British Art as International Art

On Friday I went to a Post-Grad Art History symposium at the UEA on the subject of this post’s title. The talks were from lecturers and PhD students at Warwick, the Courtauld Institute, York and the University of Vienna.

The Key Note speech by a Professor from Warwick University on nowhere-ness, Utopias and ‘trans-localism’ and these concepts’ relationship to both homosexuality and art in Britain and America was extremely interesting. The group of people the talk focused on had Fred Holland Day at its centre, who had links through his publishing company to Aubrey Beardsley’s work, as well as Edward Carpenter, who wrote the poetic, socialist ‘manifesto’, Towards Democracy. Both Day and Carpenter’s ideas of total social integration among people of all class, race and sexual orientation, along with an advocacy of the arts, are still concepts we should take from today in order to improve society.

After the symposium finished I had an interesting conversation with someone studying for a PhD in Design History at Kingston University; he informed me it’s possible to take a PhD in practical design there too, something which I like the idea of at the moment…