Visual artists – your universities need you

With all the talk of cuts and fees its easy to get disheartened about the future health of creative industries in higher education – whether this is the number of students choosing arts courses, the breadth of courses being offered or the support that universities can give the arts.

To capture the current offering and get a picture of what both visual artists and universities want in the future from a collaborative relationship with its students and with partners, as part of my Creative Campus Initiative project, which I am working on with Tania Holland Williams, we have been asked by ACE to report back to them on the state of visual arts and higher education to help to set a bench mark for the future.
Focusing on the sector in the south east, we will scope the level, impact and breadth of support offered by universities to visual artists and arts organisations and we need your help to build a picture of the support that universities across the region provide to the visual arts sector.
We would ask any visual artist or visual arts organisation who has benefitted from their links with a University to complete a short survey that can be found here.
The survey takes about 20 minutes and gives you the opportunity to tell us how you think partnership with universities might better serve your arts practice. The level and type of support you receive from an HEI might be varied and include resource, space, networking opportunities or something else. We are keen to capture current or recent activity so that in 12 months’ time the commissioning bodies might be able to see how funding decisions are affecting provision for visual arts.
The survey will remain open until the 10th May 2011.