Research in the Arts
July 10, 2024, 6:30pm
Highlighting the importance of research as a key aspect of artistic and creative practices, this panel discussion brings together internationally acclaimed artists, curators, and academics to reflect on the role of practice research within today’s social, political, and cultural context.
Organised collaboratively between the Institute of Contemporary Arts and Kingston University’s Centre for Practice Research in the Arts (CePRA), “Practice Now” will explore the challenges and opportunities in producing new knowledge and change through creative research in its multiple forms.
Touching on artist-led, curatorial, community-based, grassroots, indigenous, and academic knowledge production, the panellists will consider the value of research practices and methodologies. Here we ask: how can creative research generate social change, be recognised as institutionally valuable, and respond to global events and technological shifts? How can practice research in the arts, thereby, provide new ways of lifting the lid on complex ideas, and locate innovative perspectives on making and learning?
The Centre for Practice Research in the Arts (CePRA) was launched in November 2022 as the newest research centre at Kingston University, London. Its goal is to build on Kingston School of Art’s long-standing excellence in practice research and contribute to key debates around contemporary art and design, with a view to becoming a prominent advocacy voice for creative practitioners nationally and internationally. The founding Director of the Centre is artist, theorist, and educator Bill Balaskas.
The panel discussion will be followed by a DJ set and drinks reception celebrating the establishment of CePRA, and its activities in 2023–24.
About the panellists
Elizabeth Price has exhibited in group shows internationally, and has had solo exhibitions at Tate Britain, UK; Chicago Institute of Art, USA; Julia Stoschek Foundation, Dusseldorf; Index Gallery, Stockholm; Musee D’art Contemporain, Montreal: Artangel, London; Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt; GoMA Glasgow and the Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo, Madrid. In 2012 she won the Turner Prize for her solo exhibition, Here, at the BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead and the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, Award for Artists. In 2013, she won the Contemporary Art Society Annual Award with the Ashmolean and Pitt Rivers Museums, Oxford. Price is Professor of Film and Photography at Kingston University, London.
Steven Cairns is a writer and Head of Artistic Programme at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London. He has commissioned and supported projects across exhibition, live event, screening and broadcast media. With a specialism in moving image culture and interdisciplinarity, he has curated projects and exhibitions internationally, often in collaboration with artists and other practitioners. As a writer, he has written for numerous international art publications and published on arts and archival practices. He lectures on contemporary arts and has an ongoing research practice informed by contemporary arts and culture.
Justin McGuirk is the Director of Future Observatory, the Design Museum’s national research programme for the green transition. He is also the former chief curator of the Design Museum. A writer and curator, he has produced numerous high-profile exhibitions and publishing projects. His writing has appeared in the New Yorker, the Guardian, e-flux and numerous art and design journals. He is the author or editor of several books, including Radical Cities (Verso, 2014) and Ai Weiwei: Making Sense (2023).
Bill Balaskas is an artist, theorist, and educator. His works have been exhibited internationally, including at Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona; BOZAR, Brussels; National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens; Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo, Madrid; Le CENTQUATRE, Paris; John Hansard Gallery, Southampton; TENT, Rotterdam; and Les Abattoirs, Toulouse. His books include Fabricating Publics: The Dissemination of Culture in the Post-truth Era (Open Humanities Press, 2021), and Institution as Praxis: New Curatorial Directions for Collaborative Research (Sternberg Press, 2020). Balaskas is the founding Director of the Centre for Practice Research in the Arts at Kingston University, London.
