Residential Programs
Classes are held during the day Monday through Friday only. Students living on campus will enjoy evening and weekend programs and trips coordinated and run by a staff of Residential Counselors living on campus as well. Evening programs will include film viewings, karaoke nights and other social events. Weekend trips into the City as well as the surrounding area will include visits to museums; parks; concerts and New York City neighborhood visits (Chinatown, Greenwich Village, Harlem, Lincoln Center, Little Italy, Times Square, etc.).
- Application Fee for all High School Courses: $25
- Registration Deadline: Friday, June 20, 2008.
- Residential Programs: A deposit of $250 is due by the registration deadline.
- Meal Plan: Students will have $25/day allotted on their Student ID cards to purchase food at the Ruth Leff Siegel Center. This is enough money to cover breakfast, lunch, and dinner each day. The Siegel Center offers an assortment of food choices from sandwiches to salads, grilled items such as hamburgers and chicken as well as soup, entrees and a full range of beverages.
Check-in/Registration Information
- Sunday, June 22, 2008: Filmmaking Program
- Sunday, July 13, 2008: Three-Week Programs
2-5:30 p.m. – Check-in/Registration
5:30-6 p.m. – Orientation
6-7:30 p.m. – Dinner
Campus tours will be given throughout the day at 2:30 p.m., 3 p.m., 3:30 p.m., and 4 p.m.
For the three-week programs, there will be smaller orientations for each class right after the large group orientation, during dinner.
Friday, August 1
All of the programs will celebrate the completion of their Summer Intensives with a recital, exhibition, performances, and film viewings of their work to take place throughout the day. Parents and friends are welcome to attend these activities as well.
Saturday, August 2
7-9:30 a.m. – Breakfast
Check-out by 11 a.m.
Preliminary schedules will be online for each of the programs.
Sarah Lawrence College & The International Film Institute of New York’s Six-Week Summer Filmmaking Intensive
Sunday, June 22–Saturday, August 2
Deposit: $250
Tuition: $4,875
Housing: $1,700
Meal Plan: $945
This six-week, intensive program offers hands-on experience and instruction in all aspects of filmmaking and focuses on four core elements: writing for the screen, directing, production, and post-production. Lectures feature hands-on camera work, augmented by special guest speakers and behind-the-scenes visits to Manhattan production studios and editing facilities. After you shoot three film exercises focused on different filmmaking techniques, you’re ready to write, direct, produce, shoot, and edit your own short video. You choose the format–narrative, documentary, or experimental. You may choose to stick to a script with actors, costumes, and a controlled set, or you may approach your shoot with the spirit of improvisation. You’re the director. You call the shots. The final product is your completed short–to which you own the exclusive rights–ready for your professional portfolio, graduate school application, or Web distribution.
Review a sample schedule for the Six Week Summer Filmmaking Intensive.
Information Sessions
Thursdays, January 10; February 14; March 6; April 10; May 8
Meet with Misael Sanchez, Co-Director of the International Film Institute of New York, and Liz Irmiter, Director of Special Programs at Sarah Lawrence College, to learn more about the program and tour the facilities used during the summer. This is an opportunity for you to hear about the curriculum, the faculty, where you will be living, and any other questions you may have about the program. Each information session is held at 1 p.m. and lasts about an hour. Please call Liz Irmiter at (914) 395-2693 to RSVP.
Sarah Lawrence College’s Summer in the City
Instructors: Roland Dollinger, Christine Farrell, and Leah Olson
Sunday, July 13–Saturday, August 2
Tuition: $2,750
Housing & Meal Plan: $1,450
Using New York City as the backdrop, students will take three, one-week classes about the history and literature, science, and theatre of New York. This exciting new program will give you an opportunity to discover the city that eight million people call home while staying just 30 minutes away on the beautiful Sarah Lawrence College campus. Throughout the six weeks, you will travel into the City, visiting theatres, neighborhoods, and landmarks that will give you a deeper understanding of the subjects you will study in literature, history, theatre, and science. Included in the tuition fee is the cost of admission into museums, plays, readings, and National Parks.
History of New York
During the first week, students will study some of the major periods, developments, and influential personalities who have shaped the rich history of New York City. We will explore Dutch New Amsterdam, English New York, and the Americanization of the Big Apple; we will analyze the various waves of immigration to New York; and we will discuss major historical and cultural events such as the construction of Central Park or the Brooklyn Bridge.But students will also learn about the city’s history by visiting Ellis Island, the Museum of the History of New York, the Tenement Museum, the Empire State Building, and Philipse Manor (a reconstructed Dutch farm).
Francois Weil’s A History of New York will be our textbook.
Science in the City
This week we will explore the world of science and nature as found in New York City. From the Hudson River to The New York Aquarium on Coney Island, New York City has tried to preserve and conserve its rich and beautiful natural heritage while at the same time providing technological and scientific leadership of our country. We will explore our outstanding museums and scientific institutions, such as the Hayden Planetarium, The National History Museum, The Hudson River Museum, the Sony Wonder Technology Lab and the Liberty Science Center that document, conserve, and help develop ways to build a respectful, sustainable relationship between humans and our world. We will also spend time thinking about how to better understand human behavior, and will learn about brain and brain processes through an afternoon lab spent dissecting a brain.
Theatre of New York
Explore the New York City theatre scene through the eyes of an actor. This will be the focus of the final week of the course. Students will work on monologues and scenes from the three productions that we will see On and Off Broadway. They will be chosen from three distinct styles; a classical piece (perhaps Shakespeare in the Park), experimental (the work of the Wooster Group or LaMaMa), and an Off Broadway play by a new, young American playwright.
To create a strong ensemble and a sense of creative play, we will study improvisational skills throughout the week and attend an evening of improvisational comedy (Upright Citizens Brigade, The Pit, or Barrow Street Theater). One of the afternoons will be spent in the Theater District discussing the history of New York theatre, watching a professional acting class, and sitting in on an audition for a play or musical. Students do not need any prior acting experience, simply the willingness to work with the material on their feet and allow their bodies to experience the language and techniques of a trained actor.
Monday, July 14–Friday, August 1
7-9:30 a.m. – Breakfast
10 a.m.-12 p.m. – Class
12-1 p.m. – Lunch
Afternoon trips into New York City three days a week.
5:30-7 p.m. – Dinner
Young Artists Summer Music Intensive
Instructors: Glenn Alexander, William Anderson, Joan Forsyth, Members of the Cygnus Ensemble, and The Glenn Alexander Trio (with Kermit Driscoll and Terry Silverlight)
Sunday, July 13–Saturday, August 2
Tuition: $2,450
Housing & Meal Plan: $1,450
Expand upon existing skills while exploring new concepts. Students will be organized into ensembles and assigned a faculty coach. Students may hone their performance skills in daily master classes and a final concert experience. Classes in jazz improvisation, composition and keyboard skills promote the kind of creative musical thinking necessary for today’s musicians. Classes include: Introduction to Music Theory, Aural Skills, Sight Reading, Jazz Improvisation, Composition, Keyboard Skills, Master Classes, and Ensembles.
Musical Elements
Provides students the strong musical foundation. Subject matter will include topics in music theory, harmony, analysis, and ear training. Participants will be divided into small groups according to their level of proficiency.
Jazz Improvisation
This class covers basic chord progressions, scales and riffs and provides both a forum for beginners and a chance for accomplished players to explore new styles and expand their skills. There will also be a Blues Ensemble open to all participants with further improvisation opportunities.
Composition
This course explores contemporary compositional techniques in various idioms, including songwriting.
Keyboard Skills
This course will help students develop sight reading ability, transposition, figured bass, accompanimental styles, improvisation.
Master Classes
Master classes provide a forum for student performance and discussion. Master classes will be lead alternately by members of the summer music program faculty. In addition to solo and ensemble coaching the master classes will deal with performance practice with relevant historical background.
Ensembles
Ensemble playing, instrumental and vocal, is a vital part of the SLC musical experience. Each group will be assigned a faculty coach and repertoire, with the goal of performing in master classes and in the final concert at the end of the session. Students will be encouraged to send a recording and repertoire list in order to be assigned music before their arrival.
Chorus
All students are encouraged to participate in chorus. It is the foundation of musicianship across a spectrum of styles. Classes will include warm-up technique, and instruction in proper vocal production.
Preliminary Schedule
Monday, July 14-Thursday, July 31
7-9 a.m. – Breakfast
9-10 a.m. –Music Theory
10-11 a.m. – Keyboard Skills or Composition Rehearsal
11 a.m.-12 p.m. – Jazz Improvisation and Ensemble Rehearsal
12-1:30 p.m. – Lunch
1:30-2:30 p.m. – Blues Ensemble and Chorus
2:30-3:30 p.m. – Ensemble Rehearsal and Coaching
3:30-5 p.m. – Master Class
5:30-7 p.m. – Dinner
Practice Time: Evenings and Weekends
Concentrating on the Visual: Painting, Sculpture, Watercolor, Printmaking
Instructors: Drawing, José Ruiz; Experimental Painting, Chris Randolph; Sculpture, Chad Stayrook; Watercolor Painting, Hillary Altman; Printmaking, Amy Gartrell
Sunday, July 13–Saturday, August 2
Tuition: $2,500 (includes most supplies)
Housing & Meal Plan: $1,450
Focus on either sculpture, painting or printmaking. Courses are offered in painting: Experimental Painting; Variations in Aqua Media; Sculpture: Techniques, Methods, and Concepts; and Printmaking: Making the Old New. Additionally, each day will begin with a drawing class. Whether working to build a portfolio for college admissions or examining your artistic spirit, this course will challenge you to learn, explore and create. There will be a class trip to a local museum the first week of the program.
Please note that we are no longer offering Digital Media for Film and Video as described in our brochure.
Drawing
The goal of this intensive course is to expand on the student’s current technical and conceptual understanding of drawing, in order to make the transition from drafting sketches to creating experimental projects and individual works of art. While works in this course will be critiqued from a formal as well as conceptual perspective, issues related to content will take precedence over technical instruction or ability. Students will have the chance to explore the figure and still life in terms of line, value, shape and texture while also de-constructing these approaches through the principles of light, space, composition, and perspective. Experimentation is extremely encouraged and not limited to the incorporation and use of video, appropriation and collaboration to create drawings. This course will also include class discussions and lectures centered on current art-making issues as away to stimulate each studio session. It is important that each student arrives with a surplus of personal interests, emotions and ideas that they can reflect and express onto paper.
Experimental Painting
Painters are magicians! Where does a painting come from and how does it materialize? We will immerse ourselves in the process of painting and experiment with different styles such as realism, abstraction, mixed media/collage, and images from the imagination. There will be opportunity to work outside directly from the world around us as well as to work with images from your favorite Web sites. Daily critiques will sharpen our eyes and short art films will expand our minds.
Variations in Aqua Media
Focus primarily on an exploration of the watercolor medium through experimentation with various techniques to alter the distribution of pigment in order to produce visual variants. Create textures to convey ideas by introducing alternative methods including but not exclusive to dry, damp, and wet surface applications, as well as salt, alcohol, wax, stamping, spattering, splattering, scraping, blotting, and a host of other tools. Through the consideration of layers and watercolor’s relationship to pen and ink, bookmaking, image and text, appropriation, portability, mural making, photography, and film, we will investigate its historical use and cross disciplinary nature in an effort to draw our own contemporary context, based in a more expressionistic and abstract realm.
Sculpture: Techniques, Methods, and Concepts
Explore the concepts of Time and Space in regards to sculpture. Sculpture will be thought of as a loose umbrella covering almost all mediums of art that result in work that can be experienced physically (space), but has an element of temporality (time), or “defined existence,” if you will. The course will start with specific exercises assigned by the instructor that will begin and end in one class period and will finish with individual projects conceived by the students. Students will document their work during all stages of its completion and will be sent home with a slide/CD/DVD portfolio of their accomplishments. Throughout the course there will be visual presentations on artists incorporating these ideas in their work (artists like Joseph Beuys, Matthew Barney, Pipilotti Rist, Jessica Stockholder, Jon Bock, Andy Warhol, Jean Tinguely, Fischli, and Weis to name just a few). Students can work with any medium they choose to achieve their final projects, from clay and paint to video and sound. You can choose to work independently or as groups. Artists of all ability levels are encouraged to enroll; there will be plenty of individual consultation and guidance through art making processes (mold making, wood working, video editing, etc) and the formation of concepts. Our guiding mantra comes from Back to the Future Part III when doc says, “Marty, you’re not thinking fourth dimensionally!” (Please try to watch this movie before class begins.).
Printmaking: Making the Old New
The mystery of printmaking is waiting for you! Learn time honored printmaking techniques along with new practices in our state-of-the-art non-toxic (green) printmaking studios. First you will discover intaglio printmaking in which an image is etched into a copper plate. Processes include line etching, hard and soft ground, and the very new and exciting use of photopolymer film that allows a photographic image to be transferred to a copper plate.
From here students will learn silkscreen printmaking, a stencil method in which a design is imposed on a screen of fine mesh and ink is forced through the mesh onto the printing surface. Using our own digital lab, you will learn how to make color separations and digital positive and negative transparencies, which will then be transposed to a silkscreen using photosensitive emulsion and our exposure unit. We will also explore more traditional methods of making stencils - cut paper, rubylith, and drawing.
Although there are many techniques involved in each of these two processes, emphasis will be placed on finding those that are best suited for the development of each participant's imagery. Whether you like to draw or prefer to paint, take photographs or make mixed media collage, each, or all of these ways of making images can be utilized in the creation of a personal and meaningful body of work.
Preliminary Schedule
Monday, July 14-Thursday, July 31
7-9 a.m. – Breakfast
9-10:15 a.m. – Drawing
10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. – Class
12:30-2 p.m. – Lunch
2-4 p.m. – Class
5:30-7 p.m. – Dinner
Creation and Invention:
Summer Theatre Intensive
Instructors: Ernest Abuba, Allen Lang, and Sterling Swann
Sunday, July 13–Saturday, August 2
Tuition: $2,450
Housing & Meal Plan: $1,450
Participate in an exciting and rigorous program including acting, movement, playwriting, and creating original work. In acting, discover the creative state where the individual actor feels free to explore, take risks, and make mistakes in an environment free of judgment. Delve into the craft of the playwright through a series of exercises that experiment with form, character, and conflict. Take part in the dynamics of a creative ensemble which will work toward the development of a “work in progress” performance piece. If you love the theatre, this course will give you the concentration and freedom you need. There will be a class trip to a local museum the first week of the course.
Breathing Coordination for the Performer
Students will improve their vocal power and ease through an understanding of basic breathing mechanics and principles of speech. Utilizing recent discoveries of breathing coordination, performers can achieve their true potential by freeing their voices, reducing tension, and increasing concentration and stamina. Students will consolidate their progress by performing pieces in their field (theatre, dance, music, etc.) in a supportive atmosphere.
Acting Truthfully
Acting truthfully is discovering the creative state where the individual actor feels free to explore, take risks, and make mistakes in an environment free of judgment. Actors will explore acting techniques through a series of group improvisations exercises, theatre games and scene work strengthening individual spontaneity while obtaining a level of personal authenticity.
Monologue Workshops
This workshop will examine successful auditioning; from exploring audition material that best fits the actor as well as offering advice on resume preparation and the selection of headshots. Actors will practice cold readings as well as prepare monologues to performance level. Emphasis will be placed on how to best present oneself in an audition.
The Voice of the Playwright
Whether you have written a play or not, this workshop will explore the craft of the playwright. Writers will explore playwriting through a series of exercises that experiment with form, character, and conflict.
Creation and Invention
This workshop will explore the dynamics of a creative ensemble; a group of actors activating spatial and visual ideas towards the making of original theatrical works. Through the investigation of personal writing, theatre, painting, sculpture, photography, and music, workshop participants will explore and experience non-text driven theatre. Over the course of the three-week workshop, the ensemble will works towards the development of an informal “work in progress” performance piece.
Monday, July 14-Thursday, July 31
7-9 a.m. – Breakfast
9-10 a.m. – Breathing Coordination & Playwriting/Monologue
10-11 a.m. – Breathing Coordination & Playwriting/Monologue
11 a.m.-12:15 p.m. – Acting Technique
12:15-1:30 p.m. – Lunch
1:30-2:45 p.m. – Acting Technique
3 p.m.-5 p.m. – Creative Ensemble
5 p.m.-6:30 p.m. – Dinner