Programming and Curating: History Theory Methods

• Credit value: 15 credits at Level 7
• Convenors: Janet McCabe, Dorota Ostrowska
• Tutors: Janet McCabe, Helen de Witt
• Assessment: a 3000-word essay (100%)

This module offers a historical, intellectual and conceptual understanding of film curating, curatorial practice and moving image culture. It looks at the various approaches to thinking about film curating. It starts with a focus on the audience and theories of spectatorship, to consider what it is to programme for an audience, before exploring the sites of exhibition and how spaces and places provide an architecture for the filmic experience. Next is the role of the archive and what it is to engage with film canons and exhibit moving images from the archive, before looking at the issues involved in the programming practices, concluding with a workshop on what it is to research a film programme. This module is an essential addition to the Pathway teaching provision by complementing and enhancing it.

Indicative module syllabus

• Audiences and theories of spectatorship
• Sites of exhibition and the architecture of experience
• Theories of the archive
• Practices of film programming
• How to research a film programme

By the end of this module, you will be able to:

• think critically about the historical, intellectual and conceptual understanding of film curating, curatorial practice and moving image culture
• understand approaches to thinking about film curating: the audience and theories of spectatorship; sites of exhibition and the architecture of the filmic experience; the role of the archive, film canons and the exhibition of great collections; and issues of curatorial practice, both past and present
• demonstrate an understanding of curating theory and practice.