Rowles, Sarah;
(2024)
Examining The Role of Undergraduate Fine Art Education In The Production Of Professional Artists.
Doctoral thesis (Ed.D), UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
This thesis investigates the role that undergraduate fine art education plays in the production of professional artists and the factors that might influence whether final year students intend to practice as artists after the course. The study begins by examining how fine art professionalism has been conceptualised in the literature and observes that unlike occupations like law and medicine, which have distinct criteria to define the profession, the criteria that sets the professional artist apart from the amateur is more nebulous. I draw on the work of sociologists Howard Becker (1982) and Pierre Bourdieu (1993) who observed that professional artists participate in a distinct social world of art and seek recognition of their artwork from its participants e.g. other artists, gallerists, and curators with who they share a set of values and beliefs about art and the artist. I label these beliefs ‘discourses’ and consider how students are socialised into them through the BA Fine Art curriculum. I present a case study of one BA Fine Art course in Greater London where through interviews with staff and final year students and an analysis of course documentation, I consider how artistic professionalism was presented to and understood by final year students. The study found that the students most confident that they would pursue a professional practice after the course were those that had developed a methodology for making art; identified a context for their work; had some understanding of the field; and could imagine themselves sustaining a practice in the ways presented to them during the course. I add to the literature by putting forward an expanded definition of artistic professionalism as: knowledge and participation in the field of art; an ability to contextualise artwork in relation to relevant art practices and debates; and knowledge and application of a particular methodology for making art.
| Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Qualification: | Ed.D |
| Title: | Examining The Role of Undergraduate Fine Art Education In The Production Of Professional Artists |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © The Author 2024. Original content in this thesis is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Any third-party copyright material present remains the property of its respective owner(s) and is licensed under its existing terms. Access may initially be restricted at the author’s request. |
| Keywords: | higher education fine art, fine art professionalism, sociology of art education |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Culture, Communication and Media |
| URI: | https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10197601 |
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