Arts

These arts dissertation examples are student-contributed and bring together a broad mix of creative disciplines, including visual art, photography, sculpture, ceramics, dance, museum and exhibition practice, and arts education. Because “arts” is wide, many dissertations in this area work best when they take one clear lens — a medium, a theme, a community, or a setting — and build an argument around how meaning is made and received.

You’ll find topics that explore portraiture and representation (including the relationship between painting and photography), the body in contemporary art, and how material processes such as clay or print influence interpretation. A strong strand in arts dissertations is context: how technology changes making and viewing (digital media, platforms, tools), how institutions shape art (museums, galleries, education), and how audiences respond to form, style, and narrative. Students also often research debates that sit inside art education and practice, such as art versus craft, creativity and leadership, originality and copyright, and how identity, gender, and empowerment are expressed through visual culture and storytelling. Performance-led work can include dance and embodied practice, exploring cognition, wellbeing, or cultural tradition through movement.

Use these arts dissertation examples to refine keywords such as visual culture, portraiture, representation, materiality, practice-based research, arts education, museum studies, photography, performance, creativity, and copyright.