Resources
Graduate students in SAIC’s Sound Department have access to five sound studios and four work stations equipped with the following:
- Digital and analog recording studios for live recording, electronic music production, mixing and mastering
- ProTools digital audio workstations
- Vintage and contemporary analog synthesizers and signal processors
- Advanced software including MAX/MSP, Supercollider, IRCAM Tools, and RX Tools
- Multi-channel playback system
- Performance controllers and installation microcontrollers
- A wide range of studio microphones and outboard gear including rare signal processors
- Purpose-built labs for software and hardware design and development, instrument construction, and hardware hacking
- Several workstations for exclusive graduate use, including modular synthesis, digital audio production, and a Yamaha Disklavier computer-controlled acoustic piano
- An extensive inventory of portable equipment including hydrophones, accelerometers, specialized microphones, and high-quality remote recording gear
Resources Available to all SAIC Students Include:
Libraries and Special Collections
Unique access to important libraries and special collections including a world-class museum.
Media Centers
The media centers provide audiovisual equipment and services to accommodate documentation, creation, instructional, and exhibition needs.
Gallery Spaces
The SAIC campus showcases a diversity of student artwork across multiple exhibition venues. Students can propose to exhibit their work in a variety of formats and locations.
Visiting Artists Program
Public lectures are presented by world-renowned visiting artists, designers, and scholars. Speakers meet with students through studio visits, roundtable discussions, seminars, and workshops.
Instructional Shops
From bedazzlers to sewing machines, from traditional wood/metalworking to CNC milling, the SAIC Instructional Shops are facilities that have the resources to help you realize your projects. The shops are equipped with a wide range of hand, power, and stationary tools.
What the City of Chicago has to Offer:
World class museums and galleries
Since the late 19th century, when the museum collection of the Art Institute was established as a study center for the School of the Art Institute, students have used the museum's vast holdings to inspire and inform their creative and scholarly practices. No other school of art and design can claim such a major museum as part of their campus.
Unparalleled architecture
A living laboratory of the study of late 19th- and 20th-century architecture, landscapes, and interiors—the development of the Chicago school of commercial architecture, the flowering of the Prairie style house, the progression of the City Beautiful movement in urban planning.
