Tate awarded major funding for future art scholarships

Tate today announces a major grant from UK Research & Innovation (UKRI), enabling the gallery to continue investing in the future of visual arts research. An investment of £1.4million from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Collaborative Doctoral Landscape Awards, will support 12 new studentships at Tate over the next four years, starting in October 2027. Working in collaboration with academic partners from across the UK, this programme will fund innovative new scholarship on art and culture into the next decade.

This funding builds on the achievements of Tate's existing doctoral programme, which to date has supported over 84 collaborative studentships across more than 20 years. Recent research has explored the art of Northern England during the 1980s, the international history of textile art in the 1960s and 70s, and the impact of acrylic paint on modern artists and artistic styles. Projects have also furthered understanding of artists from William Blake and JMW Turner to Ronald Moody and Ithell Colquhoun, and surfaced groundbreaking research into museum conservation practices, including the preservation of digital artworks in the face of technological change, and the development of new techniques for removing aged acrylic varnishes from paintings.

New research of this kind underpins activities across all Tate’s galleries, including the staging of exhibitions and displays, the acquisition of works for the national collection, and the conservation of art for future generations. Each project brings together specialists from different fields through collaborations with the public, artists, universities and industrial partners, to help build new knowledge, address practical problems and contribute to broader debates.

Co-supervisory opportunities for university researchers are currently live on Tate’s studentships webpage. Student recruitment will open in spring 2027.