Master of Fine Arts - Fine Arts

at Massey University - Wellington Campus New Zealand

It’s a flexible program of study with lots of choices. You’ll be introduced to the basics of art and design:

• Creative thinking
• Visual communication
• Specialist skills
• Critical awareness.
• No portfolio is required, just passion.

The Diploma in Visual Arts is made up of eight courses from the first year of our Bachelor of Fine Arts and Bachelor of Design programs.
You’ll study with art and design degree students in a range of studio and lecture-based courses. These exciting courses cover everything from critical and contextual studies to social media, painting, and digital fabrication.

The world is undergoing a radical shift in how people communicate, work and share ideas. More people can share more ideas in more ways than ever before - photos, video, animations, tweets, graphics and experiences. We can connect with people across countries, languages and cultures. People can interact with governments and corporations in new ways, while they are using the same tools to try to influence us.

Visual communication design (VCD) offers huge scope and flexibility. At Massey, we teach a diverse range of media, like print, web and video, and give you the chance to try all of them. Within VCD you can explore and specialise in print, typographic and editorial design, information and graphic design, web, interaction and service design, and illustration and branding. You’ll learn to solve complex design problems. You’ll follow your interests and aspirations by developing a higher level of expertise in a specific area.

The Bachelor of Commercial Music (Honours) is a one-year degree, with taught courses followed by an independent project. You’ll get one-on-one mentorship and support from our industry-connected academics.

You’ll gain more skills in research, development and creating prototypes and learn how to make your work professional. Your creative work will be research-driven, as you explore your place in the complex, ever-changing music industry.

This includes world-class recording facilities and technology labs, as well as a range of immersive media technologies. You’ll learn from well-connected academics who have extensive research and performance expertise in New Zealand and across the globe.

In the Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours – BFA (Hons) – you’ll spend two-thirds of your time in the studio, experiencing different approaches to making art, and developing your own unique practice.

The qualification isn’t media-specific so you can focus on the methods and ideas of contemporary art production, and make bodies of new work that are responsive to a variety of contexts. Work, learn, and collaborate alongside students across disciplines and year levels. You can work across a range of media, such as:

• Sculpture
• Painting
• Drawing
• Performance
• Installation
• Moving Image
• Photography
• Printmaking
• Site-Responsive Work
• Curatorial Activities
• Art Writing.

The BFA (Hons) will stretch you, ground you in art theory and immerse you in art-making, with the support of some of New Zealand’s most notable fine artists.

You’ll gain an understanding of the complexities, challenges, and rewards of interpersonal and organizational communication – you’ll be a communication specialist.

The Bachelor of Communication (Communication Management) gives you insight into how organisations and communities use communication, whatever form it takes. You’ll investigate how factors such as culture, gender and technology influence our ability to connect with others.

Explore and develop fashion design concepts, garments, accessories or systems that respond to the times. Consider the global impact of the multi-billion dollar fashion industry and explore how fashion can have a more sustainable future.

You’ll learn skills in idea generation, fashion communication, patternmaking, construction, materials, historail and contemporary fashion analysis, and critical thinking.

Degree-level study of fashion design teaches innovative and creative design of apparel, skills in producing patterns and prototype garments, knowledge of textile materials, market and trend analysis. This qualification will help you develop the ability to position fashion products in the marketplace.

Discover how the media shape our identities and our world. Massey will help you create, critique, and connect with the media world, building skills to understand and make media for a wide range of professional communication roles.

Media studies is an exciting discipline that will prepare you for the challenges of an information-rich society.

Media studies is taught through an innovative qualification that blends theory with creative practice. It analyses the production, consumption and content of media and their social, cultural, political and economic implications.

You will learn how decisions are made on what is communicated, how media forms and industry structures shape those messages, and how this impacts our lives and understanding of the world.

Media studies will help you become a flexible and critical thinker and maker, equipped to be a digitally literate, politically-engaged citizen.

Expressive arts is unique in New Zealand and was created in response to student demand. As part of your study, you will be able to choose from a range of activities such as devising, directing and writing theatre, writing creative works including fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, writing for children, and screenplays, or filming and producing digital video.

Commonplace across all major broadcasters and platforms is the audience's desire to consume factual series, bite-size web content and formatted shows from around the world. Factual Production is usually associated with non-fiction broadcast and includes formats such as documentary, chat shows, comedy, quiz and reality shows etc. In addition to broadcast TV, these formats are distributed across a number of different digital platforms both real-time and pre-recorded.

You will go on a journey of discovering compelling real-world true stories and characters lighting the screens of Aotearoa, as well as the international market. This deep dive into factual development, production and post- production reveals the mechanisms of fun and formatted, multi-camera, and studio shows all the way to long-form storytelling around the big issues of the day and character-based features.

We will investigate how the story or format defines the best approach to making the content, alongside explorations to discover your unique, creative voice. 

The Master of Management (Communication) focuses on key skills that will increase your business knowledge, to help move your career in a new direction.

Perhaps you do not have previous communication experience, but have found yourself a manager of communications staff. Or you may be looking at moving into a management role in a communications area. The Master of Management (Communication) will give you the in-depth knowledge and skills for these roles.

The strategic management of communication channels within an organisation is a growing discipline. It can be very demanding, requiring an ability to multi-task and constantly re-prioritise.

The Master of Management is a professional, relevant and contemporary qualification.

It has a unique core of courses that focus on key business skills like communication, leading and working in teams, and current issues in business.