Meet one of the very last artists to graduate with a PAFA college degree

When Faith Castillo dons her cap and gown in a few days, she’ll be graduating with a bachelor of fine arts, and a rare distinction she could hardly have imagined when she started school four years ago.

She is a member of the last Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts class to graduate with a college degree.

Facing a string of deficits and declining enrollment, PAFA announced in January 2024 that it would be ending its college program. Castillo was in the middle of her junior year when the decision was made public, and “reading that email, it was terrifying,” she said.

She came from modest means, and had a full scholarship to PAFA that might have been hard to find had she been forced to transfer to another school.

“It was just like, ‘Where am I gonna be able to get this scholarship anywhere else?’ I felt like it was like my only option really. I was just scared because I wouldn’t be able to get a proper education without a scholarship.”

As information emerged after the announcement, Castillo learned she would be allowed to finish her degree at PAFA, a member of its final class.

But even though she will graduate, the elimination of college degrees has left her concerned that the value of her diploma might be somehow diminished in the eyes of potential employers.

“I think it’s still a bit of an uncertainty. I don’t know if it will hinder the effect that my bachelor’s degree will have,” says the 21-year-old. “But I don’t think it is any less than any other college or any other degree program. We’ve learned and we’ve practiced and we’ve done all sorts of things, and I think it was a wonderful school.”

PAFA recently revealed the details of its new educational future, unveiling a one- to two-year certificate program. It will keep its joint BFA program with the University of Pennsylvania. The school now sees its role more in catering to young professionals looking to burnish their skills than students fresh out of high school.

But it was PAFA’s past and its long tradition as an art academy that drew Castillo to the school in the first place as a 17-year-old from near Austin, Texas. She learned about PAFA — which was founded in 1805 — at a college fair.

“When I was looking at pictures of the school, I noticed the old building and it was just gorgeous. I loved everything about it, the details, and the architecture is what initially brought me in. But it also was just the traditional sense. I really loved working with my hands and drawing, and seeing that they were so traditional and it was the oldest art school [and museum] in the country — I absolutely adored that about it.”

Once there, she became part of that lived connection to history and tradition.

“All of the professors are great,” she said, but she cites two in particular, both important links in PAFA’s pedagogical chain: Al Gury, who has held various posts at the school and who himself is a graduate of PAFA’s four-year certificate program; and Bruce Samuelson, who also attended the school and has taught there since 1969.

“Al Gury was a wonderful person, and he was gentle and sweet and a very soft-spoken man. And I loved him as a professor because he gave me confidence in my abilities and helped me learn more about the kinds of things that I would be interested in,” she said.

“And I think Bruce Samuelson was also one of my favorites because he was super honest, even if you didn’t necessarily want to hear it, and I really appreciated it. It helped me feel like I grew as an artist. I needed that — the balance of having that reassurance and then the other side of just being able to have someone to tell me if it doesn’t look right, if it’s missing something.”

Castillo said that at PAFA she learned technique and critical career-building skills like how to photograph her work properly and how to build a website and portfolio. And she particularly appreciated the synergy of studying at a school with a substantial archive and museum. PAFA’s 16,000-plus-piece collection is focused on American art over three centuries.

“I think one of the more fun things was going back into the archives where you could set up appointments or meetings, and we held some of the classes in the archives and they would share pieces that are old and just beautiful. Looking at all the archives and seeing all the attempts that people have created really helped me understand what makes the human accept what they see.”

These past few years have also been important to Castillo figuring out who she is as a person and an artist, and how the two fit together. Her work focuses on the natural world, and she loves using religious or spiritual references.

“I grew up Roman Catholic, very strict and very concise. And as an artist, it affected me in the way that I was confused for a long time with being a woman, and just being a woman in the Catholic Church. Growing up in that kind of area, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do or what I wanted to be. But I knew what kind of person I wanted to become, and being an artist moving to Philadelphia, I think has brought me closer to who I want to be. And I’m a spiritual person inside, no matter what.”

Castillo aims to stay in Philadelphia after graduation. This summer she has a job painting a mural at Old First House, which provides housing for people who have experienced homelessness, at Fourth and Race Streets. After that, “it’s a bit of an uncertainty.”

In other words, in this regard, she will be more or less like thousands of other graduates from PAFA or any art school.

“I’ll work with a gallery or a church or any opportunity that pays the bills.”