Photography MA

Why study with us?

• We take a distinctive fine art approach to photographic practice and encourage work that crosses technological boundaries and engages with film, video, sound and installation, performance, painting and sculpture.
• You will be practising and thinking about photography in a creative and critical environment, working in a modern building with specialist facilities.
• We will encourage you to engage with the latest developments in photography, fine art and wider media culture, and to constantly challenge the limits of the medium.
• During the course, you will build a professional profile as an independent practitioner, graduating with a body of work ready for exhibition, a publication and a piece of critical writing that will help to position your work.

• We offer guidance on professional development.
• Brighton has an established photographic culture. Photoworks, a commissioning and publishing organisation who run the Brighton Photo Biennial are based on-site.
• You will be learning with course tutors who are experienced professional photographers and photographic researchers.

Areas of study

Areas of study

Practice-based projects are supported by introductions, tutorials, lectures, seminars and technical workshops. Workshops include demonstrations in the latest digital and traditional analogue processes, involving camera use, lighting, and black-and-white and colour printing. Key professional practice sessions include talks and seminars by photographers, artists, writers and other professionals concerned with commissioning, publishing and exhibiting photography.

Semester 1

• Research and Experimentation (40 credits): a practice module designed to help you explore your own approach to practice in more depth and develop related skills in research, experimentation and critical reflection.
• Contemporary Debates (20 credits): a theoretical seminar series leading to a 4,000 word essay considering the essence, apparatus and medium of photography in visual art and related documentary contexts.

Semester 2

• Photography Research Project, Stage 1 (20 credits): a practice module laying the foundations and making initial work in your specialist area of practice.
• Professional Development (20 credits): offers an understanding of professional structures and career options in the specific area of photography within the broader field of visual art.
• Dissertation (20 credits): a 5,000 written dissertation exploring ideas related to the area in which your own photographic practice is situated.

Summer Semester

• Photography Research Project, Stage 2 (40 credits): developing and resolving a body of work for exhibition
• Photography Books and Publications (20 credits): realising your project as a publication

Making sure that what you learn with us is relevant, up to date and what employers are looking for is our priority, so courses are reviewed and enhanced on an ongoing basis. When you have applied to us, you’ll be told about any new developments through our applicant portal.

Staff profile

Fergus Heron, Course Leader

Fergus Heron is Course Leader for MA Photography at the University of Brighton. He teaches photography practice and theory across the course. He studied photography at the Royal College of Art and the University for the Creative Arts and holds a Postgraduate Certificate in Learning and Teaching Higher Education from Plymouth University. He is also a registered Research Student Supervisor.

His work as an artist involves photography as a form of picturing exploring ideas of place. Exhibitions featuring his work have included shows at the Museum for Contemporary Art (Roskilde, Denmark) K3 (Zurich, Switzerland), Pitzhanger Manor House and Gallery (London), Centre for Contemporary Art and the Natural World, Royal West of England Academy, and the first major exhibition of Photography at Tate Britain, How We Are: Photographing Britain.

He edited Visible Economies published by Photoworks and is a contributor to The Companion to Photography published by Blackwell. His photographs and writing are included in the anthology Emerging Landscapes published by Routledge. He has curated exhibitions in partnership with galleries and museums and as part of festivals, chaired artist talks and panel discussions and reviewed portfolios for artist development events and organisations across Europe. His practice-based research has been presented at numerous university conferences on photography, landscape, architecture and wider themes of place. He is also a trustee of Brighton Photo Fringe.

See Fergus's work at fergusheron.com.

Find out about our other teaching staff.

• Francis Hodgson
• Judith Katz
• Xavier Ribas
• Daniel C. Blight
• Asa Johannesson

Facilities

The following resources are exclusively for MA and BA(Hons) photography students.

• Fully equipped photographic studios
• Dedicated photographic computing facilities
• A digital print bureau
• Traditional colour darkrooms with enlargers that accept a range of negative sizes up to 10 x 8”, capable of enabling the production of exhibition-standard prints
• A traditional black-and-white processing area and darkroom
• A selection of film and digital single lens reflex cameras – and medium-format and large-format film cameras – to supplement your own equipment

The university’s art and design library has a well-stocked photography area and provides access to a wide range of online resources.

International requirements and visas

We can help you meet our English language or academic entry requirements.

Visas and immigration advice

Portfolio requirements

Digital portfolio

When you apply, please upload a digital portfolio. You may have a website you want to link to, or you may want to prepare your portfolio as a PowerPoint file or on Tumblr. Make sure there is some brief text explaining and contextualising the work so we can understand the thinking behind it. We are not interested in lots of striking single ‘images’ but want to see evidence that you can sustain an idea through the development of a body of photographic work, so we would expect the portfolio to be organised thematically. We would also normally expect to see 15-25 images.

Interview portfolio

If you come for an interview you should bring a hard-copy portfolio of prints (if this is your medium). Once again we would expect to see evidence of whole projects, and for the prints to be considered – we are interested in your attention to the medium itself, not just the virtual image. You do not need to ‘mount’ the work – bringing it along in vinyl sleeves or a portfolio box is adequate. Think carefully about the sequencing and how you are going to present the relationships between different projects as a narrative. If you have moving image work you may bring it on a memory stick or laptop. If you work in installation, please bring appropriate samples and installation shots.

Course fees

Scholarships, bursaries and loans

We offer a range of scholarships for postgraduate students. Bursaries and loans may also be available to you.

Find out more about postgraduate fees and funding.

What's included

You may have to pay additional costs during your studies, although we have tried to keep this to a minimum. The cost of optional activities is not included in your tuition fee and you will need to meet this cost in addition to your fees. A summary of the costs that you may be expected to pay, and what is included in your fees, while studying a course in the School of Media are listed here.

• There will be opportunities to attend field trips and off-site visits. These are optional and are not required to pass your course but you can budget approximately £30–£700 for these. The nature of the costs vary from provisions for a packed-lunch to flight and accommodation costs for international field trips. The amount spent would be based on location and number of trips taken.
• Typically, practice-based courses incur more costs than text-based subjects. These costs are normally associated with specialist equipment and materials for making work and for the public presentation of work.
• Specialist equipment is provided to cover essential learning. Students may choose to buy their own specialist equipment, these may include cameras, or computers and software. Budgets can range from £50–£2,000. Buying specialist equipment is best undertaken in consultation with our academic and technical staff. This expenditure is not essential to pass any of our courses.
• For some courses you will need to budget up to £200 for printing and publishing. Photography courses may incur higher costs (£500–£2,000) when printing and framing images of professional standard for public presentation.
• Course books are available from the university but you may wish to budget up to £200 to buy your own copies.
• For some courses you will need to budget up to £150 for stationery.
• Final-year graduation shows are opportunities to present your final, independent project work to the public. Practice-based courses will typically incur higher costs. Depending on the specific nature of your final project you will need to budget between £20–£2,500. 

You can chat with our enquiries team through the Stay in touch panel at the end of this page if you require further information. Or check our finance pages for advice about funding and scholarships, as well as more information about fees and advice on international and island fee-paying status.

Info

The fees listed here are for full-time courses beginning in the academic year 2020–21.

Further tuition fees are payable for each subsequent year of study and are subject to an annual increase of no more than 5% or RPI (whichever is the greater). The annual increase for UK/EU students, who are subject to regulated fees, will increase no more than the statutory maximum fee.

You can find out more about our fees in the university's student contract and tuition fee policy (pdf).

The tuition fee you have to pay depends on a number of factors including the kind of course you take, and whether you study full-time or part-time. If you are studying part-time you will normally be charged on a pro rata basis depending on the number of modules you take.

Local area

Campus where this course is taught

Accommodation

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