Outline
Offered in one of the largest, oldest and most research-focused art history departments in the UK, set in a culturally rich capital city, the MSc in Modern and Contemporary Art provides an in-depth understanding of art and its contexts of interpretation and mediation.
Through two core courses and an enviable selection of option courses, you will acquire a solid knowledge of the development of art and related discourses from the 19th to the 21st centuries.
The MSc combines a focus on art history, current developments in the art field, theoretical frameworks, and curatorial thinking while it focuses on the encounter of art and society.
Programme structure
The programme of study comprises two core courses, option courses, and the dissertation where you demonstrate you can develop and pursue your own research ideas.
The two core courses of the programme are taught by a team of experts:
- Research: Theories and Methods (Semester 1)
- Cultures and Politics of Display (Semester 2)
Research: Theories and Methods
This course introduces a variety of approaches to doing research in the field at the postgraduate level and is essential not just to students who will seek positions in the art field but also to those who would like to carry on to a PhD.
Cultures and Politics of Display
This course offers more specialised knowledge on how we encounter art and/or mediate and contextualise it as professionals.
Option courses
Option courses can vary annually, but address developments from the 19th century and the historical avant-gardes to globalisation, all exploring the changing role of art and art institutions in society:
- digital art and its frameworks
- performance and participatory art
- inequality and policy in the arts
- feminist, postcolonial and decolonial critiques
- questions on class and labour
- memory and the lens
- the city in relation to museums
- the theories and politics shaping the contemporary art field
- curating and exhibition-making
- art in specific regions, countries and continents.
We also offer work placements as an option course in Semester 2 (but preparation begins in Semester 1).
The MSc ends with a dissertation that you research and write after Semester 2.
Our option courses are specially designed by staff as leading researchers in their fields (many with curatorial experience) with the aim of deepening students’ knowledge in a specific subject and exciting their intellectual curiosity.
The option courses engage theory-led debates while also introducing and contextualising a range of artworks and related cultural artefacts and their contexts of mediation.
Our option courses entail small-group teaching and may incorporate both lectures and seminar discussions.
Full-time
Full-time students do the MSc in one year, from September to August. You will complete two option courses in each of the two semesters. You will then research and write the dissertation between April and August.
Part-time
Part-time students complete the programme of study over two years. You will research and write the dissertation in Year 2 of your studies.
Teaching
The two core courses of the MSc include both lectures by experts and small-group tutorials where the lecture content is further unpacked and discussed. In the final part of the Semester 2 core course, Cultures and Politics of Display, you will meet the annually appointed Fellow in Contemporary Art Theory and Curating to gain insider knowledge on a given subject or role.
The option courses are taught by individual staff members and student numbers are capped to ensure a small-group learning environment. The work placement as an option course is overseen by a staff member.
The dissertation is supervised by a staff member with relevant expertise, while dissertation workshops are also offered before you start.
Besides the teaching that forms part of our curriculum, you are expected to attend the History of Art Research Seminars that take place weekly during term time. These seminars are given by invited researchers in the field and are important for introducing students to new material and approaches beyond our in-house expertise. The seminars help you acquire broader knowledge of the field.
In addition, academic staff and research clusters may organise events throughout the year with invited speakers that further expand your knowledge and understanding of modern and contemporary art, its frameworks and interdisciplinary grounding.
Assessment
Each course has its own mode of assessment, appropriate to its learning outcomes.
These may be:
- 4,000 or 3,000-word essays
- a report or oral presentation
- a combination of assessment methods.
Assessed assignments are monitored by a second staff member.
Assessment methods for this postgraduate degree do not include exams.
Once you complete the taught part of the MSc, you will begin to research and write a supervised 15,000-word dissertation on a topic you are interested in.
The dissertation is an exciting part of the programme, where you develop your own ideas and specialise in a subject. You are asked to think about a dissertation topic early on, though you will get more ideas as your knowledge deepens and as you encounter new areas of study and questions through your core and option courses.
