The Art Department at Phillips Academy believes in the power of the imagination and its underlying strength in the building of flexible, creative, analytical, inquisitive and humanistic minds. At the core of a visual education at Phillips Academy is the understanding that art is for everyone not just the "talented" few. The Art Department believes that a visual education is an essential part of a liberal arts education. To be educated visually is to be more aware of the rich history of human ideas as expressed in the arts and more focused on the ever changing, more global, multicultural and technologically advanced world of the 21st century. Studies in the visual arts encourage students to trust their ability to see, to gather information, to think about their observations and to believe in their intuition. The Art Department emphasizes the development of creative ideas in relation to the understanding of skills, materials, history and new technologies.