Stockholm university

Art History

The need to create pictures, shape ideas and form surroundings has existed in all times and cultures. In art history, you track how this will to create has changed in form and content from antiquity to our age. You will learn about art and architecture as well as other forms of visual culture, design and the shaped environment.

Subject description

Studying art history means being in the middle of a living cultural life and a dynamic notion of art. The education is actively working with on site-seminars at exhibitions and in the public space to connect the theoretical tools to an actual context. You learn tools to interpret and analyse your surroundings, whether it’s an artwork at a museum, media images, architectural environments or the visual expressions of everyday life.

Through your studies, you will receive thorough historical and theoretical knowledge about art, art forms and art worlds, with a focus on social context and current research questions, such as intermediality, gender perspectives and postcolonial approaches.

Great importance is applied to your own acquisition of knowledge and skills as well, through relevant theories and methods, interpreting the artefacts of art history – be it images, environments, buildings and artefacts in your everyday life - or the art, design and architecture included in the classics of art history. However, studying art history is not only about acquiring fixed knowledge and skills, but also to critically examine, rethink and question traditional perspectives, knowledge and selections.

Career opportunities

The education can lead to positions in the state and municipal cultural institutions such as museums, art halls, at the country administrative boards, at auction houses and galleries, in media such as newspapers, magazines and publishing companies, and as a part of an education for teachers, conservators or archivists.

Courses and programmes

Degree

You can earn a bachelor’s or master’s degree in Art History by taking freestanding courses or one of the programmes listed under Education.

More information about degrees at Stockholm University

Research

Art History is a broad field in which the researchers take many different approaches – covering all periods from early-modern to contemporary, and media such as art, architecture and landscape, images and the built environment through material and visual culture.

Art History is often the principal organizer for a number of externally funded research projects. Several researchers participate successfully in extensive research networks with international reach and renown. The research results are communicated in national and international publications of high standard, and through conferences and public talks.

More about our research