MA Art Education, Culture and Practice

This innovative MA provides a forum to explore and debate contemporary issues in the expanded field of art, culture and education. It is designed to enable students from different backgrounds to draw on both their experiences as educators and their practice in art, curation, design, art history and critical theory as a basis for research. In this way students are able to set up productive relationships between theory and practice and between academic study and professional experience. The MA challenges students to engage with art practice as a means to understand learning in and through art and culture. In addition to working with social science and humanities methodologies students are encouraged to explore the process of making not only as the object of educational research but as a mode of research in itself. 

This programme is for anyone interested in the intersection of art and education with experience in both teaching and art practice. We invite applications from early years educators, primary and secondary school teachers, university and college lecturers, curators and freelance arts educators working in formal and informal educational contexts (local communities, galleries, hospitals, museums, prisons, etc.). We also invite applications from practising artists working or planning to work in galleries, schools, universities and other educational sites.

Key issues addressed throughout the programme include access and inclusion, globalisation, materiality and embodiment, discourses of creativity, the “educational turn” in curation, socially engaged practice, alternative educational models and digital technologies.

Art education at IOE, UCL’s Faculty for Education and Society—the leading institution for education worldwide (QS World University Rankings by Subject 2021, for the eighth year in a row)—has a long and distinguished history which can be traced back to the work of pioneering art educator Marion Richardson (1892–1946).  Students continue to enjoy the use of purpose-built studio space in a Grade II listed building and benefit from being part of a wider community of PGCE, MA and doctoral students. Students are also introduced to a diverse network of local, regional and international organisations including contemporary art galleries, schools, colleges and alternative learning contexts.

Globally, the programme’s alumni go on to be key influencers in the expanded field of art education. We are therefore looking for applicants with strong practical and theoretical interests in shaping art education for the 21st century.

To learn more please join us for an online information open evening on Tuesday March 15, 2022 at 6pm UK time via Zoom.