Dean's welcome

Located in the Georgian terrace in Gordon Square where, a century ago, Virginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell, Lytton Strachey and other members of the Bloomsbury Group lived and worked, Birkbeck's School of Arts offers an invigorating educational experience built upon our international reputation for leading-edge research and an exciting range of arts and humanities courses.

Facilities at Birkbeck's School of Arts include an award-winning state-of-the-art cinema, the Peltz Gallery exhibition space that displays the work of the School as well as a diverse programme of events, and the beautifully restored  Keynes Library, hung with paintings by Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. We also run collaborative programmes with world-class cultural institutions such as the British Museum, the Globe Theatre, and the ICA, which give our students and researchers access to the best that London can offer. 

Our courses cover a very wide range of approaches to the arts and humanities, offering various modes of study at all levels. Our range includes contemporary, practice-based degrees in creative writing and theatre directing and producing; historical studies in Renaissance art and medieval literature; professional courses that will equip you for a career in journalism, arts management and the creative industries; linguistic and cultural courses in Japanese, Latin American, and modern European languages as well as programmes in applied linguistics. Studying the arts at Birkbeck is stimulating, eclectic, relevant, and fun. Interdisciplinarity is central to our work, and we host the Birkbeck Institute for the Moving Image, and we are a constituent part of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, Birkbeck Institute for Gender Studies, and Birkbeck Institute for Social Research. 

Access students, undergraduates, postgraduates, and life-long learners looking for flexible delivery in a lively learning environment will find courses to stimulate them here in the School of Arts. We also welcome research students wishing to work with our distinguished and dedicated academics in one of the largest and most successful graduate schools in the UK. 

Our vision is to remain an outstanding beacon for the Arts and Humanities and continue to develop and innovate. The School of Arts at Birkbeck looks forward to welcoming you.

Professor Joanne Leal