art-exhibit

We are delighted to announce this year’s exhibitions, produced in partnership with our wonderful exhibition partners, the Barber Institute of Fine Arts, Royal Collection Trust and, Grand Union. Below are details of our two student exhibitions, opening this June.  We hope you can join us!

Barber Institute of Fine Arts, 15 June-23 September

MA Art History and Curating students, in collaboration with the Barber Institute of Fine Arts and the Royal Collection Trust, present their exhibition, Drawn to Perfection: Masterworks on Paper from the Royal Collection. 

This first exhibition in an exciting new partnership with Royal Collection Trust explores the use of drawings – as preparatory sketches and studies for paintings and frescoes, tapestries, sculpture or architecture, and as detailed working designs that allow an artist to explore the subject or trial compositional ideas. It includes a wealth of exquisite works on paper by outstanding Renaissance and Baroque Masters, including Bernini, Carracci, Claude, and Poussin. The artists featured used a great variety of techniques and media, and their work thus provides a rich introduction to the practical skills of drawing.  The exhibition has been curated by students on MA Art History and Curating under the guidance of staff at Royal Collection Trust and the Barber. Generous loans by Her Majesty The Queen have been supplemented by items from the Barber’s collection. The exhibition is accompanied by a booklet researched and written by the student co-curators; available at the Barber. For public programming, please refer to the Barber What’s On guide.

Central Art Gallery, 1-10 June

Opening: 1 June 18:00

Centrala, Minerva Works, Digbeth, Birmingham, B5 5RT

Open: 2 June – 10 June | Open Tues – Sat 11-00

Artists: Chris Alton, Ian Giles, Greta Hauer

MA Art History and Curating students, in collaboration with the programme’s contemporary art partner, Grand Union in Digbeth, present their exhibition, Three Models for Change. This features new commissions and existing works by the artists Chris Alton, Ian Giles, Greta Hauer. It asserts the importance of historical awareness in establishing future potentials of communities. The works fluctuate between three actual and staged narratives: the formation of a fictional Quaker-punk band; the staging of cross-generational Queer histories; and the uncertainty surrounding a newly formed volcanic island and its territorial disputes. Ian Giles is developing a new performance project on queer spaces for the exhibition; auditions are on 28 May and the performance is  on 9 June – for details, see here. The students are currently crowdfunding to publish a reflective publication on the exhibition.

The MA Art History and Curating is run by the Department of Art History, Curating and Visual Studies. Applications are still open for this coming year. For details, contact the programme convenor, Dr Claire Jones.