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Critical Writing in Art & Design Programme Specifications (PDF).

The Critical Writing in Art & Design programme offers a high-quality learning environment. All classes are taught by expert tutors and there are ample opportunities for one-to-one tutorials. Drawing on the teaching methods of the art school, this programme makes full use of the ‘crit’ (group reviews of student work), briefs and writing workshops. Breaking the isolation that characterises much writing practice, it forms a lively environment for intellectual exchange and collaboration.

Alongside a strong emphasis on criticality, expertise and theory, this programme views writing as a practice in its own right. Writing is strongly shaped by the contexts in which it is practised and where it appears. The programme offers the opportunity to develop writing skills in a variety of contexts including radio and the internet.  Students on the programme publish their work – interviews, reviews, polemics, sustained critical essays and scripts – online and in print. They produce a major publication in the second year of their studies.

In the first year, we concentrate on core writing and research skills and in developing students’ understanding of the changing contexts in which writing is practised. In the second year, students will increasingly become their own ‘editor’, shaping their briefs and working in formats which they will determine. In the second year, the proportion of class time will reduce slightly in favour of more independent study in which students work on major projects.

A series of writing workshops – which run throughout the two years – will see students conducting interviews, writing texts that explore London’s diverse faces, writing polemics, and exploring the ‘borders of fact and fiction’ and many other themes. A rolling seminar entitled ‘Critical Reading: Reading Critically’, offered a cross both years of the course, explores concepts and ideas with high currency in contemporary art and design. Similarly, the Critical & Historical Studies lecture and seminar series, which students undertake in the first year, introduces major contemporary issues in different fields of art and design. Classes in media platforms and contexts in the first year examine the practice of writing in different media fields including radio and television, print- and web-based media. They are taught by leading media industry professionals.

In the second year of the course, a series of masterclasses sees prominent visiting writers and critics set briefs and lead crits of student writing. By the course’s conclusion, students will have submitted a major independent project which might take the form of, for example, a sustained critical essay on an aspect of art or design, based on original research (interviews, archival sources, etc.), an anthology of primary documents collated by the student and accompanied by an introductory essay, or a scripted and researched documentary produced for radio.

On graduating, Critical Writing in Art & Design students will have a portfolio of different kinds of writing, editing skills and critical understanding as well as membership of a formidable network of RCA graduates. This MA will enhance their opportunities to pursue a career in the arts and the cultural industries.