APPLICATIONS FOR FALL 2019 will be accepted starting on September 17th, 2018. The deadline for all application and portfolio materials is at 12:00AM (EST) on December 15th, 2018. All letters of recommendation are due by 12:00AM (EST) on December 17th, 2018. Final Decisions are made in mid-to-late March, and all applicants will be notified of their admission status by a letter from the graduate division. We unfortunately do not offer any grace period beyond these deadlines.

To start applying, follow this link to UC Berkeley's Graduate Division. Please note that you will be submitting three separate statements; the graduate application provides instructions for the 'Personal Statement' and the 'Statement of Purpose', but for the department specific 'Artist's Statement', we ask that you speak to your understanding of your process, the ideas that you are working with, and that you identify the critical and historical conversations you hope to engage in with and through your work. We no longer accept paper applications; all materials must be submitted through the Graduate Division website.

In the portfolio section of the application, we are interested to see your recent work, particularly work made within the last 3 years. Include what you consider to be your strongest and most developed projects. Try to put accurate information in the descriptions regarding materials, sizes, etc. The maximum image count is 20, plus up to five minutes of video, so do plan accordingly. Contact the Graduate Division directly if you have trouble with your portfolio or application.

In cases where you submit collaboratively-made projects, we are interested to know what the role of each collaborator is, to the extent that it is possible to clarify them. If you AND your collaborator are both applying to the program, we do expect you to submit individually made work as part of your portfolio.

Our selection process begins by anonymously reviewing the submitted portfolios. From there, we begin a second round of deliberation in which we carefully examine transcripts, the three statements, and letters of recommendation. Lastly, we begin our final round which involves phone interviews with a number of selected finalists. Every year, somewhere between 175 - 200 students apply. We admit 6 each year, for a total 12 students in the program at any given time.

If you have any other questions about the application process, please contact our department administrator Dee Levister at dplev@berkeley.edu .