Output details

On being unique: world art and its British institutions

This article brings together a set of contemporary critical concerns with fresh data drawn from across the intellectual, museological and public spheres. It seeks to reframe some of the boundaries of the discipline of art history, and proposes an argument for rethinking the status quo in the institutionalisation and bureaucratic formations around difference, culture, 'race' and ethnicity in Britain today. It is one of the top five most downloaded articles from a leading journal published by Routledge, Taylor and Francis.

The content ranges across three significant contexts and establishes their previously undisclosed relations: first, pedagogical practices and issues surrounding the introduction of 'cultural diversity' and multicultural agendas into the field of teaching and learning in art, architectural and design history in UK Higher Education Institutions. This part of the essay reports on the critical research outcomes of the author's lead involvement in a national project exploring pedagogy and curriculum change, funded by HEFCE and involving 47 HEIs. Second, the settings for exhibition display, with reference to publicly-funded examples of curatorial and professional practices in the field of multiculturalism; third, the context of the programme of World Art Studies at the University of East Anglia and the wider intellectual project of studying art on a global scale.

The article involved project planning and design and the gathering and analysis of data. Examining the various institutional settings where concerns with 'world art' have emerged over the past decade in this country, it extends detailed critical scrutiny to a challenging range of contexts – including museology, curatorial practice, and teaching and learning in higher education.