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This case study focuses on three areas in relation to the social impact of art, across the categories of `cultural life' and `public discourse'.
1) Artistic collaborations with non-artistic specialists in order to generate new interdisciplinary pathways
2) Artistic collaborations with non-artists within a given community or non-artistic institutional setting in order to create new forms of artist-audience participation
3) The sharing of knowledge/skills between either non-artistic specialists or a non-specialist audience and artists in the production of a shared task or project.
4) Performance-based practice inside and outside of the gallery
The outward facing nature of this research, then, addresses the way such work tests the prevailing competences, boundaries and identities of artist and audience alike. This means researchers are involved with both artistic and non-artistic funding-bodies and agencies as the basis for work on a range of critical issues affecting the borders between the art institution and non-artistic settings and contexts.
Afterall is a research and publishing organisation founded in 1998 by Research Fellow Charles Esche and Professor Mark Lewis at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London (UAL). Afterall focuses on contemporary art, and its relationship to wider theoretical, social and political fields. Researchers associated to Afterall undertake and commission research, which is disseminated to an international audience through publications and events. Afterall impacts on the cultural sector and an extended audience by providing a platform for critical and creative responses to art, curatorial and cultural practice and by shaping discourse in this area. The significance and wide reach of this impact is demonstrated through partnerships and high-profile cultural events, publication reach, and support from the cultural community.
The developing collaborative strategic relationship between Professor Ben Quash and the National Gallery stemming from Quash's research, in particular his unique exploration of religious art — or specifically `Christian' art along the dual lines of 'Art in Christianity' and 'Christianity in Art' — has impacted on the approach of this world-leading cultural institution in a number of ways. It has been central to the Gallery's decision to make `Art and Religion' one of its four lead research themes. It has been responsible for attracting significant financial support from donors impressed by the theological character of the questions Quash's research explores. It has resulted in the Gallery's commissioning of its most ambitious educational investment to date in a series of online educational resources; and it has influenced the Gallery's staging of its highly successful 2011 summer exhibition `Devotion by Design'. Finally, Quash's research has impacted on how the National Gallery's education department organizes the public study of religion and art.
The impact of this case study is the evidence that public art can function for social benefit. Significant research projects were completed for Ashford, commissioned by Kent County Council (2010), New Art Gallery Walsall (2005 - 2009), Collective Gallery Edinburgh, UK (2008), Liverpool Biennale (2010). This research claims three types of impact: 1. Public Service: a public artwork as part of a shared traffic scheme, which demonstrates a reduction in traffic accidents, 2. Civil Society: participatory artworks that enable public engagement in the design of a place (Ashford & the Black Country) , and 3. Influencing Policy — making: a contribution to policy debates concerning public art's function for social and economic regeneration.
Derek Matravers' research in aesthetics has contributed to the public discourse on art by offering a plausible postmodern definition of `art'. Matravers' definition offers a way of understanding art that places the emphasis on reasons, and thus moves beyond the obscurantism associated with contemporary art. His podcast on the subject, as part of the PhilosophyBites series, has taken the topic into public discourse. His work has also influenced the art world. Matravers participated in a conceptual art piece, where his ideas on the definition of art were incorporated into the art piece, effectively blurring the borders between the philosophy and the object of study.
The impact of Professor Taylor's work in interpreting modern and contemporary art has taken place on two complementary levels: on the one hand the lucid and accessible exposition, for a wide international reading public, of some of the most difficult, intractable, or provocative works of recent and contemporary art; and on the other, more specialist readings, again for an international reading public, of key tendencies in the broader range of modern art, from Cubism to the present day. Wide readership across Asia, Europe, and the United States has secured increased public understanding of art, and has influenced both policy and art practice.
Matthew Kieran's research focuses on the role that individual motivations, skills and settled dispositions (i.e. someone's character) actively play in artistic appreciation and creation. In particular, it shows the significant role that character should play in guiding artistic creativity and evaluation. He has worked extensively outside higher education—using small group sessions with the public, contributions to creators' conferences, high-profile media work, policy inputs, a prime-time TV documentary and widely disseminated web materials— to enrich the public understanding of artistic values based on this approach and to help skill people up in developing their artistic creativity and art appreciation.
The research described focuses on performance in an expansive sense — including both live and documented forms — to address and engage with audiences both within and outside the usual parameters of the art museum or gallery. Impact is achieved through multiple modes: public, audience and community, participation, video, broadcast and performance. This work addresses the impact on cultural understandings and attitudes to performance art in the light of its increasingly de-marginalised role within fine art. The study should be considered in the context of moves by major institutions to acknowledge the increased significance of performance art practice whilst also reaching beyond the fixed notions implied by permanent structures such as the Tate's oil tanks.
Research carried out at the University of Southampton into the social and intellectual value of conceptual art has been the basis of creative education and personal development programmes designed for school children, teachers, young offenders and the general public. Through public engagement activities run through the University's John Hansard Gallery, public knowledge and understanding of conceptual art have been deepened. Research has had a significant impact on 93 young offenders whose participation in arts-based programmes has resulted in the attainment of educational qualifications, enhanced employment prospects and a drop in re-offending. New programmes, co-developed with Southampton Youth Offending Service, have influenced public policy at local and national government levels, with impact reach evidenced when they were recognised by the Ministry of Justice as a model for best practice.
This case study demonstrates the impact of the Cass' research that has promoted and supported the now pivotal role of Installation art and Artists' Writing on the wider field of artistic and curatorial practice over the last decade and more specifically since 2008.
The body of research based on de Oliveira/Oxley's activities as curators and writers has been instrumental in the development of emerging forms of practice and critical discourse. Installation art highlighted significant changes in the understanding of the idea of the `medium', the institution and the relationship between artists, curators and audiences. This research is documented on their website www.writinginstallation.org.