Imperial encounters - University of Birmingham

Research in our department critically examines how the impacts and aftermath of empire are manifested in art history and visual and material cultures, both contributing to and evaluating ongoing efforts to decolonise the art history curriculum and museums.

Our work under this research theme investigates how art shapes and is shaped by the political, economic and cultural practices and legacies of empire. It examines how the movement of peoples, goods, materials, artworks and ideas creates encounters, exchanges, and intimacies that are born of empire yet challenge or even transcend its structures.

Key to this work, and fundamentally shaping our questions and methods, is our ongoing collaborative work with museums and galleries, artists, education workers, and community groups, which enables us to help effect curating, learning, and visitor engagements that grapple with empire’s aftermath in the present. This research on the impacts and aftermath of empire and our collaborations inform our teaching at undergraduate and postgraduate levels, including on our modules ‘Image as Witness’, ‘Art, Race and the British Empire’ and ‘Global Art and Cultural Studies’.

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