Careers

Our Program in Art and Art History will prepare you to think critically, create thoughtfully, and engage deeply with the cultural, historical, and social dimensions of art. As an art history major, you will graduate from our program with knowledge about specific artistic traditions and dialogues plus skills in developing an argument and producing well-crafted writing. As a studio art major, you’ll graduate with the skills required to make considered aesthetic choices while working on art projects, all the while learning technical and material knowledge relevant to one or more artistic traditions. In addition, all our students learn to understand dialogues within historical and present-day artmaking and that artwork exists in a socio-political-economic context. You will also explore differing perspectives on the human condition, which offers opportunities to increase empathy and appreciation for others.

A person works in an art studio beside a large, colorful painting, with paint containers and brushes in the foreground.

Person concentrates while painting or drawing at a worktable in a studio.

Person wearing gloves examines an ornate embroidered garment laid out on a table beside a laptop.

What Can You Do with a Liberal Arts Degree with a Major in Art or Art History?

Blending creative practice, critical thinking, and historical insight, our studio art and art history majors prepare you to analyze, create, and interpret visual culture across time and place, leading to careers in artistic creation, museums, galleries, education, arts administration, and more.

Past UVM art history majors have gone on to work in careers such as:

Museum curator
Museum director
Archivist
Visual resources curator
Professor
Academic researcher
Education program manager
Author
Art critic
Art conservation technician

Past UVM studio art majors have gone on to work in careers such as:

Visual artist
Graphic designer
Scenic designer
Production designer
Art director
K-12 art teacher
Professor
Exhibition installer
Studio manager
Freelance illustrator

A group gathers around displayed artwork in a studio, looking closely and discussing the pieces.

What You’ll Learn

When you graduate with an art history or studio art major from UVM, you’ll have gained the tools you need to be successful in your career, including the top five skills employers are looking for, according to the National Association of College and Employers Job Outlook 2025.

What You’ll Learn

When you graduate with an art history or studio art major from UVM, you’ll have gained the tools you need to be successful in your career, including the top five skills employers are looking for, according to the National Association of College and Employers Job Outlook 2025.

UVM Art and Art History Students Learn the Top Skills Employers Want

Critical Thinking and Problem Solving

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Critical thinking and problem solving are integral to courses in the arts. As an art history student, you’ll learn how to examine things visually and interpret visual data in foundational classes ranging from first-year seminars to the senior seminar. As a studio art student, you’ll learn from studio classes how to develop artworks in a rhetorical sense—that is, to render the visual effectively communicative.

Teamwork and Collaboration

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Opportunities to develop collaborative skills abound in both art history and studio art coursework. Group work and group critiques are an important part of our class structure, and both depend on the communication and planning that is essential to successful teamwork.

Written and Oral Communication Skills

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Whether you’re studying art history or studio art, you’ll learn how to analyze, write about, and speak about the aesthetic in complex ways, preparing you for virtually any career.

Professionalism and a Strong Work Ethic

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We have high expectations of all our students. You will be assigned demanding coursework, which in turn will foster a strong work ethic and practice. Additionally, the School of the Arts has developed professional practice coursework and other opportunities. The course “How to Get a Job in the Arts” has been extremely popular with our students, as has the course’s companion lecture series, “Careers in the Arts.” This series hosts four practicing creatives each semester, each of whom visits the class (physically or virtually) to describe and answer questions about their personal career path.

Initiative

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You have opportunities to excel if you take the initiative! You can do an independent study or honors thesis in original, advanced work in studio art or art history, and we have a beautiful, professional-quality art gallery that you can reserve to exhibit a body of artwork. In addition, you can do a variety of internal or external internships, pursue independent scholarly research for credit, and work as a teaching assistant for credit.

Alumni Spotlights: How the Liberal Arts Shaped Their Careers

Katharine L. Noiva ’13

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A person stands on a quiet forest path surrounded by bare trees and early spring greenery.

Lives in: Hinesburg, VT

Major/minor: Art history major, studio art minor

Why art? “I’ve always wanted to work in the arts but originally came to UVM to be an arts education major. I took my first art history course during my freshman fall semester and fell in love with the subject. I’ve always been fascinated by the way art history soaks up so much of what is going on during a particular time and place. I also appreciated the flexibility of the art history major for careers, especially where museums were concerned.”

Current position: Director of Visitor Experience & Learning at Lake Champlain Maritime Museum

What work looks like: “I supervise the Visitor Experience team and make sure the programs we offer support the mission, vision, and values of the Museum. I also support our exhibits, helping ensure they are written and designed to be accessible to a broad audience.”

What she loves about it: “I love witnessing the ‘light bulb’ moment when a visitor discovers something that directly links to their own experience. I believe making those connections gives people a sense of kinship with the past and helps them be more involved with and engaged in their futures.”

What she gained from a liberal arts education: “It gave me a solid understanding of a wide range of areas, taught me to be a better researcher and writer, and showed me how to engage with new and unfamiliar topics. Through the liberal arts, I developed the ability to find information through close observation and attention to detail, a skill that has been particularly useful as I’ve trained docents and learned to interpret historic collection items. Having a well-rounded education that covered a range of disciplines has been vital to my career, especially as I’ve grown professionally and changed positions and locations. It has provided me with the confidence to dip into new subjects and quickly gain a baseline understanding—a valuable tool in my profession.”

Grace Weaver ’11

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A person stands in an art studio with large paintings displayed on the wall behind them.

Lives in: Berlin, Germany and Brooklyn, NY

Major/minors: Studio art major, biology and art history double-minor

Why art? “I began my time at UVM considering a career in wildlife biology or conservation biology before finally finding my way to the studio art major, with the intention of becoming a professional artist.”

Current position: Artist

What work looks like: “I exhibit my artwork in galleries and museums in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. I spend most of my time painting and drawing but also spend time on administrative work, shipping and receiving, writing, editing, accounting, etc. ”

What she loves about it: “I love that there is no template for what it means to be a contemporary artist. As an artist you are constantly re-defining your own projects to best accommodate your obsessions, your influences, and the big questions you are trying to probe in the world.” 

What she gained from a liberal arts education: “Studying multiple disciplines in tandem gave me a blueprint for how I think and work today. By taking a wide variety of classes outside of my major I learned to approach my artistic projects as research endeavors, applying rigor and thoroughness to every inquiry, no matter how idiosyncratic or personal. Because of the wide-ranging aspect of my liberal arts education, I saw the importance of being legible not just to my own field of contemporary art but across disciplines. I learned this especially from my time in the Honors College, in which my fellow students came from all over the university to join in seminars on literature or philosophy. I also learned to value clarity in writing and self-presentation. This has all strengthened my belief in the importance of intellectual generosity.”

Robin Craren ‘10

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A person stands in a grassy meadow with forested hills and rocky mountains in the background.

Lives in: Drexel Hill, PA

Majors: Art history and political science

Why art history? “I found art history through the general education requirements for the College of Arts and Sciences. I took Kelley DiDio’s introductory to art history class. After scoring quite well on my first exam, Kelley asked me to visit her during her office hours. She convinced me to take the second introductory class and a seminar with her the following semester. The rest, as they say, is history.”

Current position: Senior Coordinator for Collections Information and Research at the Barnes Foundation

What work looks like: “I manage and do research into, and the writing of interpretive materials for, the art collection at the Barnes Foundation. I also work closely on projects related to our archival materials and publications.”

What she loves about it: “I enjoy engaging directly with art objects and being able to tell stories about them to the public. I also find their histories fascinating and fun to explore, both from the aspect of how they fit into history or an artist’s career and from the perspective of where they came from and how they ended up in our collection.”

What she gained from a liberal arts education: “I gained such a wide set of skills from my experience in the College of Arts and Sciences. Being able to take classes in different, but related, areas has helped me immensely and given me the ability to make connections between disparate subjects. The language and writing skills I gained have been the most helpful. Having a foundational understanding of government, history, language, and the arts has helped me to make connections within my writing and have a better understanding of our place in history. Studying the liberal arts has been very important to my overall career and life. Had I not had the opportunity to take that first art history class, I wouldn’t have pursued a career path in the museum field, I wouldn’t be in the position I hold today, and I wouldn’t be able to engage with art in a way that I find fulfilling.”