Summary of the impact

The interdisciplinary study of Black and Latino visual cultures by Professor Celeste-Marie Bernier and Dr Stephanie Lewthwaite has led to the retrieval of lost and neglected art from the 19^th and 20^th centuries and to the display of this artwork for the first time. The research and recovery process has provided new information for curators and archivists who have begun to change their practice to reflect this expanded canon.

Summary of the impact

Work undertaken by the Centre for Transnational Art, Identity and Nation (TrAIN) at the University of the Arts London (UAL) focuses on the role of identity and nation in the production and consumption of artwork and artefacts. This has resulted in an increased awareness and critical understanding of transnational art and design, to the benefit of the Museums and Galleries sector, arts organisations, and the artistic community.

Summary of the impact

In times of financial instability, there is particular pressure on arts and cultural institutions to operate effectively and attract, develop and retain new audiences. Research conducted at the University of Southampton's Winchester School of Art has directly enabled key cultural institutions to address these challenges. Since 2009 three major Tate exhibitions/events with related public education activities were built out of this research — resulting in over £140,000 of economic benefits for the Tate through ticket sales, a broadening of traditional audiences, and greater public understanding and knowledge of art and social history.

Summary of the impact

The `Northern Spirit` research project entailed the co-production of a new gallery about the visual culture, histories and identities of North-East England at the Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle, the region's foremost public historical art gallery. The project generated a range of impacts across the local and national cultural, social and policy spheres:

• Cultural life: It contributed to the production of a new permanent display which challenged, changed and enhanced the ways that the visual culture of North-East England is presented to, and understood by, the local public and tourists.
• Civil society and public discourse: It brought together diverse members of the local community including marginalised and disadvantaged groups, making their perspectives visible in the gallery for the first time. It offered new precedents for combining art historical display with issues of social history and regional identity using digital media and participatory methods.
• Policy making: It explored and theorised the opportunities and challenges of working collaboratively with diverse community groups on the production of a public gallery display, resulting in the production of new policy guidelines and feeding into the gallery working and wider staff training.
• Public services: Through the production of a new permanent and well-received gallery display it directly enhanced the provision of cultural services, promoting the artistic heritage of the region and increasing visitor figures for the Laing. Since its opening in October 2010 the `Northern Spirit' gallery has been visited by an estimated audience of 800,000.

Summary of the impact

York's British Art Research School, judged `world-leading' in RAE 2008, aims to change the way key cultural institutions represent British art. To advance this aim we have fostered partnerships with museums and galleries at local, national, and international levels. The partnerships have influenced curatorial practices through:

• co-curatorship of exhibitions and displays
• staff exchanges, which provide continuing professional development
• generation of funding for partner organisations
• co-production of digital resources

These initiatives have helped partners to display and promote a significantly wider range of British art and to generate new kinds of interpretation for larger and more diverse publics.

Summary of the impact

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.

Summary of the impact

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.

Summary of the impact

Ysanne Holt was Academic Advisor and Commissioning Editor for Tate's Camden Town Group in Context project, funded through the Getty Foundation's Online Scholarly Catalogue Initiative which aims to transform how museums disseminate information about their collections. Holt undertook and commissioned new research into the Group's artworks and their broader contexts. Impacts derived from the project's online catalogue include increased awareness for national and international public and specialists; and improved access to the art and its contexts via a multi-platform open access facility. In addition, the project has influenced the Tate's Digital Strategy and led to the creation of the new post of Digital Editor within Tate's Research Department.

Summary of the impact

Since 1993, the Visual Culture Research Centre has established an international reputation for interdisciplinary research. Historical, theoretical and practice-based research is applied in collaborations and partnerships with outside public-facing organisations, events, markets and professionals in the creative arts. This case study articulates significant social and cultural impacts epitomised by the exhibitions Weapons of Mass Communication 2007-8 and Archiving Place and Time 2009-10 and accompanying publications. The case study demonstrates how the researchers from within the unit have effectively engaged with the public, participants, practitioners, interpreters, writers, and critics to promote understanding of how images of conflict work: that they are neither natural nor real, but sites of contestation.

Summary of the impact

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.