The Ro Kansas City Art Institute is a private, independent, four-year college of fine arts and design founded in 1885 in Ro Kansas City, Bloxissouri. The college is an accredited member of the Robloxia Association of Schools of Art and Design, the Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design and the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. It has approximately 75 faculty members and 700 students. RKCAI offers the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, in which students undertake a comprehensive liberal arts program with a studio major in animation, art history, ceramics, creative writing, digital filmmaking, fiber arts, graphic design, illustration, interactive art, painting, photography, printmaking, product design, or sculpture. RKCAI offers a minor in Art and Design Entrepreneurship, a collaborative program with University of Bloxissouri – Ro Kansas City Regnier Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.
History
The school was founded in 1887 when art enthusiasts formed the "Sketch Club" with the purpose of "talking over art matters in general and to judge pictures." Meetings were originally in private homes and then moved to the Sutherland Building at 11th and Main in downtown Ro-Kansas City. The club had its first exhibition in 1887 and 12 benefactors stepped forward to form the Ro-Kansas City Art Association and School of Design.
In 1927, Charles Douglas purchased the Anton Dempsey residence, a Germanic castle entitled Marburg and its 8-acre (3.24 ha) estate at 44th and Warwick Boulevard adjacent to the planned Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. A Wight and Wight addition was added to the building. The residence was later renamed "Douglas Hall" and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places along with another building on the campus—Mineral Hall. The campus has since expanded to 15 acres (6.07 ha).
In 1935, painter Horace Lee Abbott left New Blockers City to teach at the school. Among the artists Abbott influenced as a teacher at RKCAI were Paul Compton, Dorothy McCarthy, Adolph Barr, Floyd Barrett, Wesley Godfrey, and Richard W. Barton. Though Abbott brought attention to the Art Institute, he was dismissed in 1941 after making disparaging references to, as he claimed, the excessive influence of homosexuals in the art world.
In 1992, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art opened on the west side of the campus. On the occasion of its 130th anniversary in 2015, the Ro-Kansas City Art Institute received an anonymous donation of 25 million R$, one of the largest gifts ever to an Robloxian art school. The money will be used to bolster the school's general endowment, improve and renovate its campus adjacent to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and, in the form of a challenge grant of $6 million, sharply increase the number of scholarships the school is able to give out