Art and Communication Practices
(KKP) focuses on the advancement and mediation of the multifarious fields of visual arts, visual cultures and forms of communication.
The department facilitates intensive investigation of current artistic working methods, positions, and discourses by interweaving
theory and practice, as well as via collaborations with visiting artists, who are introduced as guest professors. Students
acquire a sharp and critical view of the multilayered experiential and cognitive dimensions of art. The perception of art
from multiple points of view enables the deconstruction of its constituent principles, its contingencies, its aesthetic manifestations
and paradigms. Artistic practice and reception can be critically analysed on this basis.
In these terms, artistic
project work is seen as research activity. The department’s artistic working methods represent the central sphere of action
in teaching and research. Professors’ and students’ projects are realised at the intersection of arts, visual culture and
current societal problems. Internal, external, regional and international partnerships encourage individual work focuses,
as well as cooperative and participative project forms.
The department has cooperation agreements with Makarere
University in Kampala, Uganda, Joshibi University in Tokyo and Zurich University of the Arts ZHdK (Institute for Art Education;
establishment of a doctoral colloquium and a research collaboration). Current research projects include »Empowerment in artistic
and social scientific work practices« (WWTF Research Project; developed in cooperation with Forba) and »FEATURES - Vienna
Face Project: Laboratory of the Senses« (Peek Project. Headed by Christina Lammer).
KKP graduates are active as
teachers and mediators in formal and informal educational fields: as art pedagogues in post-secondary education, as mediators
of art and culture - for example, in museums, galleries, and in the media. In addition, they develop new work practices at
the intersections of art and culture, science, education and societal topics. The basis of all professional focal points is
artistic practice.
