Visual Culture and Cultural Studies

The Visual Culture and Cultural Studies cluster brings together academics, curators, practitioners and doctoral researchers who share a commitment to investigating visual cultures and art practices, past and present, across cultural, geographical and political contexts.

We offer expert research supervision in fields including: the visual and material culture of the city; modernism in art and architecture; popular and avant-garde cultures; women's experimental photography and film; social and cultural history of photography; fin de siècle visual culture; new media and digital arts; film studies, with a particular focus on Spain and Latin America; migration, identity and gender as represented in cultural practices; politics of aesthetics and aesthetic theory; and critical theories of modern and contemporary culture.

Our interdisciplinary and intellectually rigorous approach to research benefits from a strong sense of collaboration and the infectious influence of other colleagues across our Graduate School, and this is reflected in the cutting-edge research produced by our doctoral students.

Current and recent PhD projects

Some previous PhDs within our research group have, for example, explored:

  • relational art practice and memory studies
  • a genealogy of travel photography
  • new media art and the materiality of technical media
  • the experience of new media in contemporary art

Staff