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SVA: A PRIMER
1947 – 2022
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A brief history of the School of Visual Arts
ost of you reading this already know a good deal about the School of Visual Arts. In all likelihood you are one of the College’s 41,000plus alumni, but maybe you are one of the more than 7,000 undergraduate, graduate and continuing-education students, from more than 128 countries, who are attending now, or among the unknown number of applicants who hope to enroll next year. You could be among the approximately 1,300 people (many of them, not coincidentally, also alumni or current students) employed by SVA, whether as faculty, staff or administration. Or maybe you are a relative stranger to SVA and found this magazine by happenstance—on a friend or relative’s coffee table, in an artist’s studio or, less likely, buried in a time capsule, someday far into the future.
Cartoonists & Illustrators School founded
1947
First show of student work
Regardless, for all but a select few Visual Arts Journal readers, there is probably much of the College’s history—its founding, its founders, its 75 years of evolution and growth—that you don’t know. A fuller, more colorful version of this story may be found in a commemorative anniversary book that will be published early next year by the Visual Arts Press, the in-house design studio at SVA (see page 4). A truly exhaustive account may be pieced together through dedicated research at the SVA Archives, established in 2007 to house College publications, records and other ephemera (archives.sva.edu). But for those looking for an overview, the following text should suffice.
C&I moves to Demilt Dispensary
1950
First professionalexhibition
SVA’S FOUNDERS, Silas H. Rhodes and Burne Hogarth, came from different professional backgrounds. Rhodes, a Bronx-born World War II Army pilot with a PhD in English, was working in the federal government’s Veterans Administration (now Veterans Affairs). Hogarth, four years Rhodes’s senior and raised in Chicago, had been a working cartoonist since his teens, and was best known for his work on the Tarzan of the Apes, a newspaper strip he illustrated for many years beginning in the late 1930s. The two met through their shared interest in left-wing politics (more on that later).
With young veterans looking to start civilian careers and the GI Bill offering funding for education and vocational training, Hogarth had been trying to start a school that prepared artists for commercial and editorial success—“teaching the actual, working, two-fisted facts about cartooning and illustration,” as he wrote not
George Tscherny, first design faculty member, hired
1955
C&I renamed School of Visual Arts
long after, in an essay announcing the school’s launch. Together, the two established the Cartoonists and Illustrators School, or C&I for short, with Rhodes securing the VA’s approval.
C&I was initially located in a partitioned loft space at 89th Street and Columbus Avenue on the Upper West Side, with an inaugural enrollment of 35 and a faculty of three. As both numbers grew, so did the school’s footprint. In 1950, operations relocated to the Demilt Dispensary, a 19th-century building at the corner of Second Avenue and 23rd Street, which has since been torn down. Six years later, to reflect its expanding mission, C&I was renamed the School of Visual Arts and by 1960, it had moved once again, to a one-time dental school at 209 East 23rd Street. SVA still occupies this address today, which now serves as the nucleus of a sprawling and noncontiguous campus comprising more than 10 buildings and nearly 1 million square feet of space. IN 1970, Hogarth retired from SVA, eventually moving to California. He published a number of instructional books and collections of his work, lectured widely and was internationally recognized for his role in the development of comics as an art form. He died in 1996, at the age of 84.
Rhodes, who had been the driver behind the school’s transformation into a more fully rounded educational institution, attracting applicants from not just the New York City area but around the world, served as president until 1978—when the current president, his son David, was appointed to the role—after which he served as chairman of the College’s board until his death in 2007, at the age of 91.
The SVA of today and the past several decades has been, in large part, a family enterprise. In addition to President David Rhodes, another of Silas’s sons, Anthony, occupies the executive vice president position, from which he runs the College’s administrative operations, admissions and alumni outreach. Both brothers have worked at SVA in varying capacities since their teens. Among other early jobs, David once painted the banisters in the 209 East 23rd Street building. More consequentially, he also served as director of Admissions, chair of Humanities and Sciences and vice president for Academic Affairs. Anthony’s earlier service included time as an admissions counselor and director of Continuing Education, which reorganized with its current director, Joseph Cipri (BFA 1987 Media Arts). With Gary Shillet, the College’s long-serving chief financial officer, he also established the Human Resources office.
SVA moves to 209 East 23rd Street
1960
SVA becomes a three-year institutionof higher education
FROM LEFT Early C&I posters; U.S. Army portrait of Silas Rhodes; undated photo of Rhodes teaching; early C&I catalog, featuring Burne Hogarth in the upper left photo; C&I’s second home; Will Eisner’s Gallery, 1975, presenting of SVA student work; SVA painting studio, c.1966. Images courtesy the SVA Archives and Visual Arts Press.
First on-campusgallery opens
1961
Salvador Dalí speaks to students
1963
Shirley Glaser named gallery coordinator
1964
Four-year fine artsprogram established
Keith Haring (1979 Fine Arts) works in a campus space during his time as an SVA student, c. late 1970s; completed SVA gallery show proposal form by Haring, 1979. Images courtesy the SVA Archives.
SVA: A PRIMER
1947 – 2022
C&I DID NOT OFFER degrees, but within a few years it had already grown to add classes in advertising and design. As SVA, the institution’s ambition and scope broadened further, with courses in fine art, fashion, television (and later film), photography and the humanities.
In 1972, the New York State Board of Regents— the governing authority for educational programs in the state—authorized SVA to confer the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, making it the first proprietary school in New York to be so recognized. The College’s offerings were subsequently accredited by other organizations, including the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. In 1991, SVA became a charter member of the Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design, or AICAD, a nonprofit consortium of 37 Canadian and American institutions, as well as six affiliate schools overseas, dedicated to sharing best practices and promoting the value of an education in the arts.
Just over 10 years after its introduction of BFA degree programs, the College won approval for its first master’s degree program, MFA Fine Arts. In 2022, SVA is home to 11 undergraduate and 19 graduate departments in a range of creative fields, from animation to interior design to art therapy. Its most recent degree offering is a Master of Arts option from the Art Education Department (which has run an MAT program since 2003). This fall, what is arguably the College’s oldest department, for cartooning, changed its name to BFA Comics, in recognition of how the discipline has grown since 1947 (see page 11).
BEGINNING WITH Hogarth himself, SVA policy was to employ top working professionals as its instructors, a tradition that continues today. As Silas Rhodes once explained, “If students are not exposed to greatness, they will never understand certain aspects of greatness.”
A full accounting of distinguished SVA faculty would be impossible in this space. Instructors in the College’s foundational subjects—cartooning and illustration—have included the late Will Eisner, creator of The Spirit comic strip and early graphic novel A Contract With God; the late Harvey Kurtzman, creator of Mad (the late BFA 1976 Media Arts alumnus Nick Meglin and 1969 alumnus Al Jaffee, among other graduates, would go on to work for the magazine); and the late Robert Weaver, an illustrator whose journalistic approach helped to transform the practice. George Tscherny, the designer responsible for identity campaigns for W.R. Grace and Texasgulf (as well as SVA’s flower-like logo, created in 1997), was the first design faculty member to be hired, in 1955, and such influential talents as Paula Scher and the late Ivan Chermayeff and Milton Glaser followed. Other past and present faculty include artists Carrie Mae Weems, Lorraine O’Grady and the late Alice Neel; critics Jerry Saltz, Amy Taubin and Lynne Tillman; avant-garde composer Steve Reich; the late cinematographer Gordon Willis (The Godfather trilogy) and three-time Academy Award-winning sound engineer Christopher Newman (The Exorcist, Amadeus).
Visual Arts Press,in-house studio,founded
1970
Department in Media Arts is created
1971
SVA authorized to confer BFA degrees
1972
SVA Alumni Societyincorporated
1972
SVA celebrates 25 years
1972
Film department addsanimation
FROM THE START, SVA’s lean administration, its willingness to experiment and its trust of faculty to structure and teach their courses and programs as they best see fit have given it an agility rare among institutions of higher education. This quality is often credited among administrative and academic leadership as the reason for the College’s success.
“SVA, for me, was the freedom to have a vision and be able to not have anybody looking over you, or telling you you couldn’t do it,” says Lita Talarico, co-founder and co-chair of MFA Design at SVA (see page 42).
This spirit of experimentation and innovation runs throughout the College’s operations. SVA was an early adopter of the computer as a creative tool: its MFA program in computer art, launched in 1986, is considered the first of its kind in the U.S. Since 2011, the BFA Fine Arts Department has been home to a “bio art” laboratory—equipped with a host of scientific instruments, workstations and collections—for the pursuit of projects at the intersection of science and fine art. The SVA Destinations programs—short-term, location-based courses in Cuba, Los Angeles, Bali and Italy, among other places— are created and organized by faculty and staff, not the administration.
Begun in the mid-1950s, SVA’s most consistent advertising effort, a long-running poster campaign designed for display in New York City’s subway stations (see page 11), also functions as a public-art project: the participating faculty are given considerable leeway with the assignment, and encouraged to create a work that is personally meaningful to them. Early on, SVA committed to an enterprising and inventive exhibitions program for both students and visiting artists (see page 28), and under the leadership of 3D Design Chair Kevin O’Callaghan (BFA 1980 Media Arts), students have also mounted attention-grabbing themed shows in such iconic New York spaces as Rockefeller Center (such as “Dashing Through New York,” a 2018 exhibition of repurposed sleighs) and Grand Central Terminal (“Yugo Next,” a 1995 exhibition of repurposed Yugo cars).
SVA hosts first commencement
1976
SVA receives MSCHE accreditation
1978
David Rhodes named SVA president
1978
First off-campus gallery opens
1979
First international program, in Morocco
1980
First MFA program, in fine arts
FROM LEFT “Dashing Through New York,” 2018; C&I class, c.1947; Milton Glaser with students, 1987; an SVA Chelsea Gallery exhibition; November 23, 1981, cover of Canvas; November 13 – 15, 1969, issue of The Utterer; poster for “Black Artists” (1970), organized by the United Black Artists of SVA; “Send Our Boys Home” (1966), an anti-Vietnam War poster by Cris Gianakos (1955 Fine Arts), which Silas Rhodes displayed in his office; figuredrawing class; campus green-screen studio; WSVA, SVA’s radio station, c.1983, photo by Nuriel Guedalia. Images courtesy the SVA Archives, Gianakos and the Visual Arts Press.
SVA: A PRIMER
1947 – 2022
STUDENT LIFE AT SVA —an urban campus in the heart of Manhattan, populated with artists from all over the world—has never been the stereotypical American college experience. There is no athletics program, no grassy quad, no Greek life. Instead, the College has developed a campus culture all its own.
In 1970, SVA established WSVA, the College radio station, which originally broadcast on the FM band and now streams online (wsvaradio.sva.edu). In the 1975 – 1976 academic year, SVA students formed the Visual Arts Student Association, the College’s student government. VASA officers, elected annually, organize fairs, parties, cultural outings and other events throughout the year and engage the SVA administration on issues affecting students’ experiences. Student housing was introduced in 1981, with the rental of several dozen rooms in a nearby YMCA building, Sloane House; today the College operates four residence halls, including the purpose-built 24th Street Residence, opened in 2016. And while student newspapers (Canvas, The Utterer) have come and gone through the years, Visual Opinion, a student-produced art and literary magazine, has been publishing for two decades and counting.
Veterans remain integral to the campus community. SVA participates in the Yellow Ribbon Program, which offers tuition and fee assistance not covered by the Post-9/11 GI Bill, offers a veterans’ discount on continuing education, and is routinely included on the Military Friendly Schools list, compiled each year by the veteran-owned marketing and research company VIQTORY. The Veteran Coalition of Arts, a collective dedicated to supporting and promoting the work of veteran artists, is among the many student-run clubs on campus. (Others include the Asian American Student Union, Black Student Union, Cartoon Allies, La Bodega, LGBTQ+ SVA and a Women in Animation chapter.)
A PARAMOUNT VALUE at SVA, as at any creditable college or university, is a commitment to free speech. This has been a personal value for the College’s leadership as well.
Hogarth and Rhodes’s early political associations—both had attended Communist Party meetings years before founding SVA—resulted in a contentious appearance in 1956 before notorious red-baiting Senator Joseph McCarthy and a Senate subcommittee investigating schools that were supported through the GI Bill, and a subsequent audit from the VA, which temporarily put the school’s future in doubt.
Years later, David Rhodes, not yet SVA president, would be arrested in 1965 for his participation in the civil rights marches from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, organized in part by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, then led by John Lewis, who would later become a member of Congress. (In 2014, Lewis delivered the SVA Commencement
SVA establishes first computer artMFA in the U.S.
1986
SVA celebrates 40 years
1987
Art for Kids program begins
1987
First Masters Series exhibition
1988
Anthony Rhodesappointed VP foradministration
1992
SVA hosts first annual Digital Salon
keynote address. His National Book Award–winning graphic-novel memoir series, March, was illustrated by BFA 2000 Cartooning graduate Nate Powell.)
On campus, SVA students have organized protests against the Vietnam War in the 1960s and ’70s and, in the 1980s, U.S. policies in Central America and South Africa; this past year, a group of SVA staff, faculty and students participated in New York City’s Pride March (see page 9), in support of LGBTQ+ equality. In 1969, SVA hosted the first meeting of the Art Workers Coalition, a group formed to advocate for workers’ rights and fair wages. Silas Rhodes was known for allowing antiwar activists to use the College’s facilities to print their posters and leaflets, and David Rhodes directed College resources to support a number of advocacy campaigns masterminded by Milton Glaser (who became acting chairman of the SVA Board following the elder Rhodes’s death). These drew attention to everything from genocide in Darfur to our catastrophically warming planet. AS SVA LOOKS to the future and the drafting of its next strategic plan, expected in the coming years, the institution’s challenges and opportunities are clear.
As the art and design professions become increasingly global and decentralized— and long-running issues of representation and equality deservedly come to the fore—the College will endeavor to expand its curriculums and recruit its students, faculty and staff with an increased focus on inclusivity. To that end, SVA established an office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in 2020, charged with identifying, prioritizing and addressing inequities on campus, and engaging the entire College community in its efforts. Other ongoing efforts include developing a campus master plan, to best harness SVA’s existing space and resources; encouraging continued innovation in the College’s academic programs and engagement with peer institutions and industry partners; and, most significantly, converting the institution to a nonprofit organization, to better secure the College’s continued success in the decades to come.
“In my 44 years as president,” President Rhodes says, “there has been no ‘grand design’ other than to be the best art college. SVA has moved toward that goal incrementally—one decision, one program at a time. I expect that, whatever its structure, SVA will continue in this pragmatic way, while hiring good people and giving them the freedom to achieve excellence.” ◆
FROM LEFT 1966 SVA photo by Chris Stein (1973 Fine Arts); “Straight Information” lectures poster, 1971; 1981 exhibition flier printed at SVA; SVA Destinations; the BFA Fine Arts Bio Art Lab, opened in 2011; SVA’s International Student Office; Devaun Dowdy (BFA 2020 Cartooning) in a shirt by A.E. Kieren (MFA 2021 Illustration as Visual Essay) for the spring 2020 Style, a Visual Arts Press publication; SVA’s 24th Street Residence, opened in 2016; the SVA Theatre, opened in 2009. Images courtesy the SVA Archives, SVA Printshop and Visual Arts Press.
SVA celebrates 50 years
1997
George Tschernycreates logo
1997
Milton Glaser DesignStudy Center and Archives opens
2006
SVA Theatre opens
2009
24th Street Residence welcomes students
2016
