Photography
Areas of interest

Study art and photography , Ākona te mahi toi, mahi tango whakaahua

Study art and photography at Massey to find your creative voice. Explore paint, performance, print, sculpture, Māori visual arts, and more.

Need help or know what you want to study?

Go broad or specialise

Focus on your passion – painting, sculpture, printmaking, photography, Māori visual arts or performance – or mix and match.

Get hands-on

Create and make in Massey's well-equipped studios, workshops, computer labs, digital suites and darkrooms.

Design your own degree

All Massey design students start with broad core courses. Then in later years you can specialise or gain wide-ranging skills.

Global-ready skills

Our Massey graduates are sought after by employers and work in New Zealand, Australia, Europe, North America and beyond.

Overview

Focus on photography. Explore contemporary Māori art, culture, language, and tikanga. Delve into paint or printmaking. Or broaden your horizons by picking courses from across creative disciplines.

Whether you're starting out or established as a creative, learn the fundamentals and stretch and grow at College of Creative Arts – Toi Rauwhārangi.

Learn from award-winning artists, designers and photographers. Discover new ideas with researchers specialising in areas such as art and the environment, and memorialisation and remembrance. Explore ways of making, and why you make what you do.

Get hands-on in our studios and workshops. Master new skills in our state-of-the-art computer labs, digital suites and darkrooms. Graduate with a qualification respected nationally and internationally.

Art and photography are a good fit if you:

  • do well in school subjects such as design, visual arts (ngā toi) or technology (hangarau)
  • want to push your creativity and hone your skills
  • like being creative and thinking analytically.

Scholarships for Massey's College of Arts

Fine arts courses

Drawing. Painting. Performance art. Sculpture. Video. Take classes in any media, supported by technical workshops to hone your skills.

As well as independent creative work, courses may cover:

  • communication for makers
  • creative cultures
  • research methods and practices.

Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours

Māori visual arts courses

Toioho ki Āpiti, Māori visual arts, recognises language, culture, tikanga and art as inseparable. Our bachelor's degree has a strong Māori kaupapa, with te reo, tikanga, and manaakitanga at its core.

We welcome students of Māori, Pākehā and international indigenous heritage. We cater for all levels of te reo Māori.

As well as independent creative work, courses may cover:

  • Māori design processes, including cultural significance
  • Māori visual culture, including contemporary and traditional contexts
  • te reo Māori
  • Te Tiriti o Waitangi (Treaty of Waitangi).

Māori visual arts – Toioho ki Āpiti

Photography courses

As well as independent creative work, courses may cover:

  • composition
  • darkroom and digital techniques
  • lighting in studios and on location
  • post-production
  • studio techniques
  • video art.

Bachelor of Design with Honours (Photography)

How to study art and photography

Discover what we offer if you’re interested in art and photography – whether you’re coming to university for the first time, changing direction or returning to advance your study or career.

Undergraduate study

An undergraduate qualification is generally the first thing you’ll study at university.

Bachelor's degrees

Degrees are the standard qualifications you do at university – the most common is called a bachelor’s. Degrees give you enough time to explore your interests, and also focus on specific subjects.

Undergraduate bachelor's degrees with honours

An undergraduate honours degree is a four-year bachelor’s degree. We also offer postgraduate honours years.

Graduate certificates

Graduate certificates let you study in a subject you're interested in without doing a second bachelor's degree. Or you can use it as a bridge to postgraduate study if you already have an undergraduate degree.

Undergraduate diplomas

Undergraduate diplomas let you try university study before you commit to a degree. They’re also useful if you need to advance your career.

Graduate diplomas

Graduate diplomas can help you advance to postgraduate study or research in a subject you haven’t majored in for your undergraduate study.

Relevant undergraduate subjects to major or specialise in

When you apply to study at Massey, for some undergraduate qualifications you can choose what subject you’d like to specialise in. You can usually change your mind after you get to university, depending on the courses you enrol in.

Photography

Postgraduate study

Once you’ve graduated with a bachelor’s degree – or have equivalent experience – you’ll be ready to take on postgraduate study.

Master's degrees

A master's degree normally builds on a main subject of study from your undergraduate degree.

Postgraduate diplomas

Postgraduate diplomas are postgraduate-level qualifications that are longer than a postgraduate certificate. If you’re successful, you might be able to use the credits towards the longer master’s degree.

PhD and other doctoral degrees

Doctoral degrees, including PhDs, are the highest degrees we award. They’re very demanding and their entry criteria reflect this.

Relevant research areas at Massey

Discover research expertise, projects and initiatives relating to art and photography at Massey.

Art and photography research

What our students say

“I'd never intellectualised my process before. This was the first time I'd actually gone, 'Why am I doing this? What does this actually mean?’”
Jon Toogood

Musician

Master of Fine Arts

“Chev found his strength in bringing together his art and his whakapapa. With a passion for cultural identity and social ethnography, his emerging creative career has involved advertising, journalism, mural and documentary projects. In 2017 he won the Ngā Manu Pīrere award for emerging Māori artists at Te Waka Toi Awards.”
Chevron Te Whetumatarau Hassett

Ngati Porou, Rongomaiwahine, Ngati Kahungunu ki Mahia, Pakeha

Bachelor of Design with Honours (Photography)

“Some of the most valuable skills I gained were how to deliver and present my art and writing, and to be self-directed when constructing a project. I liked the way Massey provides the resources to create and become an artist without telling you exactly how to do it.”
Isabella Loudon

Sculptor

Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours

Our facilities

You'll have access to a wide range of first-class facilities when you study with us.

Gallery spaces

Students studying fine arts, Māori visual arts and photography have access to gallery spaces where they can exhibit or test their work.

Workshops

Students can access a number of workshops on campus, alongside technical staff who will introduce them to the equipment and assist them if required. Equipment in the fine arts workshop includes a range of wood and metal working machinery, hand tools, a spray booth and casting area.

Te Pūtahi-a-Toi

Te Pūtahi-a-Toi - School of Māori Knowledge has a rūnanga room and a wharekai – Toi Te Ora – where we can manaaki visitors, students and staff.

Location: Manawatū campus

Te Pūtahi-a-Toi

Marae and Māori spaces

Photo studios

Massey University's Wellington campus has specialised professional photography studios, (white cycs, green screen, Elincrom/Bowens/Diva lite) access only by students enrolled in photographic specialised papers only.

Screen and digital print facility

Massey students have access to a screen and digital print facility, where they can use a digital sublimation printer for polyester fabrics and materials, and a screen printing facility with 7m print tables.

Fab Lab

Fab Lab Wellington is Australasia’s first digital fabrication laboratory affiliated to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Fab Lab's capabilities include:

  • A computer-controlled laser cutter
  • numerically-controlled milling machine
  • a sign cutter
  • a precision milling machine to make 3-dimensional moulds
  • surface-mount circuit boards
  • and small 3D printers.

Toystore

The Toystore offers a wide range of audiovisual equipment for design students to borrow, as well as access to large format printing and technical support.

Jobs in art and photography

Set your own horizons. You'll graduate as an inventive and resilient thinker and maker, ready to make an impact.

Some of our graduates become artists, either working alone or in collaboration with other creatives. Others work in community or cultural organisations, galleries or museums.

Art and photography careers include:

  • artists, who specialise in areas such as conceptual art, painting, printmaking or sculpture
  • conservators, who repair and maintain artworks and taonga (treasured objects)
  • curators, who research and create exhibitions
  • film directors or designers
  • gallery or museum roles such as archivists or publicists
  • photographers or videographers
  • photojournalists
  • teachers or lecturers.

Annual salary ranges for jobs

Salary ranges disclaimer

Indicative pay rates are:

Which art or photography qualification?

Examples of where our qualifications may take you.

Table showing jobs and what you could study to enter them.
Jobs Examples of what you could study
Artist Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours
Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours (Mātauranga Toi Māori)
Bachelor of Māori Visual Arts
Curator Postgraduate Diploma in Museum Studies
Postgraduate Diploma in Māori Visual Arts
Photographer Bachelor of Design with Honours (Photography)
Bachelor of Design with Honours (Photography / Mātauranga Toi Māori)

Accreditations and rankings

Red Dot Design ranking

Ranked 3rd in Asia-Pacific by International Red Dot Design Awards, the only design school to be ranked in New Zealand and Australia. This significant achievement recognises the high calibre of our teaching staff and the exceptional quality of our students' design concept work.

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Grey dot with NASAD in the middle

NASAD

Massey's College of Creative Arts is New Zealand's only art and design school granted “substantial equivalency” — an international benchmark of quality — by the United States National Association of Schools of Art and Design (NASAD).

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QS Ranking - Art & Design

College of Creative Arts – Toi Rauwhārangi ranks in the global top 150 for art and design by QS World University Rankings.

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Get an information guide

Download our guides to find out more about studying art and photography at Massey.

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