BFA (Honours) in Social Practice and Community Engagement

Extend your creative practice by working with communities outside the traditional artworld. Applications close soon.

The Victorian College of the Arts (VCA), within the Faculty of Fine Arts and Music at the University of Melbourne’s Southbank Campus, is situated on the land occupied by 1000 generations of Australia’s first people. The VCA is committed to providing a deep and transformative learning experience in pursuit of artistic excellence, innovation and an absorbing education. We welcome you to a community of artists of all sorts: contemporary artists and writers, choreographers, musicians, designers, performers, actors, filmmakers, dancers and many more, all committed to the production of new artistic work.

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) in Social Practice and Community Engagement
The Honours program in Social Practice and Community Engagement is for students that have completed an undergraduate degree in the creative arts, and who wish to develop their research ability and extend their creative practice in working with communities outside the traditional artworld. It is a year-long program that allows you to undertake advanced work in social practice; develop fluency in the conceptual and practical issues involved in engaging communities and further develop your capacity as an informed, skilled and articulate artist in the social realm.

The program is centred around three week-long intensive fieldwork visits in Melbourne, Central Australia and Indonesia. The intensives bring students into real-world, place based arts initiatives under the guidance of community-based artists and scholars.

You will develop an independent major project (or series of projects) and receive a thorough grounding in practice-based and theoretical research methods. The program offers a direct pathway to a PhD as well as equipping you to work as a social practice artist and in broader arts and community settings.

Course Coordinator: Danny Butt. Coordinators for 2020 intensives: Tania Cañas; Beth Sometimes; Nuraini Juliastuti.

Guest artists and interlocutors in 2019 included: Jason Tamiru, Uncle Larry Walsh, Alec Reade / New Wayfinders, Footscray Community Arts Centre, Jade Lillie, Maree Clarke, The Torch, Richard Ennis, Caroline Wylds, Latai Taumeopeau, cohealth Arts Generator, Bo Svoronos, Public Assembly, Apmere angkentye-kenhe, Akeyulerre Healing Centre, Dan Murphy, Mike Gillam/8 Hele, Fiky Daulay, Indonesian Visual Art Archive, Lifepatch, Brigitta Isabella, Bakudapan, Sutanto Mendut, and Charles Koroneho.

For more information on admission requirements, or to apply now, please visit our course page.