My academic career has spanned 30 years of working within Higher Education. I am currently Professor of Art and the Public Sphere at the Centre for Postdigital Culture, Coventry University. Previously I established and run the Contemporary Art Practice Programme at the Royal College of Art from 2014- 2020. 

From 2004 – 2018 I worked with Dave Beech and Andy Hewitt as the Freee art collective. In 2018, I initiated the Partisan Social Club; an on-going and continually reforming art and design collective with its first presentation at Beaconsfield Gallery Vauxhall, London, November 2018. My research concerns are with the practice, histories and theories of art and design and its potential to impact upon publics and communities, through its role as a type of opinion formation in the public domain. I work in the urban context of the city and broadly address cultural practices with communities in the role of city-making, utilising the theory of the public sphere as opposed to conventional theories of space originally applied to public art and cultural production. As a result, I have contributed to new understandings and articulations of public art’s impact upon community cohesion. I have been working on the concept of Social Montage which I describe as the montaging of bodies, texts and actions onto and into public space (Augmented Reality) to create new social arrangements and extend political engagement.

I am the founding editor of the journal Art & the Public Sphere, Intellect Ltd., ISSN 2042-793X https://www.intellectbooks.com/art-the-public-sphere

Academic Position

2023 - present; Acting Director Centre for Postdigital Culture, Coventry University

2020 – present; Professor of Art & the Public Sphere, Centre for Postdigital Culture, Coventry University

2017– 2020; Head of Programme Contemporary Art Practice, Reader in Art & the Public Sphere, Royal College of Art, Budget holder, line management 8 staff members, overseeing of Contemporary Art Practice Programme

2017 - 2018 Head of Programme Contemporary Art Practice & Sculpture, Reader in Art & the Public Sphere, Royal College of Art, Budget holder for two programmes , line management 16 staff members, overseeing of Contemporary Art Practice & Sculpture

2013 – 2016: (0.6) Senior Tutor in Sculpture, Reader in Art & the Public Sphere, Royal College of Art.

2007 – 2013: Senior Lecturer Loughborough University, Reader in Art & the Public Sphere, Research Co-ordinator/ Lead REF submission for Art & Design, Taught BA Fine Art, Dissertations, PhD supervisor for 8 Students.

2000- 2007: (0.5) Senior Lecturer in Fine Art, University of Wolverhampton, taught BA Fine Art as Social Practice, Painting & Sculpture.

2005 – 2007: (0.2) Lecturer in Art, Goldsmiths College of Art, Tutorials and teaching BA Art.

Visiting tutor at numerous art schools including Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm, Malmo Academy of Art, Malmo, University of the Arts, Middlesex, Chelsea College of Art, Goldsmiths College of Art (BA & PhD), Academy of Arts Helsinki and Glasgow School of Art. I recently delivered a lecture How to carry on: ways of doing and enduring in the practice of the Freee Art Collective and the Partisan Social Club, 18 Feb 2020,Chelsea School of Art, University of the Arts, London

External Roles

2022 Panel member - Online conference for Artistic and Architectural research NTNU Department of Architecture and Planning 27th March & 10-12th June 2020, Trondheim

2020 member of international external panel review - only UK member (Quality Assurance review) Malmo Academy of Art, Lund University, Sweden

2019 Visiting Professor Helsinki Academy of Art

2019 Expert Reviewer Wolfson Foundation, London

2019 Visual Arts Panel Expert London Arts & Humanities Partnership (LAHP) AHRC-funded doctoral training partnership supporting PhD studies in the arts and humanities.

2018 Peer Reviewer ‘Contemporary Photography’, (Routledge).

2017 Editorial Board ‘Contextualizing Art Markets’ book series (Bloomsbury).

2017 Judge, the Woman’s Prize at the Royal Academy Summer Show

2016 Editorial Board 'Transforming Capitalism', book series, (Rowman & Littlefield International)

2015 Visiting Professor at Malmö Art Academy, Sweden

2014 Visiting Professor at Stockholm Academy of Arts, Sweden

2014/ ongoing Peer Review College, Arts and Humanities Research Council.

PhD Completions

I have supported 17 PhDs to completion, 12 of which were practice-based. I have externally exmained 6 PhDs. 

External Funding Achieved