Fine Arts - How to Create a Successful Portfolio - Fulbright.no

Tips for Presenting Your Portfolio at U.S. Art Schools

Your portfolio shows what you do as a designer, illustrator or fine artist. It contains your best work, professionally displayed and assembled into a hand-carried or mailable format.   It is your essential tool of communication and plays an important part in all art program admissions processes.  

When assembling a portfolio, it is important to remember that every school will have different submission guidelines for applicants.   Be sure to contact each school’s admissions department to obtain their particular requirements and then tailor your portfolio for each interview accordingly.   The following outline provides very general portfolio guidelines and some similarities and differences in portfolios for different types of artists.   

Portfolio Content

Research schools to see what type of work will be appropriate to include in the portfolio.   Some schools will be interested in the full scope of your background, but some specialized programs may be interested solely in the type of work the program focuses on. Show only your best work. Quality is better than quantity.   Be able to talk confidently about your work and to explain it if asked.

Observational work:

Observational work is frequently the central part of a school’s portfolio requirements. Observational work can be drawing, painting or collage done from a still life, figure model or landscape.

Personal work:

” Personal work” can include any work that you create on your own in a medium and style that demonstrate your strengths. Included in this category are animation, photography, graphic design, film, video, sculpture, etc. This is an opportunity to show off your unique abilities.

Portfolio Presentation

Depending on the type of work that you do and the schools to which you are applying, the way in which you present the work in your portfolio may vary substantially.   Some schools will only accept 35mm slides of art work while some will only want to see the original (i.e. actual) art itself.   Often, however, the applicant must decide which presentation format best serves their work. For example, a media designer's portfolio might consist solely of some combination of videotape, CDROM or floppy discs. A fine artist's portfolio might contain original work (if two dimensional and not too large), 35mm slides, color prints and/or display transparencies of large or three-dimensional work. Significant articles or reviews, in protective pages, might be placed at the end of the portfolio.

Depending on the presentation format of your work, your portfolio case can also vary widely in appearance. A soft zippered case with a ring binder and removable acetate sleeves is a popular, flexible format, as is a hard case containing loose acetate page sleeves. Whatever the format, the case should be of manageable size, easy to carry and able to protect work well. It should be easy to open and operate.

Work should be presented cleanly and simply. Use high-quality pages and page protectors. Use only as many pages as necessary to show your best work. Do not leave empty pages in the back. For this reason, a ring binder or portfolio that contains removable pages is much more flexible that one with fixed plastic sleeves.

Don’t use distracting colors or patterns behind your portfolio pieces. Many portfolios come supplied with black or gray inserts, which can be replaced with a color of your choice, but backgrounds should enhance your work, not draw attention away from it.

You will need to present large or three-dimensional work using 35 mm slides, display transparencies or color prints. Check with the school to find out which they prefer.   Slides should presented be in acetate sleeves or pages. Include a separate printed slide index listing any relevant information for each piece, such as size of original and medium.   Label each slide with your name, and contact information.   Keep at least one master set of slides in case a set gets lost or damaged.   Only submit clear, focused slides. Color prints or display transparencies are placed in vinyl or mylar pages and presented consistently.

All work should be labeled and your name and contact information should appear on the reverse of each piece.   If submitting original artwork, be sure to document it especially if you are mailing the portfolio and will not be present at the interview.

Portfolio Organization

• Place your best work first and last
• Group work according to subject and content
• Place targeted work first, published or “famous” work second (if present)

Mailing Your Portfolio

If you are mailing your portfolio to the school and will not be present at the portfolio review, it is even more important that each piece of work is labeled, and, especially in the case of original work, documented.   If you can, try to avoid sending original work in the mail. 

Make sure that you have packaged the portfolio case securely against damage and weather, and insure it.   Also make sure that you comply with any requirements the school has in terms of providing return postage.