MSt in History of Art and Visual Culture

Watch the recording of our MSt in History of Art and Visual Culture Information Session from our Master's Open Week 2024.

Aims of the Programme

By the end of the course students should have demonstrated:

• a deep and systematic understanding of history of art and visual culture and their interrelationships with other disciplines
• an understanding of current theoretical and methodological approaches and how they affect the way that knowledge is interpreted
• conceptual understanding in order to evaluate critically current research in the discipline and to critique methodologies, where appropriate proposing new hypotheses
• the extension and development of their visual analytical, evaluative and critical capacities
• originality in the application of their knowledge, having developed the ability to form independent judgements based on their close visual analysis and object study, reading, research and writing
• a comprehensive understanding of techniques, knowledge and analysis applicable to their own research or advanced scholarship (in this case the dissertation)

Skills and other attributes

By the end of the course, the students should have acquired or consolidated:

• the academic, technical and ancillary skills necessary to participate in critical debates within the field of history of art and visual culture, dealing with complex issues both systematically and creatively and making sound judgments in the absence of complete data
• self-direction and originality in tackling and solving problems, and the ability to act autonomously in planning and implementing tasks at a professional or equivalent level
• transferable skills, including the ability to take responsibility for their own learning, decision-making in unpredictable situations, making oral and written presentations to both specialist and non-specialist audiences, planning and producing written assignments, working independently, and, where they have chosen to do so, using different types of technology
• the ability to formulate a research topic, create a research design, and communicate their ideas and research conclusions in a substantial piece of postgraduate level research

Student Support

Depending upon your needs, a variety of support opportunities are available to you including wellbeing support sessions, short-term counselling, and study skills support sessions. Find out more in our student support webpages.

Expected academic standard

Applicants for this course will normally have achieved a UK 2.1 honours degree or overseas equivalent in history or a humanities-related subject.

If your degree is not from the UK, please check International Qualifications to find the equivalent in your country.

We are able to consider 'non-standard' applicants who do not meet the standard academic criterion. In such cases, you will need to produce evidence of relevant and equivalent experience, and your suitability for the course.

Language requirement

If English isn’t your first language, you will be required to submit evidence that you meet the University’s English language requirement before you are admitted.

Please see full details on the University Language Requirement webpage.

Language requirements for this course are below:

• IELTS Academic: Overall band score of 7.5 (with a minimum of 7.0 in each individual component)
• TOEFL Internet: Overall score of 110 (a minimum of 25 in each individual component)
• C1 Advanced: Grade  A or B (with at least 193 in each individual element), plus a Language Centre assessment.
• C2 Proficiency: Grade A, B, or C (with at least 200, with no element lower than 185)

There are no exceptions to this requirement and, if you are offered a place on the course, it will be subject to you meeting this requirement.

Visa information 

Students registered on a part-time Master of Studies (MSt) will be able to attend the short teaching sessions with a visitor status in the UK. Entry to the UK as a visitor has a number of expectations and restrictions which you should consider carefully.

Further information is provided on the International Students website and prospective students are advised to read this in full.

Students attending sessions taking place at intervals across the year with a visitor status are expected not to remain in the UK for extended periods. The majority of study must be undertaken outside the UK and generally students will be required to leave the UK at the end of each session and return for the next. As a visitor on a course of more than 6 months, it is not possible to make the UK your main study location or residence, or make frequent or successive visits to stay in the UK for extended periods.

Teaching

The MSt in History of Art and Visual Culture takes place over two years, running typically from October of the first year to September of the second. 

You are expected to attend all of the in person residentials in Cambridge in Year 1, and participate actively in the day schools in Year 2.

A Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) offers learning support to students while they are on the programme, including learning resources, to build a virtual community of practice. Students are expected to have sufficient IT skills to engage with the VLE and all assignments are uploaded to the VLE for assessment.

Year 1

During the first year, all students will be required to undertake six core modules, 2 per term, paired in numerical order:

• modules 1, 3 & 5: Thematic approaches to understanding art
• modules 2, 4 & 6: Research, Sources and Method

A number of themes will allow students to explore the history of art and visual culture, including theoretical approaches and useful concepts. Themes may include, amongst others: class and social status; race and gender; local / global; the relationship of medium to style; the historical valuation of fine art versus decorative arts; art and ecology. Students will be introduced to a range of art and approaches to the history of art and visual culture from the earliest examples to the present day.

The planned themes for 2025-26 (which may be subject to change) are:

Term I: Thinking across media

The idea of intermediality - or thinking across media - is currently the focus of much scholarly attention. Term 1 (modules 1 and 2) will introduce you to a variety of intermedial approaches to Art History, focusing mainly on the medieval and early modern periods in the West (c.1100-c.1700), whilst raising theoretical and historiographical issues relevant to the study of art up until today across a range of geographical locations. It will encourage you to think about the interactions of different media at the time of works’ making, the different visual influences on artists and how to question traditional hierarchies of medium that privilege ‘fine’ over ‘decorative’ arts.

Term 2: Art and environment

With global ecosystems facing irreversible crisis, the need to envisage new approaches to the relationship between nature and culture is taking on increasing urgency. Term 2 (modules 3 and 4) asks how the history of art can be used to explore how societies have visualised and shaped both built and natural environments, and how changing environments have in turn impacted art’s history. Alongside this, we will ask how focusing on questions of environments and ecology affects the methods and sources of art history and visual culture. As such, this module explores new perspectives on fundamental topics, whether landscape painting, twentieth-century Land Art, or contemporary photography.

Term 3: Visual cultures of activism

Term 3 (modules 5 and 6) will explore the ways that artists and curators have redefined our conceptions of art and its role in society, focusing on the seismic shifts in the art world of the twentieth century to show how art became increasingly self-reflexive and activist. The global surrealist movement will be examined via a discussion of the works of artists from Europe, Africa and the Americas. We also discuss decoloniality through an analysis of the work of Diego Rivera and Violeta Parra. Finally, we reflect on the transversality of art and activism in the twenty-first century, focusing on feminist textile art. 

Modules 2, 4 & 6: Research, sources and method

These modules explore the different ways of researching the history of art and visual culture in practice, for example: close visual analysis and object handling; the digital humanities in visual culture; archival study in the arts; the intersections of literature, visual sources and material culture; museum display and interpretation within a heritage context

Residential in person teaching dates

Term 1: 07 - 10 October 2025

Term 2: 10 - 13 February 2026

Term 3: 28 April - 01 May 2026

In order to proceed to Year 2, students must complete the three assessed essay assignments satisfactorily, each between 4,000-5,000 words. The Year 1 essays constitute 50% of the overall award mark, and the dissertation constitutes 50% of the overall award mark. Students must attain an average of 60% overall across the three essay assignments.

Students achieving a minimum of the pass mark for Year 1 but not completing the Year 2 requirements may be awarded a Postgraduate Certificate in History of Art and Visual Culture.

Year 2

Dissertation research (90 credits).

Three day schools taking place on:

• day school 1: Friday 02 October 2026
• day school 2: Friday 15 January 2027
• day school 3: Friday 16 April 2027

The requirement for the award of the MSt degree is satisfactory completion of a 12,000-15,000 word dissertation, constituting 50% of the overall mark and which is read by two examiners, who report independently. The dissertation must reach the pass mark of 60%. The overall pass mark for the award of the MSt degree is 60%. The examiners are required to assure themselves that the dissertation is clearly written, that it takes account of previously published work on the subject, and that it represents a contribution to scholarship.

To complete Year 1 successfully students must pass at least two of the three assessed essays and reach an average pass mark of 60% across the three. Students who achieve this can progress to Year 2, where they research and write a dissertation on a topic of their choice, subject to the approval of the Degree Committee of the Faculty of Architecture and History of Art. Dissertation work is individually supervised and is assessed following the Faculty of Architecture and History of Art’s common examinations handbook (except where a case is made for alignment with common MSt protocols). The dissertation must reach the pass mark of 60%. 

Teaching methods 

The learning outcomes of the programme are achieved through:

• personal study of appropriate material guided by reading lists and other resources
• residential study blocks/modules including lectures, seminars, classes at which students express their own ideas and present accounts of their work
• full and appropriate use of our virtual learning environment (VLE)
• one-to-one supervisions (usually five in total) with a designated expert supervisor to include detailed feedback on students’ work and progress

Assessment methods

In Year 1 the taught elements of the course are examined through three compulsory essay assignments, one per term of between 4,000-5,000 words each, totalling a maximum of between 12,000 and 15,000 words. All essays will be independently marked by two assessors. Each written assignment in Year 1 will be submitted at the end of term (Michaelmas, Lent, Easter).

In Year 2 of the course examination will be by a supervised dissertation (of between 12,000 and 15,000 words). A viva voce examination may be required by the examiners and, subject to the Faculty of Architecture and History of Art’s common examinations handbook, will be required in the case of a borderline fail. Dissertations are due in term 3 of Year 2.

Students will receive a range of formative assessments during the course.

Fees

The fees for 2025-27, which include College membership, are: 

• £7,755 per annum for Home students (total £15,510)
• £15,510 per annum for Overseas students (total £31,020) 

The fee can be paid across the two years of the course, normally in eight equal instalments. All fees for Year 1 must be paid in full in order to progress to Year 2.

You will be expected to cover the application fee (£50 online) and any costs of travel, accommodation and subsistence during residential sessions in Cambridge.  Whilst we do not anticipate entrance fees being charged for museum visits, it is possible that small costs may be incurred for specialist exhibitions. 

Funding

We do not currently have any scholarships or bursaries for this course. 

We recommend that you explore any potential funding well in advance of the application deadline. See our External funding page for more information.

Applications will be accepted until 2nd April 2025.

All applications are considered on a gathered field after the closing date. Late applications will not be considered. We encourage all applications to be submitted as early as possible, to avoid any possible technical difficulties with submission. 

All short-listed applicants will be invited to interview. Interviews will take place using video conferencing tools, such as Zoom. 

Interview dates: 22 - 25 April 2025

Apply using the applicant portal

The Apply Now button on this page will take you to the Applicant Portal. There, you can create and submit your application and supporting documents, and you can also request your references.
An application is only complete when:

• you have submitted your application and supporting documents via the Applicant Portal
• you have paid the application fee if applicable.
• your referees have provided their references.

College membership

When you apply, you can specify a first and second choice from any of the following partner Colleges, or select ‘No Preference’:

• Lucy Cavendish
• Murray Edwards (female only)
• Wolfson 

There may be small additional fees payable to a College for specific services provided; for further information please contact the College directly.

We will do our best to allocate students to their preferred College(s), but this is dependent on capacity and ensuring an equal balance between all partner Colleges. To find out more about College membership, see the most recent ‘Meet the Colleges’ recording. 

If you have a pre-existing membership at a Cambridge College which is not listed above, you can approach them to ask if they would consider you as a member for this course. However, we are unable to arrange this for you. It is only possible to select membership of one of the above partner Colleges if this is not your case.  

Students may wish to book accommodation at Madingley Hall, subject to availability. You are also free to make your own accommodation arrangements. College accommodation might be available to book for the residentials, but this will vary from College to College. Please check with your College first.

Students are expected to make their own transport arrangements to and from Madingley Hall and College matriculation events. There will be a number of site visits in central Cambridge during the taught residential blocks. Transport one way from Madingley Hall to Cambridge will be provided for these visits. 

When completing your application, please note the University restrictions and risks of using AI tools.