Media, Art and Performance Studies

Media, Art and Performance Studies is an interdisciplinary and internationally oriented research-based programme which offers an advanced training in academic research skills appropriate for today's highly dynamic and interdisciplinary field of media, visual arts and performance. 

Investigating emerging media, art and performance

As a student of this programme, you will be introduced to and specialise in new research areas and methodologies, necessary for investigating emerging media, performance and contemporary art forms within today's rapidly changing culture. In relation to this you will also reflect on the role of the Humanities in both academic and public debates.

Central concerns in the programme

• the role and meaning of (visual) media in a mediatised society, inter- and transmedial practices in theatre, dance, film, television, digital media and visual arts 
• spectator- and usership, the performative turn in contemporary arts and media
• technology, materiality and corporeal literacies
• game, play and activism
• changing institutions, mobile and/or location-based media, urban interfaces, navigational screen-based practices
• art and media ecologies

Research questions

In this programme you will reflect on questions such as:

• How have media developed from the time of early cinema up to current new media art?
• How has the definition of 'live' changed alongside these mediatised cultural forms?
• How has the performative turn changed the ways we think about audiences?
• How do media technologies facilitate new methods of self-staging and social performance?
• What is the influence of media and technology on way we curate and educate in museums and archives and other cultural institutions.

Why this programme in Utrecht?

Art in relation to media and performance

Unique in its profile is the programme’s focus on contemporary art in relation to media and performance, which entails the examination of principles of creation, curation (including exhibition and staging), and collecting and archiving across these fields. Examples of topics are:

• history of new media art
• performativity and the visual arts
• hybridisation in and of art and performance
• staging and restaging of art exhibitions

ICON research institute

This programme is firmly anchored in research conducted by the Institute for Cultural Inquiry (ICON) at Utrecht University. The Faculty of Humanities combines strong expertise in historical research into local, regional, and global media practices with theoretical research into concepts of performativity; embodiment; visuality; media literacy; intermediality/transmediality/crossmediality; participation; data visualization; mobility; urban culture.

After graduation

Alumni of the Media, Art and Performance Studies research Master’s have been successful in obtaining PhD positions in various prestigious international programmes. Graduates also find their way to other job markets.