art history phd netherlands

Art History

Medieval miniatures, still lifes from the Golden Age, the painting atelier and art dealership, architecture and video art: Art History at the UvA encompasses the complete history of Western art, and deals with Amsterdam both as it was in the 17th century and in its modern form. A close relationship with local and international museums, archives and art academies offers many research possibilities.

Kunstgeschiedenis

Art and Performance Research Studies

Curating Art and Cultures (Heritage Studies)

Kunstgeschiedenis (kunst- en cultuurwetenschappen).

Art, Freedom, and Decolonisation in the Global South

Hanneke Grootenboer appointed professor of Early Modern Art and Visual Culture

The Aesthetics of Geopower: Imagining Planetary Histories and Hegemonies

Mixtape No. 2: Practitheorising Counterinstitutions

Economic elites increasingly shape the art we see

ConNext 2023

Call for Papers - Urban Lives: Amsterdam Diaries and Other Stories of the Self

New ASCA Member: Assel Kadyrkhanova

Humanities Labs: innovative research and education under one roof

Relational subjects, objects and institutions: Artistic Convergences between Latin America and Europe in the Postwar

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The OSK is the National Research School for Art History

We provide interuniversity education for research master students and PhD candidates

We also act as a network hub at the intersection of academic and museum practice, bringing together scholars and curators from major institutions around the Netherlands. Currently based at the University of Amsterdam, the OSK aims to serve as a national forum for the discipline, encouraging research into, and debate around, art objects in their historical and present-day contexts.

News & Events

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KKN Lezing: Kunst, cultuur en religie in Dura-Europos

Center for netherlandish art student session with anna koopstra and bart fransen, scientiae 2024 fall conference, cfp: the global history of knowledge, osk phd day: a career in art history, herkomstonderzoek cultuurgoederen wo ii | 28 maart, upcoming courses, osk/stedelijk museum/rkd visiting fellow in modern and contemporary art.

Dates: Preliminary sessions March-May 2024; Fellow sessions 3 to 6 June 2024 | Venue: Stedelijk Museum & University of Amsterdam | Open to: RMa students who are...

OSK/Van Gogh Museum Visiting Fellow in the 19th Century Art

Dates: Preliminary sessions The tutorial dates in Amsterdam are: 21 February, 10 April, 5 June; Fellow sessions 16-21 June 2024 | Venue: Van Gogh Museum &...

OSK PhD seminar: The Architecture of the PhD Thesis

Dates: 3 & 24 April and 1 May 2024 | Time: 13.00-16.00 | Venue: Room E1.01D Bushuis, Kloveniersburgwal 48, Amsterdam | Open to: OSK...

OSK Summer School: Art Museums and Their Collections in the Contemporary World

Dates: 16 May, 23 May and excursions 10-13 June 2024 | Open to: RMA students and PhD candidates, max. 12 participants. | Credits: 6 EC...

Historic House Museums: Conserving & Curating Architecture, Interiors and Collections

Dates: 24 June – 1 July 2024 | Credits: 5 EC (can be expanded to 6 EC in case your university uses units of...

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Art History

Art history in Utrecht covers the whole of western art history and transcultural relations between European countries and other regions of the world.

Art History in Utrecht focuses on art and architecture from the Middle Ages to the present. We pay  particular attention to our own geography and at transcultural relations and exchanges with other places in Europe and the world. We research art histories and question existing knowledge practices related to the study of art and architecture. This includes amongst others the study of artworks, architecture, interiors and cities, materials and techniques, exchanges and ideas. Our art historical and historiographical research is complemented by laboratory research and digital methodologies and it is inspired by interdisciplinary, cross-border research and performative methods.

The research project Histories of Global Netherlandish (1550 – 1750) Art explores the global dimensions of early modern Netherlandish art, with Antwerp and Amsterdam as hubs of global exchange. 

The Making of Technique in the Arts

Together making Bonairean heritage belong to the people of Bonaire again

Revealed: this is what this 15th-century painting looked like before it was painted over

There are currently no events pertaining to this department or theme.

Affiliated with

• Department of History and Art History
• Descartes Centre
• Faculty of Humanities
• National Research School for Art History

Utrecht University Heidelberglaan 8 3584 CS Utrecht The Netherlands Tel. +31 (0)30 253 35 50

• All categories

Research programme

Research in and through art is an inseparable part of the artistic or design practice of the researcher. Consequently, research-in-art (as opposed to research-about-art, such as art history) does not have a set goal or expected result, nor are there predetermined general procedures. The outcome of the research is open. This openness is a condition for conducting research in art and design.

In research-in-art there is a unique relationship between the artist/designer, the research method and the outcome of the research. This research is shaped through the artist’s artistry and, the other way round, the artist develops his artistry through the research. The outcome is therefore an artistic product, combined with a discursive product, the dissertation, which does justice to the artistic one.

This final result of this type of research, which is by its nature speculative, cannot be restricted to one particular form. The criteria for the form the research may take are therefore kept as open as possible. Also, there is no fixed ratio between dissertation and artistic production. The requirements that the research must satisfy and the researcher’s methodology derive in part from the assignment that the artist or designer has given himself.

The PhDArts research trajectory consists of two elements: individual research and participation in the doctoral study programme. An appropriate team of supervisors is sought for each doctoral student. The doctoral study programme, which consists of lectures, seminars, trainings, and workshops, is an essential part of the research environment in which the student undertakes his or her research.

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