MPS Art Therapy

SVA’s Master of Professional Studies in Art Therapy is an immersive two-year, 60-credit program that prepares students to become licensed art therapists. The program integrates the experiential components of art therapy within a comprehensive framework of academic theory and clinical application via an internship program and art practice. Students learn to adapt the creative process to the specific therapeutic needs of the individual, population, and setting, with a consideration of how systems of theoretical and social constructs impact treatment. SVA believes in active engagement with the community at large, which allows for the utilization of the diverse, innovative, and creative atmosphere of NYC and beyond to enhance training.

The MPS Art Therapy Program developed from a single undergraduate course in collaboration with the Bronx Psychiatric Center in New York City over three decades ago. The undergraduate certificate program, guided by its founder, Estelle Bellomo, expanded and developed affiliations in a variety of settings and gained a reputation for excellence in both academic and clinical training. Subsequent changes in the field of art therapy made a master’s degree program the natural progression, which was initiated in 2001.