Art History and Visual Culture, BA (Hons)

Course summary

Delve into the global history of fine arts and visual media, discovering how they continue to shape our contemporary world. You’ll gain future ready skills including project management and creative problem-solving. Plus, you’ll benefit from a school with strong industry connections.Learn about the creation, distribution, and social contexts of all aspects of art history and visual media. Explore varied topics, from moving image and photography, to printmaking and exhibition histories. Join a diverse community of students from different backgrounds, learning other points of view and experiences which may challenge your assumptions. You’ll learn in a variety of ways. Small group projects give you the opportunity to connect with your classmates and gain experience in things like project management, writing research proposals, project documentation, effective communication, and ethical conduct.Why choose this course?• Freedom to explore - Deepen your knowledge of your favourite topics and explore new ones • Career-ready skills - Develop your research, critical thinking, creative problem-solving, and project management skills• Build your network – Join a department with extensive arts industry connections• Student satisfaction - 89% agree that ‘staff are good at explaining things’ and that ‘staff have made the subject interesting’ (2022 National Student Survey results)• Breadth of topics - Study periods, themes and events that have shaped the media throughout history• Top 20 for History in the UK (Complete University Guide 2024)

Year one mandatory modules cover the history of art (from Renaissance to contemporary), methods for critical debate and analysis of art and media, global media and cultural flows and the production and distribution of media. In year two, you will study social and cultural perceptions of media, art and screen culture, development of media technologies and complete a group project. In your final year, you will devise and complete an independent research project of your own choosing. Across all three years, you can choose from a range of optional modules covering topics including revivalism, the cultural legacy of the British Empire, exhibition histories and practices, protest, dissent and civil society and be able to apply for an industry placement.