Fine Art

Studio Practice, Teaching, and Research in Fine Art

Newcastle’s reputation as an art school is built on inspirational teaching, excellent studio and workshop facilities, and world-leading research and art practice by its staff. Less than 3 hours by train from London, the city has a thriving art scene with numerous artists studios and galleries. The Fine Art department is at the centre of this and provides a supportive, challenging and inspiring environment in which to study Fine Art, as well as one in which staff engage in world-leading art-historical and practice-led research. 

The BA Fine Art degree at Newcastle University is ranked 2nd in the UK in the Guardian University Guide 2024, 7th in the UK – The Complete University Guide 2024 (Art and Design category), and 7th in the UK – Sunday Times Good University Guide 2024 (Art and Design category).

Staff at Newcastle are engaged with internationally-recognised contemporary art practice and research generated at the nexus of established and new practices, technologies and methodologies.

Cutting-edge practice and research in fine art by our staff, results in a vibrant, creative culture and provides the basis for our excellent teaching. We encourage students to be imaginative and creative, to question orthodoxies, to cross boundaries, and to make their own mark in the contemporary art world.

Students studying Fine Art in the art school at Newcastle are taught by a group of distinguished artists and art historians who are all active practitioners, researchers and specialists in their fields. Our research and practice is disseminated in the form of exhibitions, installations interventions, books and other publications.

Based at the very heart of Newcastle University's city-centre campus, the art school provides students, from undergraduate to postgraduate, with excellent workshops and studio spaces, support by excellent technicians, and a superb Visiting Artists Programme. 

The department is committed to supporting and engaging with the full range of both traditional, contemporary and emerging studio-based practices in Fine Art; whether a student is working with painting, sculpture, printmaking, drawing, performance, film and video, digital media, or installation, we are able to provide a unique level and quality of support.

Newcastle's diverse and lively arts and cultural scene with its galleries and venues goes hand-in-hand with our continuing and distinguished history in innovative art teaching. The current breadth of staff, and the resulting breadth of practice and research in the subject area is a significant element of the vision and pedagogical stance within Fine Art at Newcastle; it is an approach that has its roots in post-war radical art education, much of which was originally developed at Newcastle. 

A brief history of the department

The first School of Art in Newcastle was established in 1838. It subsequently became part of Armstrong College, followed by being part of King's College, Durham University, and then it became part of the newly-established University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1963.

Throughout, it has maintained an excellent reputation as one of the UK's leading centres for art education. The first BA degree in Fine Art in the UK was awarded here in 1927.

The art school also houses the Hatton Gallery; this world-renowned gallery has one of the most iconic artworks of the 20th century in its collection - the Elterwater Merz Barn- the final work of the German Dadaist Kurt Schwitters.

The art school was a key player in radical developments in art education in the 1950s and 1960s. This led to the development of the course known as Basic Design and the subsequent revolution across art education in the UK. The Hatton Gallery, which is part of the Fine Art department, played a particularly important role in this history: https://www.hattonhistory.co.uk/.

Newcastle is also particularly associated with the development of Pop Art in the UK, as outlined in the essay by Gill Hedley for the exhibition 'Pioneers of Pop', recently held in the Hatton Gallery.

Many distinguished artists have come through Newcastle University and continue to do so, either as students or as teachers. The list includes: Sir Lawrence Gowing, Richard Hamilton, Victor Pasmore, Roy Ascott, Sean Scully, Noel Forster, Susan Hiller, Mary Webb, Rita Donagh, Mali Morris, Sarah Pickstone and Phoebe Unwin.