Nut en nadeel van het promoveren in de kunsten
On 5 October 2012 the symposium Nut en nadeel van het promoveren in de kunsten took place at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie. Central was the question why an artist chooses to do a Ph.D. The symposium was organized by LAPS and DeFKA in Assen.
Introduction Jeroen Boomgaard
Getting a Ph.D. in the arts is again a controversial subject in connection to the September-October issue of De Witte Raaf. De Witte Raaf only calls upon people that are absolutely against the theorization of art education: ‘research is not the task of the arts’. Why would you do a Ph.D.? It is often a lingering and long road to take, but in science it is the highest attainable in the profession, the ultimate recognition that you can do it and you get years to research an interesting subject. The result of these researches are interesting; the dissertations usually aren’t. Critical questions that rise are: why should artistic research be taken seriously? But why not, are people that make art less smart than scientists? The fear of theorization is a matter of dealing with a system that dictates more and more control. On its own getting a Ph.D. in the arts is an interesting development.
Read the complete report of the symposium in Dutch here.
Associated media
