COURSE PRESENTATION

This new MA created by IESA in partnership with the Whitechapel Gallery is a unique
programme concentrating on the structures, practice and theory of the contemporary art
market.

The course aims to provide a historical context for the present experience of the
contemporary art market as well as the tools to conduct structural analysis of that market.

The curriculum content creates a language and methodology
by which the subject of the contemporary art market can be
considered according to the synergistic study of art and
economics.

The core curriculum is divided into two principal but overlapping
strands : the social, cultural and economic history of art in the
twentieth century and the theory and practice of markets, cultural economics and
business practice.

The programme during the first year is intensively taught through lectures, workshops ;
visits and discussions with players in the contemporary art market ; individual research
into the historic and contemporary practice of the market for
contemporary art.

An essential element of this interdisciplinary course is to
break down the barriers between the different academic
disciplines in order to understand the reality of the complex
structures that make up the present-day world of
contemporary art.

In the second year students take two specialist options before working on their
dissertation. Proposed topics include the typology of the collector, emerging markets,
financial structures of the art market public vs. private collecting and display, regional
markets and collectors.

Classes are taught directly in the museums, the galleries and art foundations in small
groups, focussing on individuals and their responses.

Assignments develop the professional and academic potential of each student, offering
flexibility and innovation of the learning experience.

IESA asked two professionals in the contemporary
art market, Andrew Wheatley of Cabinet Gallery
and Sarah Thelwall, market analyst to create this
new and innovative programme. They have drawn
it up in consultation with leading practitioners in
the field in both France and the UK, the curators
and director of the Whitechapel Art Gallery and the Art & Architecture Department at John
Moores University, Liverpool.

The Academic Director, Adriana Turpin, is head of the IESA MA in the History and Business
of Art and Collecting run in partnership with the Wallace Collection and validated by the
University of Warwick. The various strands of the programme are taught by leading
specialists art history, social history, economics and by practitioners in the art market in
Paris and London under their direction.

Paris London Berlin Liverpool Venice