The 2026 cohort is a wrap · 2027 applications open this Spring

THE
LIVING
CITY

MFA

A real arts education — technical literacy, critical thinking, personal artistic voice — with one difference: the classroom is New York City itself.

14
Weeks
5
Focus Areas
~$300
All-in Cost
∞
Good Summers
Keep Me Posted for 2027 See the 2026 Calendar
The Living City MFA

NYC · See you in 2027

Guggenheim✦ Nuyorican Poets Café✦ MoMA PS1 Warm Up✦ Lincoln Center✦ The Strand✦ Dance Church✦ LES Gallery Walk✦ Roulette Intermedium✦ Harlem Cultural Walk✦ Smalls Jazz✦ Graduation Gallery Opening✦ Guggenheim✦ Nuyorican Poets Café✦ MoMA PS1 Warm Up✦ Lincoln Center✦ The Strand✦ Dance Church✦ LES Gallery Walk✦ Roulette Intermedium✦ Harlem Cultural Walk✦ Smalls Jazz✦ Graduation Gallery Opening✦

The Central Premise

The city
is the classroom.

A real MFA develops three things simultaneously: technical literacy, critical thinking, and personal artistic voice. This version aims to do the same.

Free museum entry, cheap theatre tickets, gallery openings, public performances, and community concerts become a curriculum — curated, briefed, and debriefed together as a cohort. Before each event, a brief to sharpen your thinking. After each one, a conversation where we genuinely interrogate what we experienced.

Then we end with a graduation to celebrate ourselves, art, New York City, life, wine (probably), and each other.

What You'll Need

01
A journal or sketchbook
Weekly reflections and notes. You'll write in it, draw in it, argue with yourself in it.
02
Around $250–300
All-inclusive ticket costs if you attend all ticketed events. Most things are free or very cheap by design.
03
3–6 hours per week
Including events, reflections, and group conversation. This is a commitment, not a drop-in.
04
Willingness to make things badly
You will draw, write, move, and create. Quality is not the point. Attention is.

Five Focus Areas

What we're
actually studying.

These run concurrently — not as silos but as overlapping lenses on every experience.

01
Seeing & Making
Visual Art and Object
Learning to read visual work rigorously — formal analysis, conceptual intention, and the difference between what something looks like and what it means.
02
Sound, Time & Attention
Music and Sonic Art
Listening as a discipline, not a pastime. Music production thinking, contemporary composition, and the politics of sound in public space.
03
Body, Space & Presence
Theatre and Performance
Live art as a distinct medium. Dramatic structure, site-specific work, community participation in movement. What does it mean that performance disappears?
04
Context, Power & History
Critical and Cultural Theory
Who decides what is art? Who gets shown, funded, and canonised — and why? Art history as a contested narrative. This runs as a thread through everything.
05
Practice
Your Own Making
An MFA doesn't end at consumption. Written reflections, short creative experiments, and peer critique sessions that treat us as a real cohort — not just drinkers of wine and yappers (though we are).

The 2026 Calendar

June – September 2026

The 2026 cohort has wrapped. Here’s what we got up to — the 2027 calendar is coming soon.

Wk
Date
Event
Focus
Cost
01
Jun 25
Guggenheim: Carol BoveDeep-focus single-exhibition visit. Closes Aug 2.
Seeing & Making
$30
02a
Jun 29
Nuyorican Bowery SlamLiterary oral tradition. Weekly Monday slam.
Context & Power
$20
02b
Jun 29 wk
Strand Book EventPrint culture event. Line-up TBC.
Context & Power
$10–15
03
Jul 6
Self-Led Reflection & Creative WritingNo event. Share a reading, reflection, or self-directed written piece.
Practice + Context
Free
04
Jul 18
MoMA PS1 Warm UpElectronic music in the museum courtyard. Free for LIC residents.
Sound & Time
$25
05
Jul 20 wk
Lincoln Center: Summer for the CityFree outdoor performance. Spoken word, music, or dance. TBC.
Body & Presence
Free
06
Jul 20 wk
Watercolour or Sketching in the ParkGroup drawing session. Figures, landscapes, and architecture.
Seeing + Practice
Free
07
Jul 27 wk
Poetry Writing SessionGuided session. We begin creating our own work.
Practice + Context
Free (aim)
08
Aug 1 wk
Self-Led Visual CreationNo event. Theme for a visual piece shared in advance.
Seeing + Practice
Free
09a
Aug 13
Dance ChurchExpressionistic movement class taught by professional dance artists.
Body + Practice
$17
09b
Aug 16
LES Gallery Walk + Figure DrawingTwo sessions: looking, then making. Lower East Side.
Seeing + Practice
$35
10
Aug 17 wk
Theatre (TDF tickets)Music, script, costuming. Interdisciplinary relationships. TBC.
Body & Presence
$40–60
11
Aug 24 wk
Roulette IntermediumExperimental music and visual environment. How space shapes sonic experience.
Sound & Time
$25
12
Aug 29
Harlem Cultural WalkPolitics and art history in conversation. Harlem Renaissance through to now.
Context & Power
Free
12b
Aug 31 wk
Smalls JazzImprovisational session. Collaboration as a group to produce art.
Sound & Time
$20–40
13
Sep 7 wk
Synthesis SessionNo event. Just the cohort. Critical reflection on the summer's body of work.
Practice
Free
14
Sep 19
Group Share and FeedbackShare a finished piece of work for feedback and critique.
Practice
Free
🎉
Sep 21 wk
Graduation — The Good List Gallery OpeningCelebrate ourselves, art, New York City, life, and each other. Manhattan.
All Focus Areas
Free

How Each Week Works

Three things,
every time.

1
Pre-Event Framing
A short brief lands before each session — not to tell you what to think, but to give you a question worth carrying into the room. You arrive with intention, not just curiosity.
2
Post-Event Reflection
Structured journalling after each experience — specific prompts, specific claims. Not free-form. The discipline is the point.
3
Group Dialogue
Our cohort functions as a seminar. The conversation is the examination. You come prepared to make one specific claim and to have it interrogated.

What You'll Leave With

Fourteen weeks
of looking.

TLCMFA

2027 Applications

See you in 2027?

The 2026 cohort is over — thank you to everyone who showed up, looked closely, and made something. We’ll open applications for the 2027 programme in Spring.

Still no audition. No portfolio. No gatekeeping. This is for anyone who wants to spend a summer taking art seriously, in the best classroom in the world.

Hit the button and send us a quick email — we’ll let you know as soon as applications for 2027 open.

The only requirement is that you show up — to the events, to the conversation, and to the work of making something.

Keep Me Posted ✦

Applications for 2027
open in Spring.