Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA)

General information

The Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) is the only institution of higher education for fine arts under the administration of the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China. The academy has eight specialty schools: School of Chinese Painting, School of Plastic Arts, School of Design, School of Architecture, School of Humanities, School of Urban Design, School of Experimental Art, and Institute of Arts Administration and Education. Besides, the Fine Arts Research Institute, the School of Continuing Education, and the Fine Arts School Affiliated with the China Central Academy of Fine Arts, also come under the umbrella of CAFA. The academy offers specialized secondary programs (the Affiliated High School of Fine Art), college certificate programs (the School of Continuing Education), undergraduate programs, Master’s degree programs, Doctoral degree programs, and visiting scholar programs.

The academy is committed to building a disciplined structure of modern education for fine arts where disciplines such as plastic arts, design, architecture, and humanities support and influence each other. It strives to take lead in building an art education system with Chinese characteristics in the new century so as to be highly praised by the international art education community for its high teaching quality and excellent research results with distinctive Chinese characteristics. CAFA has become a leading academy in the field of high education for fine arts in China as well as plays an important role in world-class fine arts schools.

Discipline introduction

The academy offers 20 undergraduate majors: Chinese Painting, Calligraphy, Painting, Sculpture, Experimental Art, Visual Communication Design, Industrial Design, Product Design, Digital Media Art, Clothing and Apparel Design, Photography, Fine Arts, Theory and History of Arts, Cultural Industries Management, Architecture, Landscape Architecture, Film and Television Photography and Production, Environmental Design, Public Art, Animation.

Since 2004, the academy has started to try out an academic credit system for teaching management and a new academic calendar. There are 38 teaching weeks in every academic year. Every academic year is divided into three semesters. The first 20-week semester is for compulsory courses required by the academy and schools. The second 10-week semester is for professional courses and courses taught off-campus. The third eight-week semester is for professional electives and public courses. Students can choose to study interdisciplinary courses according to their own hobbies and professional development needs.

Teaching conditions

The academy covers a teaching and research area of 495 mu (around 330,000 square meters), with a total floor area of 247,000 square meters. The Wangjing Campus covers an area of 205 mu, with a total floor area of 144,000 square meters. The Yanjiao Campus covers an area of 205 mu, with a total floor area of 68,000 square meters. The Houshayu Campus covers an area of 67 mu, with a total floor area of 29,000 square meters. The Xiaoying Campus covers an area of 18 mu, with a total floor area of 6,000 square meters.

Classrooms, professional experiment workshops (laboratories), libraries, art galleries, gyms, multimedia classrooms, and other teaching facilities are all in good condition at the academy. Professional experiment workshops (laboratories) are well-equipped with high technologies, strongly supporting the academy’s professional teaching and discipline construction. The library is one of the most advanced libraries for fine arts in China with nearly 400,000 books. The museum houses precious collections, including more than 2,000 scroll paintings by artists since the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Besides regularly organizing exhibitions of work by the academy’s teachers and students, the museum also exhibits fine arts work with high academic levels by artists at home and abroad. What’s more, both gyms and multimedia classrooms can meet various teaching requirements.

In addition, CAFA also has two Class A academic publications at the national level: Art Research and World Art.