Extended Major Overview
- Description
The major in Art History and Curatorial Studies is the first and only of its kind offered in Western Australia. By combining art historical knowledge with curatorial methods and techniques, this major equips students with a variety of career pathways, including arts management, museum and gallery curation, as well as art criticism and analysis. Students will gain foundational knowledge in the history and evolution of curation and examine an array of curatorial approaches, ranging from the Gesamtkunstwerk, to institutional critique, and museum decolonisation. Though focused on Art History and its curatorial applications, this course also cultivates transferrable skills in visual and spatial analysis, critical thought, and oral and written communication. Offering distinct opportunities for foreign study, industry placements, and object-based learning, this major activates Art History through hands-on experience in the field and engagement with exhibitions and curatorial institutions.
- Outcomes
Students are able to:
- Analyse a range of images, texts, and objects and situate them within their historical, cultural, and/or geographical context
- Apply the key concepts, theories, and methodologies of the discipline of Art History to the study, interpretation and curation of objects
- Critically communicate the significance and relationship among objects through written texts, oral presentation, and exhibition design
- Develop an understanding of curatorial practices in art museums, galleries, government and/or community arts programmes
- Demonstrate sound research skills through written and oral communication
- Demonstrate a critical understanding of the processes associated with object management across a variety of cultural and curatorial contexts.
- Broadening guidelines
- All students studying towards a Bachelor's Degree at UWA are required to Broaden their studies by completing a minimum of four units (24 points) of study outside their degree specific major. Broadening is your opportunity to explore other areas of interest, investigate new disciplines and knowledge paradigms and to shape your degree to suit your own aspirations and interests. Many of you will be able to undertake more than this minimum amount of broadening study and we encourage you to do so and to pursue as many areas of interest as you can during your course of study. At the same time, we k now that many of you value the University's guidance and assistance in planning your enrolment throughout your course, so we offer the following suggestions for your consideration as possible avenues to broaden your degree. Do always remember, however, that there is no wrong way to broaden your studies as long as you complete at least four units not associated with your Degree Specific Major.
Suggested Minors to broaden you study area, are:
(1) MNR-SCCOM Science Communication
(2) MNR-CCCOM Cross Cultural Communication
(3) MNR-FILMS Minor in Film Studies
(4) MNR-CRWRS Creative Writing Studies
(5) MNR-DCREA Digital Creativity - Incompatibilities
MJD-HYART History of Art
- Courses
Art History and Curatorial Studies can only be taken as a degree-specific major in the following degree courses:
No study plans found for this major. See study plans for more information.
Units
Key to availability of units:
- S1
- Semester 1
- S2
- Semester 2
- N/A
- not available in 2025 – may be available in 2026 or 2027
- NS
- non-standard teaching period
Level 1
Degree-specific major units
Take all units (12 points):
Availability | Unit code | Unit name | unit requirements |
---|---|---|---|
S1 | HART1000 | Ways of Making: The Creative Process and Material History of Art |
|
S2 | HART1003 | Ways of Seeing: Themes and Theories in Art | None |
Degree-specific major units
Take unit(s) to the value of 12 points:
Availability | Unit code | Unit name | unit requirements |
---|---|---|---|
S1 | ARTF1054 | Drawing Foundations |
|
S2 | COMM1002 | Cultures, New Media and Communications |
|
S2 | INDG1160 | Boodjar Moort Katitjin: Introduction to Indigenous Heritage and Knowledge | None |
S2 | LACH1020 | The Culture of Nature | None |
Level 2
Degree-specific major units
Take all units (12 points):
Availability | Unit code | Unit name | unit requirements |
---|---|---|---|
S1 | ARTF2000 | Curatorial Practices in Contemporary Arts |
|
S2 | HART2274 | Introduction to Museum and Curatorial Studies |
Degree-specific major units
Take unit(s) to the value of 18 points:
Availability | Unit code | Unit name | unit requirements |
---|---|---|---|
S2 | ANTH2902 | Entangled Objects |
|
N/A | HART2001 | Curating First Nations Art |
|
S2 | HART2020 | Digital Approaches to Art History and Curation |
|
S1 | HART2040 | The Lives and Deaths of Objects |
|
N/A | HART2041 | The Art of Photography | |
N/A | HART2043 | Zen to Manga: A Survey of Japanese Art | |
N/A | HART2044 | Contemporary Art and Tradition in China | |
N/A | HART2045 | Making the Modern Body: Art and the Human Form |
|
N/A | HART2201 | Art and Urban Experience | |
N/A | HART2203 | (Inter)national History of Art Study Tour |
|
N/A | HART2207 | Caravaggio and the Baroque | |
S1 | HART2222 | Contemporary Art | |
N/A | HART2223 | Global Modernisms: New York to Senegal | |
N/A | HART2275 | Italian Renaissance Art Now | |
N/A | HART2370 | Global Art Histories | |
NS | INDG2600 | Indigenous Representation: Cultural Heritage and The Museum |
|
Level 3
Degree-specific major units
Take all units (12 points):
Availability | Unit code | Unit name | unit requirements |
---|---|---|---|
N/A | HART3030 | Advanced Professional Skills in Curation |
|
S2 | HART3332 | Art Object Lab: Materiality, Meaning, and Display |
|
Degree-specific major units
Take unit(s) to the value of 18 points:
Availability | Unit code | Unit name | unit requirements |
---|---|---|---|
N/A | HART3001 | Curating First Nations Art |
|
N/A | HART3044 | Contemporary Art and Tradition in China |
|
N/A | HART3203 | (Inter)national History of Art Study Tour |
|
S2 | HART3204 | Curatorial Studies Internship | |
N/A | HART3276 | Prints from Dürer to Toulouse-Lautrec |
|
S2 | HART3301 | Manet and the French Avant-Garde |
|
N/A | HART3330 | Art Writing |
|
N/A | HART3333 | Picturing the Self: Portraiture in Nineteenth-century Europe |
|
S1 | HART3361 | Decolonizing the Dutch Golden Age |
|
S2 | HART3371 | The Northern Renaissance |
|
N/A | HART3375 | Twenty-first Century Art |
|
S1 | HART3666 | Australian and Aboriginal Art |
|