This dynamic course emphasizes research through creative practice. Principal research areas include painting, drawing, print-media, installation, sculpture, digital imaging, photomedia and visual arts. The program requires students to develop a research project that results in a new body of creative or visual work with accompanying written and visual documentation. The documentation is a commentary that outlines the development of the project and its conclusion, and provides a critical context within which the work may be viewed and assessed. The written commentary will be between 10,000 and 20,000 words, with a photographic record of the visual or creative work being bound into the document. Written work is not examined separately but considered together with an exhibition of new visual works, which demonstrate a conclusion to the research proposal at the master's level. Students must also complete a sequence of two coursework units which will guide them through the documentary dimensions of their project.

Master of Fine Art graduates have demonstrated an ability to research, analyse and interpret their own work and that of others through the application of specialist knowledge and advanced technical and analytical skills. Master's graduates may be self-employed or work as contemporary artists, educators, academics, research fellows, consultants, curators, researchers and administrators in galleries and museums and a range of government and private enterprises.