Professor Abigail Harrison Moore

Profile

I am Professor of Art History and Museum Studies. I co-developed the University of Leeds’ successful masters programme in Art Gallery and Museum Studies, and co-developed its sister programme, MA Arts Management and Heritage Studies. I was a founding member of the Centre for Critical Studies in Museums, Galleries and Heritage, and the Centre for Collaborative Heritage Research, and I have supervised a large number of PhDs in my research areas.

I credit my career largely to the support of an incredible art teacher at my state school in Yorkshire, who introduced me to my subject, took me on my first gallery visits, and inspired me to think critically about the world. I then found Art History by luck, having been enabled to select it as an elective at University. Since joining the University of Leeds in 1996, I have therefore focussed much of my work on widening access to creative education in schools, and working to ensure the widest possible access for young people to the arts, humanities and higher education. I have helped develop the curriculum in my subject areas and have written widely on the educational challenges for young people from low social and economic groups. I work with schools, teachers and exam boards across the UK and internationally, and have worked with groups of young people from year 3 to year 13. I am passionate about enabling all young people to access and benefit from a creative education that is not limited by their educational experience or place and space of birth and have developed and lead a wide range of projects for teachers and pupils.

Working with the Educational Engagement Team at the University, I developed and lead Art Teachers Connect – atcuk.org - in partnership with the Paul Mellon Centre. This is a network that currently supports via CPD opportunities over 250 art and art history teachers who teach over 40,000 young people a week in state schools in the UK. I developed and lead the associated Post Graduate Certificate in Teachers Research and Practice (supported by the Jane Featherstone Fellowships) to enable teachers to turn their residential experience into a bespoke research project and qualification. Articulation, a project in partnership with the National Gallery encourages young people to undertake art historical research and communicate their passion for art. In 2016, I launched Discover Articulation Challenge at the University of Leeds, a version of this popular national and international competition, for years 10 and 11. I developed Discovery Days in museums and galleries which are now run across the UK as part of the work to develop the confidence of young people to participate in Articulation. I also developed the University’s Extended Project Qualification Programme (in partnership with Southampton University). I am a judge for SPOKE, a film making competition for young art historians and have also contributed to an award-winning MOOC on academic skills for pupils undertaking research projects. I was recognised in 2021 for my outstanding contribution to widening access by NEON. In 2025, Art Teachers Connect was awarded the International Society for Education in Art (InSEA) award for organisations that ‘encourage and advance creative education through art and craft in all countries and promote research and praxis about art education to foster international understanding’.

I work in partnership with a wide range of museums, galleries and heritage organisations and maintain active links with many partner organisations through alumni, teaching and research projects, student placements and dissertations. I am a co-director of the Registrars Project, which brings together Leeds Museums and Galleries, the University and the Royal Armouries to train future registrars and supervise a WRoCAH funded PhD on this subject.

Responsibilities

• Outreach Lead and Programme Manager

Research interests

My research focusses on art and design history of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century, particularly the Arts and Crafts Movement. My monograph, Fraud, Fakery and False Business; Re-thinking the Shrager v. Dighton 'Old Furniture Case (Continuum, 2011), considered the social, legal and political dimensions of the art and antiques market in 1920’s England. More recently, I have been working on an international project on gender and the histories and cultures of energy supply, leading to the publication of my co-edited book with Ruth Sandwell (University of Toronto) - In a New Light; Histories of Women and Energy (MQUP, 2021) and a wide range of international articles and chapters of books, including a special edition of the journal History of Retail and Consumption, Off-Grid Empire: Rural Energy Consumption in Britain and the British Empire, 1850–1960. Starting with a funded workshop at the Rachel Carson Center for Environmental Humanities in Munich, this work has also led to a special edition of the journal Perspectives. My research and thinking draw on my long interest in the Arts and Crafts Movement and particularly the work of the designers and writers, Philip Webb, Agnes and Rhoda Garrett and Mary Eliza Haweis. In my work on energy change in the 1870s and 80s, I have also collaborated with Professor Graeme Gooday on publications and the AHRC funded project Electrifying the Country House leading to new research and activities to engage audiences beyond the university, including primary pupils and volunteer groups, in collaboration with the National Trust and Leeds Museums and Galleries. I contributed to a BBC4 documentary, Victorian Sensations; Electric Dreams, first broadcast May 2019, and presented a HENI film on William Morris; Useful Beauty in the Home aimed at 14-16 year olds. To date this film has had over half a million views on YouTube and now is part of the interpretation at Standen, a National Trust House in Sussex.

I am very focussed on creative education in schools, have helped develop the curriculum in my subject areas and have written widely on the educational challenges for young people from low social and economic groups and the ‘problem’ of cultural capital, including for The Conversation and the Times Higher Education. I am currently combining these two strands of my research and practice in my work with Leeds City Museum’s Preservative Party, a diverse group of 14-24 year volunteer curators. Building on 25 years of work in partnership with Leeds Museums and Galleries, I was awarded an AHRC Research Development and Engagement Fellowship in 2022 to work with the Preservative Party on a participatory research project to co-produce histories of women and energy in the home. Through this project and subsequent funding from Research England, we have co-produced exhibitions, zines, a primary school resource for MyLearning (https://www.mylearning.org/stories/whose-power/1753 ) and two series of a podcast, WhosePower? You can listen to the group speak about their learning from our project on our podcast; https://whosepower.podbean.com/

My research students are completing/have completed theses on collecting Wedgwood in America; hidden art; museums in Qatar; museums and education in Taiwan and China; art and design education in the nineteenth century; the display of taxidermy collections; taking museum objects into prisons; decorative ceiling plasterwork; the ethics of curating; Bardini’s collections; audience development at the Hepworth; the use of contemporary art to interpret heritage collections and audiences for contemporary art at the Imperial War Museum North and the Bronte Parsonage; the Artist-Led sector; Art Collectives; Brighton Collectors; Leighton House; Psychodelia and the Arts and Crafts; and collaborative Doctoral Projects on the role of museums in education in high security prisons (with Leeds Museums and Galleries), Wedgwood in the c20th (with the V&A), Education at Chatsworth and Ethics and the Work of the Registrar (with the Royal Armouries).

• Electrifying the Country House
• Empowering Women: Co-Producing Histories of Women and Energy in the Home
• Using digital tools in heritage

Qualifications

• University of Southampton, PhD, 2001, ‘Imagining Egypt: The Harewood Regency Furniture Collections'
• Post Graduate Diploma in Art Gallery and Museum, University of Manchester 1995
• MA History of Art, University of St Andrews, 1994

Student education

At the University of Leeds, I have individually designed, developed, prepared, and am/have been module leader for a large number of undergraduate and postgraduate modules focusing on topics such as museum collections, country houses, museum studies, ideals and aesthetics, interpreting cultures, accredited learning from study days and professional work-based learning. I co-developed the University of Leeds’ successful masters programme in Art Gallery and Museum Studies, and co-developed its sister programme, MA Arts Management and Heritage Studies. I currently am Programme Director for the Post-Graduate Certificate in Teachers Research and Practice, part of a wider programme for Continuing Professional Development for art and art history teachers - atcuk.org.

I have also contributed to many team-taught modules, and contributed to MOOCs, including the award winning ‘The IB Extended Essay; Managing your Research Project’ and have set up and delivered many Educational Engagement activities, including Articulation and developing the University’s much-praised EPQ programme.

Current postgraduate researchers

• Louise Marchal
• Izzy Bartley
• Layla Khoo