Fine Art and Art History

Fine art and art history together explore the making and the meaning of visual art, approaching it simultaneously from the perspective of the practitioner and the scholar. Fine art gives you direct experience of artistic practice, developing creative thinking, technical skills and the ability to realise ideas in material form. Art history provides the critical and historical frameworks for understanding what art means, how it has been valued and contested across cultures and periods, and how images and objects function within social, political and economic contexts.

In the contemporary art world, the distinctions between artist, theorist and curator are increasingly permeable, and this programme is designed to engage productively with that permeability.

At Manchester Metropolitan University you will study for three years full-time, developing your studio practice in dialogue with art historical knowledge and theoretical ideas. The programme includes a curating pathway, giving you the option to explore exhibition-making as a form of creative and critical practice in its own right. A sandwich year in professional practice and a placement component are built into the programme, giving you direct professional experience in a gallery, museum, arts organisation or related context and connecting your academic work to the realities of the contemporary art world.

Graduates from fine art and art history work as artists, curators, gallery managers, arts administrators, art educators, critics, art market professionals and cultural policy advisers. The combination of creative practice and critical knowledge is valued in museums, galleries, auction houses, arts funding bodies, heritage organisations, publishing and the growing range of roles in the cultural and creative sectors. Many graduates pursue postgraduate study in fine art, curatorial practice, art history or museum studies, developing more specialist expertise in research or professional practice.

Others build freelance or portfolio careers combining studio practice with arts education, writing or curatorial work.