De- and/or Re-classifying Art History?

Join us for a work in progress seminar with speaker Dr Rebecca Starr, a Lecturer in History of Art in the School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies.

Over the last few years, there have been increasing calls from artists and curators to consider the role of social class, and specifically working-class identities, in the arts and cultural sectors.

Ranging from the establishment of platforms to share opportunities for working class artists (Working Class Creatives Database), to spaces for exchanging experiences of navigating the arts and offering support to others, such as the Working Arts Club, there is a renewed interest in highlighting the contributions of, and barriers to, working-class people in these sectors.

Recent exhibitions – including Two Temple Place's Lives Less Ordinary: Working Class Britain Re-Seen and The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery’s [uz], [uz], [uz]: Artists from Working-Class Backgrounds – have sought to redefine the presentation of working-class art and artists in museum and gallery spaces, challenging the tropes of working-class backgrounds as lacking and homogenous.

Elsewhere, writers and critics including Maria Fusco, Dave Beech and Morgan Quaintance have spoken of the inequities at play in the UK cultural sector, describing how decades of the demonisation of the working classes by political parties has resulted in working-class voices appearing as ‘parts of tiny, dispersed minorities’.

Debates about the contested, ever-changing, and often hard to define, nature of ‘working-classness’, are ongoing, but one area in which such debates seem to be overlooked is Art History, a subject long-associated with accusations of elitism.

Building on the work of Beth Hughes’ Working Class British Art Network, and Vanessa Corby’s writing, this paper seeks to challenge the assumed ‘middle-classness’ of Art History. The paper traces how Art History, as a discipline, has dealt with, or overlooked, ‘working classness’, and asks whether Art History, today, can be re- or de-classified to include those from all backgrounds. 

About the speaker

Dr Rebecca Starr is a Lecturer in History of Art in the School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies and Programme Leader for the BA History of Art and BA History of Art with Cultural Studies. 

More information

This event is hosted by the School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies.

It is free to attend and all are welcome.

For more information, please email Ross Truscott at R.Truscott@leeds.ac.uk.

Image

Graffiti 'Working Class Unite' Whitehall, London by Paul Farmer. Image licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.