Duke in London: Arts

This course examines London as a site of cultural production shaped by global markets, public institutions, and diverse communities. Through engagement with theatre, visual art, design, and heritage sites, students experience artistic creativity across cultures while analyzing the institutions, policies, and histories that shape cultural life. Using local institutions as case studies, the course explores relationships among art, the state, and the global cultural economy, introducing concepts such as globalization, neoliberalism, and cosmopolitanism. Excursions to performances, museums, galleries, and markets provide firsthand encounters with artistic practice from the Tudor period to the present, prompting reflection on creativity, cultural values, inequality, and national identity.