The programme welcomes research applicants. We offer MPhil and PhD by project and thesis.
Visual Communication research consists of staff and student projects across the full range of contemporary print, digital, audiovisual, graphic and illustration media. We explore communications in the widest social and cultural contexts, based on a philosophical approach to communication theory and practice in culture and society. We see research as a conduit for ideas rather than being medium-specific, and encourage innovative and experimental ideas that test the limits of our major disciplines and their increasingly hybrid outputs. Research-active staff contribute to new media practice through publication, exhibition and curation of their own work and that of their peers and colleagues, both at the RCA and across many other art, design and media platforms. Research students – who are often professionals engaged in teaching, writing and exhibition – contribute to the research culture by progressing their own original topics, and by engaging collectively in critical seminars and forums. We encourage researchers to associate with the overall programme in postgraduate studies, and to take their work and ideas out into the wider world through external conferences and symposia, the gallery, and in print, digital and other media.
Research in Visual Communication is organised around the major research interests of staff and students. These are concerned with asking questions and finding new solutions in diverse areas of communications practice and theory. Our current multi-disciplinary themes are:
Questions of Visual Design: exploring typography, visual imaging and exhibition strategies in a range of practices. These include studies of arts and visual cultures that cut across traditional subject areas, from the design innovations of the avant-garde to new modes of web-based visualisation and to the critical role of branding in society. This cluster also includes specific studies in such topics as low-resolution visibility in print for screen and page, in association with Imperial College and other experts, to enhance readability skills for both normal and visually impaired readers. Staff active in this area are led by Jeff Willis, Adrian Shaughnessy and Teal Triggs.
Questions of Media: projects that explore the interface and overlap between analogue and digital technologies, and look at ways in which traditional craft media and processes are used alongside digital developments. They investigate emergent hybrid processes, with a particular focus on print and online publishing, moving image and sound. Research in this area includes film and video projects, typified by experimental self-authored pieces for projection in cinemas and/or exhibitions. Staff active in this area include Jon Wozencroft, A L Rees and Nicky Hamlyn.
Questions of Narrative: developing the innovative use of word and image to explain or entertain, built on our roots in animation, illustration and graphics. New ways of communicating ideas or telling stories are explored through the relationship between image and text. This area also includes work of a theoretical or contextual nature – books, articles, documentaries, exhibitions – of particular relevance to communications. Staff active in this area are led by Professor Andrzej Klimowski.
Recent successful research projects focused on Landscape, Environment and Culture, exploring the natural and the artificial environment as a source of meaning and identity; landscape imagery and sound in the context of memory, history and community; and ways in which artists and designers can intervene in environmental, ecological and social issues. These include the three-year, AHRC-funded project ‘The Future of Landscape and the Moving Image’ led by Patrick Keiller, Doreen Massey and Patrick Wright, culminating in Keiller’s widely screened 35mm film Robinson in Ruins (2011) and other publications. Current funded research in this area includes Jon Wozencroft’s study of the sonics of ancient landscape and human settlement sites (with Paul Devereux), examples of which can be seen and heard on the website ‘Landscape & Perception’.
Research students contribute to many internal and external conferences and workshops on themes from graphic visual illustration. We also focus on developments in time-based and media arts. Two recent RCA seminar series with guest speakers as well as our own researchers were organised by PhD student Andrew Vallance. ‘Black Box Projector’ (2011) explored gallery film and video (with Karen Mirza, Tacita Dean, Mark Nash and others) and ‘Forever May’ (2012) debated current issues in political artists’ films (with Nina Power, Esther Leslie and William Raban). Research students exhibit their work annually as ‘Fieldwork’, held at Brighton Regency House and in Exhibition Road, Kensington.
An important new development from 2011 is the programme’s contribution to the prestigious Creative Economy Knowledge Exchange Hub, in association with Lancaster and Newcastle Universities and funded by the AHRC. The RCA’s role is led by Professor Neville Brody. The Hub will collaborate with the BBC, Microsoft, MediaCityUK, FutureEverything, Tate Liverpool, Opera North, NESTA, Manchester Digital, Arts Council England and over 30 small- and medium-sized companies working in the sector, such as Stardotstar, B3 Media and Mudlark. It responds to and enhances digital space and interactive content online, and explores new forms of connectivity. The project will include six PhD research scholarships at the RCA, to develop innovative ideas and practice within the framework of Visual Communication, and will be based in a new Digital Research Lab.
Suky Best, MPhil by project
Neil Henderson, MPhil by project
Jeanne Hoogslag, PhD by project, AHRC Doctoral Award
Nils Jean, PhD by thesis
Sarah Kirby-Ginns, MPhil by project
Joséphine Michel, MPhil by project, RCA Bursary (HEFCE)
Catrin Morgan, PhD by project, PhD Student Award (RCA)
Gareth Polmeer, PhD by project
Catherine Rogers, MPhil by project
Andrew Vallance, PhD by thesis
Karin von Ompteda, PhD by project, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
Ian Wiblin, MPhil by project