artists a site for intense investigation in dance making, performance, and interdisciplinary embodied practice. The program emphasizes experimentation and interdisciplinarity and aims to address current and urgent questions in the field.
Objectives:
The program aims to equip students with:
- A deep understanding of dance making, performance, and interdisciplinary embodied practice
- The ability to engage in a series of core composition courses and select critical dance studies courses
- A strong foundation in critical analysis and reflection, both of their own creative work and the field as a whole.
- The skills to develop a final project that demonstrates a thorough investigation and committed execution of a specific set of critical questions unique to their cumulative research.
Outline:
The program spans six quarters and requires students to complete 40 units of course work (10 courses) and 12-14 units of independent research for a final project. Students must complete a total of at least 54 units of graduate and upper division undergraduate courses.
Core Curriculum (16 units):
- Dance 240: Improvising Choreography: Scores, Structures, and Strategies (4 units)
- Dance 241: Creating the Experiment: Identifying the New (4 units)
- Dance 242: Dancing Representation: Figures, Forms, and Frames (4 units)
- Dance 243: Collaborating in Dance Making: Material, Methods, and Interactions (4 units)
Required Courses (14 units):
- Dance 180R: Studio Pedagogy + DNCE 292: Concurrent Analytical Studies (6 units total)
- Dance 239: Introduction to Graduate Study of Dance (4 units)
- Dance 244: Special Topics in Dance Making (4 units)
Critical Dance Studies Courses (8 units):
- Dance 254: Political Approaches to Dance Studies (4 units)
- Dance 255: Historical Approaches to Dance Studies (4 units)
- Dance 257: Rhetorical Approaches to Dance Studies (4 units)
- Dance 258: Cultural Approaches to Dance Studies (4 units)
- Dance 260: Special Topics in Critical Dance Studies (4 units)
- Dance 264: Oral History and Ethnographic Methods
- Dance 267: Choreographies of Writing
Additional Requirements:
- Dance 301: Seminar in Dance Studies Pedagogy and Professional Development (does not count toward the total 54 units required for the degree)
- 4-6 graduate-level units of electives either within or outside the Dance Department.
- DNCE 297 or DNCE 299 for independent creative research work with faculty mentors on their Graduate Critique Panels, and on phases of the final project.
Final Project:
- Students form a committee consisting of three to four faculty members, one of whom may be outside the department, to supervise the final project.
- A 10-15 page proposal is required by the end of fall quarter of the second year.
- The final project may take various forms, including site-specific performances, interactive choreography, digital media or film projects, or a portfolio of distinct but connected projects.
- A 30-minute public artist talk followed by Q&A, and a 20-40 page written document outlining the aesthetic focus of the student’s research, reflecting on the creative process, and providing a historical and philosophical contextualization for the project are required.
Other:
- The program maintains a close relationship with the Ph.D. in Critical Dance Studies, which enhances opportunities for intellectual inquiry.
- MFA students benefit from professional relationships with undergraduate students through teaching, directing, producing, and community engagement.
- Students have access to various venues on and off campus, including the Performance Lab, Studio Labs, and the Culver Center of the Arts downtown, for research and sharing their work.
- The program emphasizes the value of the surrounding landscape and cultural perspectives of Riverside, CA, which serves as a generative environment for artistic and intellectual exploration.
