UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN
MICHAELIS SCHOOL OF FINE ARTS
GUIDELINES FOR THE PREPARATION OF A MASTERS RESEARCH
PROPOSAL IN FINE ART
REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO THE DEGREE
Candidates who wish to be considered for a Masters in Fine Art should hold a degree in Fine
Art from a university, or approved tertiary institution, and have obtained a grade of at least an
upper second-class pass in the appropriate area of practical study in their final year. In
addition, they should have obtained an upper second in History of Art 3, or Theory & Practice
of Art 3. In the case of the MAFA, the achievement of an upper second in History of Art 3, or
Theory & Practice of Art 3, is required.
In exceptional circumstances, professional experience or the attainment of a high level of
competence in the field of art or design may be taken into account in the consideration of
proposals.
Students who are intending to register for a Masters degree by major dissertation (MAFA) or
practical research (MFA) or interdisciplinary research (MPhil) are required to submit a
research proposal with their application. The Faculty of Humanities requires the title of the
project for its records, and you may request your preferred supervisor/s although it cannot be
guaranteed that you will be appointed your requested supervisor.
This document is intended to assist Masters students in preparing their research proposals.
A research proposal is a plan of action; it sets out the aims of your research project and how
you intend to achieve these aims. It is usually the case that as research 1 students embark on
their projects, their research questions and plans undergo some adjustment. However, the
advantage of a good research proposal is that it provides a focus for your research activity
and a benchmark against which you can make whatever adjustments become necessary.
The proposal for a Master’s should be approximately 1000 words.
1
In the context of a practical Fine Art degree the term ‘research student’ means a student who intends
to embark on self-motivated study to produce an exhibition. There is no coursework programme to
follow.
The following headings are intended to assist you in writing a proposal. You may find that in
writing your proposal, you want to use different headings, and order your account differently.
This is perfectly in order, as long as the basic issues set out here are covered.
1. TITLE (Provisional)
As indicated above, the title of your project will be registered, so the title needs to be brief and
descriptive. It should provide a fairly clear idea of what your project is about.
2. PROPOSED FIELD OF STUDY/RESEARCH AREA
A typical Masters project or dissertation is the investigation of a problem. The research
problem or question provides the focus for the entire project. In a scientific or even general
humanities masters research proposal you are asked to succinctly specify the question (or
problem) that your thesis sets out to address. In Fine Arts this is not so easily done given that
artists are more likely to have a broad area they wish to investigate. Your aim here is to state
the area of your research including reference to artistic precedents and then clearly indicate
your core concerns in relation to the topic. Write a short, approximately 1000 word, essay.
This should be properly referenced and a select bibliography should be given. The Harvard
system of bibliographical conventions should be applied. Bear in mind that a Masters should
be a well contained, tightly focused and coherent body of work that examines an issue in
some depth. Do not therefore, become too broad in your research area.
3. RATIONALE
Having identified the question/problem or research terrain you wish to address through your
research project, you need to say something about how/why this question has arisen or why
the research project is useful or relevant. For some students, the research project emerges
out of a theoretical interest, for others it emerges out of issues of practice. Whatever the
case, you should signal briefly why you have chosen the project that you have, and what
contribution you think the completed research project might make to our understanding of the
field.
4. LITERATURE REVIEW
You will need to undertake a thorough review of the literature pertaining to your research
question. For the purposes of the research proposal, you need to have read sufficiently in the
field to justify your research question or interest in the field. Why is it important? Have other
artists/academics taken up this question in the same or similar ways? How do current
debates in your own field of study bear on your research question? Your literature review
must assist you in addressing these issues. It will provide information on how your own
practice, or related, research questions have been investigated by other artists/academics in
your own (and other, related) fields. It will also provide you with resources to build your own
conceptual framework. The literature review thus has two broad aims, to familiarise you with
both the theoretical and empirical work that can inform your study.
5. CONCEPTUAL OR THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
For many students, the research question emerges from theoretical debates in their field, and
they draw from these in order to undertake their own projects. The key concepts are drawn
from relevant theory, which then needs to be discussed in the thesis itself, with key ideas
defined closely. For the purposes of the proposal, it is necessary to discuss very briefly what
theoretical ideas will be drawn on, and attempt to define key concepts as tightly as possible.
Not all studies however foreground an explicit theoretical base to the same degree. Some
emphasise a broader empirical engagement, as is often the case in Fine Arts. In this case,
there remains the need for an analytic framework to be developed, which defines key
concepts and demonstrates how these link together.
6. RESEARCH DESIGN
Masters research studies, particularly those in Fine Art, invariably involve some kind of
empirical work or practical research. This means that the artist/researcher enters a field to
collect information or data, the analysis or use of which will allow the research question/topic
in the proposed field of study to be addressed or engaged. Such data may comprise part of
an archive of, say, historical documentation and/or visual history or the collection of images or
objects. In either case, a number of crucial decisions need to be made about conducting this
empirical work:
Sampling: From where will you collect data? If you are doing archival research of an
historical nature, over what time period will your study extend? What documents will form part
of your data? Which will you leave out? On what basis will you make this decision? A range
of important decisions need to be made, about how to make the project meaningful, but at the
same time manageable in terms of the time frame and resources available.
Data collection: Developing a research design means making decisions about who (or what,
in the case of textually-based studies) to approach for the purposes of data collection. It also
means making decisions about what data to collect. These decisions need to be constantly
referred back to your research question: what kind of data or information do you need in order
to address it? Collected how?
7. ANALYSIS OF DATA
The analysis of your data will, in most masters, form the spine of the final research report, the
focus around which all other aspects of the thesis will turn. In the case of an MFA it is the
production of work for exhibition that will form the core of your practice. For the purposes of
your proposal, you should, if you can, specify how you intend to utilise data collected and in
what media you intend to produce work and how.
8. RESEARCH ETHICS
In some Fine Art masters, particularly Photography, there is a documentary element. If you
are doing documentation the ethical concerns might be straightforward and minimal, but if
your research involves work with human subjects or animals, the ethical concerns might be
quite complex. Either way, you should refer to
a) UCT Research Ethics Code for Research Involving Human Participants and
b) UCT Research Ethics Code for Use of Animals in Research and Teaching.
You will find the details in specific guides found listed under Research at:
http://www.uct.ac.za/about/policies/.
Be aware particularly in Research Involving Human Participants of Section C point D in ‘The
Research Process’:
“Research participants should give informed, voluntary consent, when appropriate, to
participation in research. Researchers should provide information that explains the aims and
implications of the research project, the nature of participation and any other considerations
that might reasonably be expected to influence their willingness to participate. This
information must be provided in language that is understandable to the potential participants.
And in the preamble of the Ethics Code for Use of Animals:
The University of Cape Town affirms that humans have an obligation to respect animals and
to appreciate that they are sentient and sensitive to pain, respond to stress and may
remember such experiences.
9. TIME LINE
Try and develop a plan of work for the completion of your exhibition and accompanying text.
Work backwards from the time you intend to submit keeping in mind that the University
requires Masters in Fine Arts to be completed in two calendar years and that submittal for
examination is in October of the second year of registration. Set aside time for conducting a
literature review and developing your research design, conducting fieldwork, producing your
exhibition and writing up the accompanying text. This will assist you in pacing your progress
through the work, and also in planning a manageable project.
10. SAMPLE BIBLIOGRAPHY
The last part of your research proposal should contain a sample bibliography. This provides a
guide to reading you have already done, or plan to do, in developing your research project.
Put down the key theoretical and methodological texts you have drawn on, or intend to draw
on, as well as that literature, both theoretical and empirical, which bears on your own study.
The sample bibliography should not be longer than a page.
At every step along the way in planning your research project, you should ask yourself if all
the elements link together in a coherent and rigorous way. Is the literature review relevant to
the research question/area? Is your research design an appropriate way to address this
area? A good project is coherent, well focused and well written up, and achieving this is
something you need to strive for from the very start of your project.
In summation:
You need:
Letter of application
This should be addressed to Ms Afiefah Rajap, Postgraduate Administrator, Michaelis
School of Fine Art, 31-37 Orange Street, Cape Town, 8001 (afiefah.rajap@uct.ac.za) and
should give your address, telephone number/s, a brief biography and an indication of what
degree you are applying for (MFA, MAFA, or M.Phil.). If appropriate, an account of your
exhibition record and/or experience since qualifying should be included.
Your letter of application needs to be accompanied by
i)
An up-to-date CV
ii)
Academic transcripts (official proof of your marks during your previous degree).
iii)
iv)
A Portfolio of your work. You may present this in PDF format or on a disc. This is
an extremely important aspect of your application and candidates are advised to
submit as representative a body of creative work as is possible.
Research Proposal - which may be presented as follows:
Candidate: (Your name)
Candidature: i.e. for what degree you are applying (MAFA) (MFA) or (MPhil).
Proposed field of study:
Title: (Provisional)
Abstract: A short, approximately ten line, description of how and what you propose
studying.
Short essay: An essay of approximately 1000 words on any theoretical or practical
aspect of your field of study. It must indicate your concerns and your knowledge of
the field into which you wish to enter.
Rationale: reason why you have chosen the project and its relevance to the field.
Presentation: A short description of the form the study will take when presented for
examination. Typically, this would comprise an exhibition of the creative works
accompanied by a bound accompanying text explicating the work. You need to
indicate what and how you envisage this – the media in which you will be working
etc. This may well change but it gives the committee an opportunity to see how
you conceive of your art production and its presentation.
Literature Review: a survey of the available literature pertaining to your topic
indicating your familiarity with the literature in the area you wish to study (you do
not need to have read them).
Select bibliography: sources you have read and may reference in your short essay.
Preferred or Proposed supervisor: (Optional) You may know a staff member’s area
of expertise aligns with your own concerns - if so you may note this. In some cases
applicants may already have approached a member of Staff with a view to gaining
their support for the proposed study. Prospective students must however note that
while we attempt to accommodate your choice staff load and availability may mean
your preferences may not be met.