Research department

Research is a core activity of the Victoria and Albert Museum helping to develop the public understanding of the art and artefacts of many of the great cultures of the world. The Research Department facilitates and develops research into the V&A's collections and connects the Museum to the wider world of research in Art and Design.

The Research department, part of the Collections Division, works with other Museum departments to further the role of research in the Victoria and Albert Museum. It aims to maintain the lively and stimulating research culture that underpins exhibitions, scholarly and popular publications (paper and electronic), gallery development, postgraduate teaching, conferences and seminars.

As well as a dedicated team of researchers and academics The department hosts a permanent staff as well as temporary exhibition teams working on forthcoming events at the V&A, researchers seconded from the Museum’s curatorial and Conservation departments who are preparing future publications, and externally funded fellows. It is also the home for some of the museum’s web-based projects - including the new V&A Online Journal.

The department forges links with external bodies and expertise , for example through a programme of AHRC-funded partnerships with universities. Research funding or support in kind also comes from charitable trusts (such as the British Academy, the Getty Grant Programme, the Kress Foundation, Yale Centre for the Study of British Art) or from UK higher educational institutions (including at present the Royal College of Art, University of Arts London, Birkbeck College, the Universities of Sussex, Brighton, Warwick, West of England, Cambridge, Queen Mary’s, University College of Buckinghamshire and the London College of Fashion). These partnerships bring considerable resources to the V&A each year to support research.

MA courses in the History of Design

The V&A has worked in a special partnership with the Royal College of Art for over 25 years to offer postgraduate study programmes incuding the world renowned MA programme in the History of Design which makes a direct contribution to research into the V&A collections. Alumni from these programmes have entered the world of design at all levels including leading curators, journalists and design historians.

The department houses three postgraduate MA courses in the History of Design, run jointly with the Royal College of Art :

Find out more about  V&A/RCA MA Courses.

Research Department staff

Glenn Adamson - Head of Research

Glenn Adamson leads the Research Department's activities, working closely with colleagues within the museum and in collaboration with scholars and institutions worldwide.  He holds a PhD in art history from Yale University, and was previously curator at the Chipstone Foundation in Milwaukee. Dr. Adamson co-curated (with Jane Pavitt) the exhibition Postmodernism: Style and Subversion, 1970 to 1990, which opened at the V&A in 2011. He has also written widely on craft history and theory, in such books as Thinking Through Craft (2007), The Craft Reader (2010), and The Invention of Craft (2012); and has edited numerous publications including the triannual Journal of Modern Craft, the volume Global Design History (co-edited with Giorgio Riello and Sarah Teasley, 2011), and Surface Tensions (co-edited with Victoria Kelley, 2012).

Liz Miller - Deputy Head of Research

Liz Miller is currently Deputy Head of Research. She has held several V&A curatorial positions since 1979, first in the National Art Library and more recently as curator of prints in the Word & Image Department, specialising in printmaking before 1600. She has contributed to two major gallery projects, and has written hundreds of catalogue entries, text panels and labels for museum galleries and temporary displays.

Angela McShane - Course Tutor

Angela McShane is Tutor in Graduate studies (post 1600) for the joint RCA/V&A MA in History of Design, she supervises all levels of postgraduate research and helps to facilitate curatorial research and writing for exhibitions and V&A and other publications. She gained her first degree in History from the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, a P.G.C.E. from the University of Leicester and, after a career in secondary and tertiary history teaching, her PHD from the University of Warwick in 2005. Read more on Academia.edu

Christine Guth - Course Tutor

Christine Guth leads the Asian Specialism on the V&A/RCA MA History of Design Course. She received her PhD in Fine Arts at Harvard University, where she studied Japanese art history. She has taught at institutions including Princeton, Harvard, Stanford and Berkeley Universities and curated shows at The Japan Society, New York, Katonah Museum of Art and LACMA .

Marta Ajmar – Acting Head of Graduate Studies

Marta Ajmar gained her PhD from the Warburg Institute and leads the Renaissance Strand of the V&A/RCA MA course. Between 2002 and 2006 she directed the research and exhibition project, funded by the Getty Foundation and the AHRC, for the major V&A exhibition 'At Home in Renaissance Italy'. She is currently working with Luca Molà (Warwick University) on a new exhibition project, exploring globalization in the early modern period (The Global Renaissance).

Katrina Royall - Course Administrator

Katrina's role involves assisting with the running of the V&A/RCA MA Course in the History of Design

Helen Woodfield - Research Administrator/Course Administrator

Helen is responsible for administration within the Research department. She also assists with the running of the V&A/RCA MA Course in the History of Design.

Research Fellows currently working in the Research Department

Donatella Barbieri, London College of Fashion/V&A Fellow in Design for Performance
Peter Cormack, American Friends of the V&A Fellow in Arts and Crafts Stained Glass
Maurice Howard, Sussex University/V&A Exchange Fellow
Guy Julier, University of Brighton/V&A Fellow in Contemporary Design
Matthew Partington, University of West England/V&A Fellow in Twentieth Century Craft
Linda Sandino, University of the Arts/V&A Fellow in Oral History
Carol Tulloch, University of the Arts/V&A Fellow in Black Visual Culture

Visiting Scholars

Ann Compton, Casts and Material Cultures