Graduate Programs

At Boston University’s Department of History of Art and Architecture, the current admissions cycle (for students entering in fall 2025) is solely for the MA degree. Admission to both the MA and the PhD programs will resume in the admission cycle for students entering in fall 2026. Information regarding admissions is available on the Dept. of HAA website under graduate admissions.

Review the FAQs regarding graduate admissions or the HAA Graduate Handbook, which describes the graduate programs and their policies in detail.

Brown University, Ph.D. in Art History Program information sheet:

Bryn Mawr’s Department of History of Art offers a Ph.D. degree in art history from late antiquity through the present. An M.A. degree is offered in the second year in the process of acquiring the Ph.D.

History of Art is one of three independent departments that comprise the Graduate Group in Archaeology, Classics, and History of Art.

Columbia University in New York City offers two MA programs–the MA in Art History and the MA in Modern and Contemporary Art: Critical and Curatorial Studies (MODA). Below are links to each program website.

https://arthistory.columbia.edu/content/ma-art-history

https://arthistory.columbia.edu/content/ma-modern-and-contemporary-art-critical-and-curatorial-studies-moda

CUNY Hunter College, Park Ave. @68th Street in Manhattan, Master’s Program in Art History. Link from the below image to a PDF that describes the program’s

• Program Highlights
• Program Requirements
• Advanced Curatorial Certificate
• Application Requirements

MA Art—(Specializations in Art History Research or Teaching at the Two-Year College Level), Northern Illinois University, School of Art and Design https://www.niu.edu/art/graduate-programs/ma-art-history.shtml

Expand your art history expertise and career options by joining our close-knit academic community. You’ll find resources and support as you prepare to pursue advanced research in art history or to teach at a two-year college.

Our alumni teach at colleges and universities around the country. Some are employed in museums, while others study in Ph.D. programs throughout the United States and abroad. When you graduate, you’ll be well-prepared for the next step in your professional journey.

Our program features:

Accomplished faculty members who will encourage you to excel.
Courses on interpretation and communication in diverse cultures and contexts.
Financial support through assistantships.

Program Options
You can pursue a Master of Arts degree in art with a specialization in art history research or art history teaching at the two-year college level. The program includes 30 hours of graduate coursework. You can choose to complete a thesis as part of your degree.

We also offer certificates to enhance your art history knowledge:

Graduate certificate in art history
Graduate certificate in museum studies
Whichever path you choose, you’ll benefit from the depth and variety of our art history courses.

OSU History of Art MA to PhD program

MA & PhD RASC/a (Rhetorics of Art, Space, and Culture), SMU—Meadows School of Art, Dallas https://www.smu.edu/meadows/areasofstudy/arthistory/graduatestudies

• Click the Image to see the brochure PDF

MA & PhD Art History & Criticism, Stony Brook University, Long Island, NY https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/art/graduate/art-history.php

• Click the Image to see the brochure PDF

Texas Christian University, TCU’s M.A. in Art History offers a fully funded, two-year program with an emphasis on museum studies. Our small program admits five students per year, each of whom receives a full tuition waiver, a competitive stipend, and 80% health insurance coverage. Students also have access to our exceptional Sunkel research fund, which provides generous support for both domestic and international travel, and summer stipends. Recent Sunkel grants have funded graduate student travel to New York, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Budapest, Paris, London, Italy, Mexico and Cuba.

TCU is a private, secular institution that values scholarship and artistic and creative expression. It is located in Fort Worth, Texas, the thirteenth-largest city in the U.S. and home to several excellent museums. The art history program benefits from close relationships with the Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Kimbell Art Museum, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, the Sid Richardson Museum, and the Dallas Museum of Art, among others. Classes frequently visit the museums; some courses even meet entirely at museums, in conjunction with exhibitions. All M.A. students participate in museum internships as part of their coursework. Our small program offers students the opportunity to work closely with professors and museum professionals in the area. Many of our graduate students go into museum careers; other continue their studies in doctoral programs.

Admission: Applicants will normally have completed at least 18 semester hours (6 courses) in art history. The department will consider applications from qualified students in other fields.

Funded MA in Classics at Tulane University, New Orleans https://liberalarts.tulane.edu/classical-studies/academics/graduate

• Current stipend is $20k.

PhD in Visual Studies at the University of California, Irvine https://www.humanities.uci.edu/visual-studies

• Click the image to download the PDF

The University of Georgia’s Lamar Dodd School of Art in Athens, GA, has the following programs, which are fully funded:

• MA in Art History: https://art.uga.edu/academics/graduate-studies/ma-degree
• PhD in Art History: https://art.uga.edu/academics/graduate-studies/phd-art-emphasis-art-history

MA in Art History, University of Massachusetts at Amherst https://www.umass.edu/art-history/academics/graduate

• Click the image to view the brochure PDF

MA or PhD in Art History, University of Texas at Austin https://art.utexas.edu/academics/graduate/art-history

The Department of Art History in the College of Letters and Science at the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee offers a graduate program leading to the Master of Arts degree in Art History. The program is designed to provide students with a solid academic foundation on which to base a variety of careers in the arts, or to prepare for PhD-level work at other universities. Two courses of study or “Tracks” are offered, one with an emphasis on Methods and Criticism, the other in Museums and Curatorial Practice. We also offer a Coordinated Master of Arts/Master of Library & Information Science Degree, which readies students for positions as art librarians, curators of rare books and special collections, and archivists, registrars, and collections managers in art museums.

Virginia Commonwealth University, VCUarts, Department of Art History

MA in Art History, Concentration in Historical Studies or Museum Studies

https://arts.vcu.edu/art-history/

The 30-credit MA program prepares students for careers in museums and other cultural institutions or continued study at the doctoral level. Small classes, engaged faculty, and a very active graduate student association foster a supportive, collegial community.

The curriculum includes foundational courses in Historiography and Methodology and History and Theory of Museums. Our focus is on global art after 1800, with faculty expertise in art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in Europe, Britain, and the Middle East, art of the African and Asian Diasporas, and history of museums and exhibitions.

Students work closely with a faculty advisor on the capstone Qualifying Paper in the second year while also enrolled in a work-shop style writing seminar each semester. The QP is a publishable article-length manuscript aimed at a target journal. Funding is available to support research travel.

An internship is required for Museum Studies (optional for Historical Studies). Our students complete internships at museums in and around Richmond, including the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and in Washington, DC.

All applicants are considered for assistantships that provide tuition and a stipend.

MA & PhD in History of Art, Design, and Visual Culture, University of Alberta https://www.ualberta.ca/en/graduate-programs/art-and-design.html

• Click the image to open the brochure PDF

MA & PhD in Art History, and MA in Critical and Curatorial Studies, University of British Columbia https://ahva.ubc.ca/graduate/

As a Canadian institution, tuition is much less than that of American universities. ($10,000/year for non-Canadian students, a third of which is covered by automatic awards. Additionally, Ph.D. students are guaranteed $24,000/year for 4 years, based on a combination of funding sources—TAing, awards, etc.)

Depending upon the advisor, students have the opportunity to obtain additional funding through research/assistant positions. 

Regent’s University London will launch the Global Art Markets MA course in September 2025 with just 15 student places available. Applications opened in mid-October 2024.

This is a new, innovative postgraduate course designed to prepare students for dynamic careers in the international art market. It blends art business, law and connoisseurship to foster the expertise and global perspective required to thrive in this fast-paced, ever-evolving sector.

• MLitt & PhD in the History of Art,  University of Aberdeen https://www.abdn.ac.uk/study/postgraduate-research/research-areas/880/history-of-art/
  • Research the history of art, architecture and visual culture, from the Middle Ages to the present day, and become part of a thriving and supportive research community.
• Related Program: MLitt in Christianity and the Visual Arts https://www.abdn.ac.uk/study/postgraduate-taught/degree-programmes/1936/christianity-and-the-visual-arts/
  • • Click the Image to view the brochure: DHPA PG Guide 2024

  

MA History of Art virtual presentation, https://youtu.be/lldbuikbMzc

• MA History of Art, https://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/graduate/taught-degrees/history-art-ma
• MSc Conservation of Contemporary Art and Media, https://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/graduate/taught-degrees/conservation-contemporary-art-and-media-msc
• MPhil/PhD History of Art, https://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/graduate/research-degrees/history-art-mphil-phd

The University of Leicester (UK) offers two MA courses, and has an excellent track record of students subsequently going into related professions, such as archaeology, the museum and heritage sector, education and academic research:

• • MA Archaeology and Heritage https://le.ac.uk/courses/archaeology-and-heritage-ma-dl/2025
  • MA Ancient History and Classical Archaeology https://le.ac.uk/courses/ancient-history-and-classical-archaeology-ma-dl/2025

Both our degrees are part-time (over 2 years) and by Distance Learning, meaning that it is possible for US-based students to study with us alongside paid work or caring responsibilities. The programmes each comprise 4 modules and a Dissertation, and are asynchronous, so that, while you will be supported through each module by a member of our academic staff, recorded lectures and reading materials are available round-the-clock. This means that students in different time zones can manage their study around their commitments. The links above provide information about fees, the structure of the course, and how to apply.