Support ECA ECA Handbook
Undergraduate Postgraduate Student Life
A blurred image showing a sitting room area of antique furniture, including a sofa, armchair and a fireplace Image courtesy of the artist

Work by Nicole Sciarone, 2016

Postgraduate

Contemporary Art Theory - MA

MA

Features

1 year (Full time); 2 years (Part time)
Full-time; Part-time

Outline

Established in 2001, the Masters of Contemporary Art Theory (MA CAT) is a post-studio programme that supports the research and practices of artists and aspiring art professionals.

The MA CAT encourages practices that are speculative and reflective, developing artistic research on, and in, a range of media, sites and organisations.

The programme supports an applied knowledge of art now, grounding schooling in the practices of art and contemporary art theory as well as extra-disciplinary and intermedial approaches.

The taught curriculum consists of an innovative series of learning sprints designed to support the development of your artistic research and practice through:

  • workshops
  • practica
  • partnerships with art organisations
  • carefully scaffolded approaches to collaborative inquiry (‘problem-based learning’)
  • peer-production (‘paragogy’).

You will create art projects designed to engage and develop emerging hypereconomies of contemporary art and its variety of media, technologies, images, artefacts, tactics, texts, cultural contexts and professional practices.

To find out more about this course, visit our Degree Finder: Contemporary Art Theory.

Careers

The programme nurtures the creative, organisational and economic knowledge required for a career in today’s contemporary art world(s), enabling you to integrate a range of perspectives traversing the roles of artist, academic, art critic, producer and curator.

The Theory programme bridges the gap between undergraduate and doctoral research, preparing you to make an application to a PhD programme. The MA CAT will also support your creative and professional development as an art educator.

The programme is aimed both at aspiring arts professionals and professional artists who want to develop a research-practice by extending their practical, theoretical, organisational and economic engagement with contemporary art. It develops from a broad to a specialist understanding of the technical resources and validating contexts in which artists work today.

Professional Development

Our programme will help you develop a creative and organisational professional-practice, one that allows you to take control of the production and distribution of your work by effectively combining the roles of professional artist, theorist and programmer.

Our unique focus on artistic learning also means that you will graduate with a heightened awareness of the educational possibilities of contemporary art as a catalyst for social and political transformation.

Multidisciplinary development

Current professionals

If you are a professional artist/theorist/curator, the CAT programme will greatly expand and develop both your existing knowledge of contemporary art and your own practice, situating both in relation to emerging tendencies in cognate disciplines in the arts, humanities and social sciences such as materialist and cultural studies, educational research, geography, and social anthropology.

Aspiring professionals

If you are an aspiring art professional with a non-art background, the CAT programme scaffolds and supports your conversion to contemporary art from related undergraduate disciplines in the arts, humanities or social sciences. Dedicated to widening participation in the arts and demystifying artistic learning, the CAT programme is unique in offering this bridge to anyone seeking a way in to our discipline.

Researcher development

This programme will specifically prepare you to establish a scholarly and artistic research-practice, enabling you to embark on a professional career as a researcher within the broad field of contemporary art in both academic (PhD) and artworld settings.

Why you should choose this programme

1

‘Art’ is the culture that rings true to your community. The MA CAT integrates peer and project approaches to learning, fostering a vibrant community where students and staff support each other. Our unique approach to art education will inspire you to devise, then realise, your own artistic community.

2

The MA CAT approaches artistic research as a careful, continuous quest driven by curiosity. A curriculum that is fresh to academic staff and students, is a curriculum that provokes curiosity. To this end, the MA CAT programme is driven and transformed by what makes staff and students curious. Since our curriculum is led by our research, it is ‘new’ each year. By joining the programme, you become part of an evolving research project with a transformational goal: re-imagining the philosophy and values that constitute ‘contemporary art’.

3

The MA CAT has a practical approach to learning – we don’t just theorise, we act. Engage in 'live' projects in collaboration with Edinburgh’s numerous arts organisations. Apply your artistic learning in real-world settings. Navigate and develop the ethical and agile organisational practices crucial for a career in today’s post-studio art sector.

4

The MA CAT is based in The University of Edinburgh - one of the world’s leading research universities.

5

You will benefit from exceptional academic facilities in The University of Edinburgh, including postgraduate study spaces, computing suites, creative industry-standard software, metal, wood, and print fabrication workshops, libraries and an MA CAT project space. These resources combine with our Capital City’s incomparably rich cultural institutions (Edinburgh’s National Galleries, National Museums, our 25+ festivals...) to create a world-leading environment for your artistic research.

Opportunities

Several summative projects in the MA CAT are ‘live’ and take place at, or in collaboration with, our partner institutions. For example, the ‘Open Toolkit’ project in Semester 1 is conducted in partnership with the Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop. The summative projects of the Curating course in Semester 2 have also been produced in collaboration with an array of Edinburgh and Glasgow-based arts organisations since the CAT programme was inaugurated in 2001.

You are free to establish and pursue placements as part of your work for your capstone Contemporary Artistic Research Project, should it be deemed suitable to your aspirations.

There are many successful examples of such fieldwork in the CAT Archive.We strongly advise students to fairly contract such placements in alignment with the Scottish Artists Union Recommended Rates of Pay. The MA CAT does not support (or require) unremunerated artworking (e.g. unpaid internships).

How to apply and entry requirements

If you'd like to study on a postgraduate programme at Edinburgh College of Art, you must apply through EUCLID, our online application system. You can find out how to do this on the University of Edinburgh website, where you'll also be able to:

  • see detailed entrance requirements for each programme on the Degree Finder
  • get information on what to expect after you apply
  • find out about study modes, start dates and fees
  • find out if, and how, you need to submit a portfolio, showreel or research proposal
  • find out where to go for further advice and guidance.
Apply now

Get in touch

Edinburgh College of Art Postgraduate Admissions

futurestudents@ed.ac.uk
+44 (0)131 650 4086

Field trips

We make extensive use of fieldwork as a core component of teaching and artistic research. There are two broad forms of ‘fieldwork’:

Field-workshops

The MA CAT is dedicated to the development of authentic learning in real-life professional settings. As such, several of our classes take place off-campus at our partner institutions (galleries, art workshops, museums, artists’ organisations, and so on).

These classes are called ‘workshops’. In most cases, workshops are devised and run by staff employed at partner institutions.

From form to field:

The shift from form towards field is core both to understanding contemporary art and pivotal to post-studio practices. As such, the MA CAT specifically teaches multidisciplinary methods that relate to the multiple perspectives of ‘field’. Key here are environmental art, relationalism, social practice, ethnography, fieldnotes, a/r/tography, augmented reality(games), worlding, and artistic learning.

Facilities

Classroom and tutorial teaching mainly takes place in the School of Art - Main Building of Edinburgh College of Art, Lauriston Campus.

We also makes extensive use of blended learning (lecture recordings, Blackboard LEARN, MS Teams are key learning technologies).

The programme also uses ‘fieldwork’ - site-related and experiential learning off campus.

The programme has its own ‘Project Space’, used as a teaching resource for the Curating course.

Lauriston campus redevelopment

ECA are excited to be undertaking a capital redevelopment of ECA’s Lauriston campus over the next 3 years, from April 2024 to April 2027.

The project aims to maximise the use of existing space, improve accessibility, and create a vibrant campus that fosters collaboration and innovation.

The project involves refurbishing and repurposing various spaces across the Lauriston campus, including technical facilities, student and teaching spaces, and the relocation of the Reid School of Music from Alison House to the Lauriston campus. New social spaces, seminar rooms, and studios are being created to accommodate our growing community.

You can find more about the project at the below link:

Building work starts at ECA’s Lauriston campus | Edinburgh College of Art

Scholarships and bursaries

ECA
Edinburgh College of Art EU Scholarship Scheme (PGT)
Value £17,500
Deadline N/A
See all Scholarships and bursaries

Facilities and resources

Students looking at journals in a library

Libraries

View all our Facilities

Our alumni

Claire Walsh's work being watched by an audience

Claire Walsh

Contemporary Art Theory - MA 2013

After graduating, Claire Walsh returned to ECA to do a short residency before she moved on to curating a series of events as part of the 2016 Edinburgh Art Festival. Since then, Claire has gone onto a role at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and is now the assistant curator in the Collections department at the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA).

View all our Alumni

Meet our staff

Neil Mulholland profile picture

Professor Neil Mulholland

Chair of Contemporary Art Practice and Theory

MA Contemporary Art Theory Programme Director; School of Art Exchange Coordinator

n.mulholland@ed.ac.uk
Zoom PMI 250 606 2887

Research interests

  • Contemporary Art Practice & Theory
  • Technē, Magic & Weird Studies
  • Fictioning & Fabulation
  • Neomedivalisms and the nonmodern
  • Open Art Education
Lecturer Jake Watts wearing a purple t-shirt and holding three, shiny balloon flowers.

Dr. Jake Watts

Lecturer in Contemporary Art Theory

Programme Director of BA (Hons) Fine Art

jake.watts@ed.ac.uk

Research interests

  • Art Education
  • Artistic Learning
  • Open Education Resources and Approaches
  • Art Education Histories
  • Paragogy
View people directory