Fine Arts

Mr. Roberto Munguia, Head of Department

The Cistercian Fine Arts Department is dedicated to awaking and inspiring each student's innate creativity and to fostering an aesthetic appreciation both of our world and of our Western artistic and musical traditions. The goal of the Cistercian Fine Arts Department is to give the student the means, in one art form or several, to express his own personal vision as well as to appreciate the expressions of others.

In Middle School art classes, students are immersed in a wide variety of exploratory assignments geared to awaken and inspire their sense of personal creativity. In Middle School music, a curriculum has been devised which encompasses a broad range of musical studies. The classes concentrate on music theory, opera and orchestral instruments.

The Upper School art electives offer a more rigorous and prolonged concentration in specific disciplines, such as acrylic painting. Art History, first introduced in the middle school, continues as a component in the World Civilization and American History courses. Unfamiliar and more challenging art forms, such as encaustic painting and performance art, are also introduced. Upper School photography courses are designed to emphasize the practice of creative vision and the interpretation of that vision through the photograph. The overall goal of the photography program is not to turn the students into photographers, but to teach them to use photography to help them discover and express their own creative thinking.

Department Faculty:

• Roberto Munguia
  M.F.A., M.A. University of Dallas, Irving, TX
  B.F.A. University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX
• Rev. Ignatius Peacher, O. Cist.
  M.Arch. University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX
  MA University of Dallas, Irving, TX
  BA St. John's University, Collegeville, MN
• Jim Reisch
  B.A. University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX
• Kelly Shea
  M.Mus., B.Mus. Rice University, Houston, TX