The History and Mission

of the EGS

The EGS was created to be an academic institution that would function beyond the many constraints of traditional disciplinary structure while stimulating work leading to respected and well-recognized academic degrees in its respective fields.  With the development of online facilities, it is also increasingly open to participation through auditing possibilities and various public events.

For the EGS, education remains a process that is both experimental and transformative. In PACT, world-leading faculty retain full freedom of speech and are encouraged to pursue a form of teaching that is not just research-led, but in itself an active form of research. In AHS seasoned professionals and researchers in the expressive arts lead students on promising career paths through innovative practices of teaching that embody founding principles. Both divisions are deeply engaged with the arts. See our Mission Statement here.

The PACT Division addresses, as its title suggests, philosophy, art, and critical thought, and within those fields, architecture, film, literature, music, psychoanalysis, and political thought. For almost three decades, it has assembled one of the strongest faculty in the world, gathering together celebrated artists, critical theorists, philosophers, scholars and practitioners. The AHS Division, for its part, centers on the expressive arts, specifically addressing coaching, therapy, education, conflict transformation, and peacebuilding. It has played a founding role in the field of expressive arts therapy under the leadership of its founder, Paolo Knill. The cross disciplinary, low-residency MA and PhD programs of The EGS offer students and scholars an exceptional academic experience centered on annual intensive seminar programs led by an eminent faculty in residence, in Saas-Fee, Switzerland, and Valletta, Malta. This dynamic structure creates a vibrant forum in which students and scholars engage with distinguished theorists, practitioners, and artists in their fields.

The EGS does not shy from the requirements of professionalism, but it seeks to redefine the conditions for achieving the true meaning of this term, opening it to creative thinking. It seeks to intervene in a global context where education is increasingly structured by instrumental ends that favour the development of technical expertise and frustrate fundamental questioning, turning aside from the core values of the humanities and from open artistic exploration.  It seeks to keep alive a spirit of free inquiry devoted to supporting creative practice as well as intellectual exchange of the highest level directed to the most pressing issues of our time.

Please contact admissions@egs.edu for general inquiries; for more specific questions, please see below for a detailed list of contacts that includes the divisional Program Directors.