BA (Hons)
Fine Art

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Key Information

Campus

Brayford Pool

Typical Offer

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Duration

3 years (4 years with Foundation Year)

UCAS Code

W101

Academic Year

Course Overview

Fine Art focuses on the artist as a socially responsive, publicly-aware practitioner, operating within physical, intellectual, and digital networks and referencing local, national, and global artistic platforms.

At Lincoln, the Fine Art programme offers the expertise and environment to nurture students' creative development and expression. It aims to enable students to extend their creative work and ideas into new areas. This includes opportunities to engage with students across the School of Creative Arts on site specific and interdisciplinary projects. It also offers specialist options in areas of applied fine art practices, such as teaching, health and community engagement, professional placements, and study abroad.

Students on the course are introduced to a range of professional and transferable skills. Academic staff are often practising artists and writers with national and international reputations, such as Dr Steve Klee whose work has been shown at LAM Gallery, Los Angeles, and Dr Alice Bell who has collaborated on projects with Damien Hirst and Sir Peter Blake among others.

A range of artists and professionals are also invited to deliver guest lectures and tutorials as part of the School's visiting artists' programme. Recent speakers include Assemble (2015 Turner Prize Winners), Mark Titchner, Jordan Baseman, Cath Keay, and Joshua Sofaer.

The programme explores contemporary art that moves within and beyond the traditional gallery to embrace a range of non-traditional sites, with assessments designed to prepare students for professional life. The course emphasises individual creativity and artistic intelligence, and aims to introduce students to the fields of Live Art, installation and digital media, as well as catering for painting, sculpture, drawing, and printmaking.

At Lincoln, students have the opportunity to work both with and beyond a dynamic studio culture. The course aims to enable students to extend their creative work and ideas into new areas. This includes opportunities to engage with students across the School of Creative Arts on site specific and interdisciplinary projects. It also offers specialist options in areas of applied fine art practices, such as teaching, health and community engagement, professional placements, and study abroad.

This programme is also available with an Arts Foundation Year, which can provide an alternative route of entry onto the full degree programme. Find out more at https://www.lincoln.ac.uk/course/afyafyub/.

Why Choose Lincoln

Subject area ranked in the top 20 overall in the UK*

Staff include practising artists and writers with international reputations

Visiting artists deliver guest lectures and tutorials

Access to studios, workshops, and an on-campus public gallery

Join study visits to destinations in the UK and abroad

Opportunities to exhibit your work

*Complete University Guide 2025 (out of 84 ranking institutions).

YouTube video for Why Choose Lincoln

How You Study

In the first year, students are encouraged to experiment with traditional media, digital practices, and live art in order to identify key areas of personal interest. This is alongside receiving a solid grounding in exploring the creative arts as a wider interdisciplinary concern integrated within gaining key academic core competencies.

The second year aims to guide students in the development of their individual practices. There are also opportunities to collaborate with other students from across the School of Creative Arts within interdisciplinary and off-site projects.

In the third year, professional practice modules offer students the ability to refine their individual development and reflective practice, culminating in their final-year degree shows.

Methods of delivery on the Fine Art programme vary from module to module and may include lectures to larger cohorts, seminars with smaller groups, guided workshops across the University's facilities, and focused studio tutoring in both group and one-to-one situations.

Modules

              † Some courses may offer optional modules. The availability of optional modules may vary from year to year and will be subject to minimum student numbers being achieved. This means that the availability of specific optional modules cannot be guaranteed. Optional module selection may also be affected by staff availability.

              Bodily Encounters 2025-26ART1017Level 42025-26Bodily Encounters focuses on expanded notions of the body, to include both human and non-human bodies, technologies, and environments. Students will have the opportunity to work with a range of media, materials and practices, provocations, processes and potential outcomes to produce their own Finished Artworks focusing on their own experience of embodiment. The module will study precedents of embodiment in art practice and focus on bodies and their creation and transformation through a series of skills workshops underpinned by a contextual element exploring what bodies can do through contemporary art. Workshops will include collectively creating new sustainable, inclusive and accessible work spaces within the fine art studios or outside, for example expanding on our pigment and dye garden, and examining and reevaluating our maintenance labour.CoreExploring 1: The Creative Arts 2025-26CAR1001Level 42025-26In this module, students will explore creative arts disciplines through the lens of cultural themes, ideas and principles. This will encompass Creative Writing, Dance, Drama, Fine Art, Music, Musical Theatre and Technical Theatre and highlight the commonalties which connect these disciplines, as well as the nuances and differences that make them distinct.CoreFrameworks 2025-26ART1020Level 42025-26Frameworks is a practical module that offers experience in developing processes for working to produce art in dialogue with, and in response to, notions of 'the public'. It highlights the programme's technical facilities and offers professional skills in the production of an arts practice, and the capture, composition and creation of digital documentation to accompany artistic output. The module is partly based in the studio but also operates across the wider University campus in order to engage with its diverse publics and spaces. Students experiment with making artwork in response to the module's theme, and receive training in technical equipment and software through demonstrations. Studio-based teaching and learning is also key to Frameworks, and students will engage in one-to-one and group tutorials, group crits, and other activities to enable the development of a professional arts practice.CoreIntroduction to Prose 2025-26CRW1005MLevel 42025-26Prose is fundamental to understanding narrative whether in fiction or non-fiction. This module aims to give students an understanding of how stories work, using the insights that have originated and developed from narrative theory and prose techniques. Contemporary writers in both the short story and non-feature writing will be used to introduce a set of critical concepts for the analysis of all forms of prose writing.OptionalProject Space Plus 2025-26ART1019Level 42025-26The module provides students with opportunities to develop their practice in response to critical spatial practices. This includes: writing a proposal that responds to a Live Brief theme; creating an artwork for a public exhibition/event; writing a contextual statement; utilising appropriate documentation techniques of creative practice; and disseminating responses to the contexts of spatial practice. This Module asks students to create a proposal and a new artwork for a curated exhibition/event in the University’s Gallery, Project Space Plus. Students will learn about curatorial issues through lectures and workshops, which will then be put into practice through the curation of an exhibition/event that will include all students on the module. Artworks are specified here as being considered in the widest sense to include creative media including but not restricted to: dance, digital, drawing, installation, music, painting, performance, print, sculpture, sound, text, video, virtual reality). Students are introduced to established and alternative models for spaces where creative arts take place. Students are encouraged to create work that imagines alternatives to the fixed, institutional space of an exhibition and how artwork can effectively engage a public audience through its situation.OptionalScreen Performance 2025-26DAN1022MLevel 42025-26Screen Performance gives students the opportunity to explore multi-disciplinary approaches to acting, choreography, music, and technical skills for screen. This module focuses on the creation of a screen work that provides students with the opportunity to develop skills in acting, directing, dance for screen, composing, technical production and scriptwriting. Students will have the opportunity to create storyboards as part of the planning process, shoot and edit a short film, as well as document this process in a production folder. Students will work in production teams to achieve a final video.OptionalStaging a Musical 2: Another Opening. Another Show 2025-26MST1007MLevel 42025-26This module gives you the chance to collaborate as a company to rehearse and stage a book musical. Through this experience, you will gain valuable insight into the development and rehearsal process involved in a professional show.OptionalTechnical Theatre Technology 2025-26TTH1006MLevel 42025-26This module is a practical exploration of the many technologies available for use in technical theatre and the contexts in which they are used. From lighting consoles to sound mixers and QLAB software. This module will teach the fundamentals of setting up and programming equipment for stage productions.OptionalThe Physical Performer 2025-26DRA1052Level 42025-26In this module students explore a range of approaches to the constantly evolving field of Physical Theatre. Through a series of workshops, they investigate different techniques, styles, methodologies ranging from classical traditions to contemporary performance, and are offered the opportunity to gain a practical and analytical insight into the countless possibilities of the body in performance - in relation to other bodies, to the space, to the audience. Students will work to develop skills that will equip them to use the body expressively, imaginatively, communicatively, collaboratively. They will engage with and draw inspiration from a variety of stimuli - words, images, sounds, scents, objects, culture and society - in order to devise original performances, using the body as the primary vehicle to generate, express and communicate meaning.OptionalExploring 2: Place and Space 2026-27CAR2001Level 52026-27In this module students will practically interrogate interdisciplinary arts practices and investigate creative arts practitioners that utilise ‘site’ in innovative ways. In multidisciplinary groups they will conduct their own experiments to explore the challenges and possibilities of working in unconventional spaces. This will culminate in a final presentation of their work.CoreMaterial Entanglements 1 2026-27ART2017Level 52026-27Material Entanglements 1 provides students with the opportunity to concentrate on developing their artistic practice to produce artwork while broadening and strengthening the documentation of their art. The module concludes with an exhibition that marks the half-way point of the degree. The module continues the dialogue between identity and practice begun in Frameworks and Bodily Encounters in Year 1. Examining the impact of politics, environment and social change, it asks how these public dialogues can influence the bodies and identities of artists, and how artists are able to make use of these impacts in their art. The module also engages with modes of exchange, current climates and artistic identities within global contemporary art.CoreMaterial Entanglements 2 2026-27ART2023Level 52026-27CoreSpecialist Elective 2026-27CAR2002Level 52026-27CoreActing the Song 2026-27MST2001MLevel 52026-27This is a practical module which explores the techniques of singing and acting a song. You will work on vocal technique, character development, and acting approaches to prepare solo numbers for performance. The module will equip you with the skills to begin to put together a rep portfolio appropriate for your voice. This will be invaluable if you are planning to apply for postgraduate study at drama school or begin auditioning for shows. Assessment will be part practical, and part based on a portfolio detailing your exploration of acting and vocal techniques through the module.OptionalArts and Health 2026-27ART2021Level 52026-27Arts and Health, an optional 30 credit module in Semester B, is a live brief project that offers students the opportunity to work in a professional public setting to facilitate artwork with participants. This may be a community, charity, educational, public or private sector setting in Lincoln or elsewhere. You will be given the opportunity in this module to facilitate artwork with service users, communities or clients in organisations such as We Are With You / Double Impact / NHS / YMCA / HMS or another charity or community setting. We have successfully worked with We Are With You / Double Impact Lincoln for the past 7 years, a national drug and alcohol charity offering support to people to enable them to make positive behavioural change. Their work encompasses community support, education, help for those in the criminal justice system, mental health services, family and employment support. In recent years we have also started to grow our community settings to provide students with further professional facilitation experiences such as working with adults with lived experience within the NHS and local communities at Doddington Hall, that draw upon community arts, participatory arts, arts psychotherapeutic methods and occupational health approaches. Students considering a career in arts-led intervention or community arts practices, will gain invaluable experience of planning, training for, delivering and evaluating a participatory art process within a community setting.OptionalContemporary Performance Technologies 2026-27TTH2009Level 52026-27This module will cover the latest technologies used in theatre and live events, from contemporary lighting and innovative live sound technology to holographic performance and virtual reality. The module will explore how this technology is used and will encourage students to consider how contemporary technology can be used or developed to create a performance. The module will research and analyse case studies from innovative contemporary productions and manufacturers from around the world.OptionalContemporary Production Practices 2026-27TTH2002Level 52026-27This module aims to enable students to understand the landscape for potential employment post-University. The module runs alongside the Placement module and will have the scope to feature guest talks from industry professionals.OptionalCreative Audio Technologies 2026-27MUS2018Level 52026-27Creative Audio Technologies encourages students to embrace and create using technology to facilitate an audio-based project, by exploring some of the creative tool available at the cutting edge of digital work. Students will be introduced to a spectrum of technological tools designed to enhance and record audio, before creating their own project incorporating these techniques. Existing original audio-based work – along with alternative uses of technologies – will be critically analysed in ways that embraces multiple genres, art forms and approaches to technology.OptionalDigital Performance 2026-27DAN2019MLevel 52026-27This module focuses on the interdisciplinary field of digital performance. “We define the term 'digital performance' broadly to include all performance works where computer technologies play a key role rather than a subsidiary one in content, techniques, aesthetics or delivery forms” (Dixon, 2007, p3). It examines the intersection of digital media and performance in various contexts, such as interactive media on stage, biosensors and the body in performance, and social media and performance opportunities. By working with various digital technologies students can engage and explore practically how to make performance using these tools and new technologies.OptionalIndustry Placement 2026-27CAR2005Level 52026-27This module is part of the University's commitment to academic programmes that encourage a high level of vocational relevance. This module encourages students to think beyond their University life, reaching into the wider community to hone their skills and target future employment possibilities. The module aims to enable students to examine how arts-based organisations, educational and non-traditional arts-based establishments function and provide students with valuable workplace experience.OptionalLSCA Study Abroad 2026-27CAR2003Level 52026-27Study Abroad is an optional module which enables students to spend a semester studying abroad at one of the University’s approved partner institutions. Eligible students must have completed their first year of study to a satisfactory standard and successfully completed the application process for the study abroad scheme. During the semester spent abroad, students share classes with local students and study on a suite of locally-delivered taught modules which have been approved in advance by the University. Upon their return, as part of the assessment for this module, students are required to critically reflect upon their experience of living and studying in a different cultural environment and the skills acquired.OptionalStage Combat 2026-27DRA2037Level 52026-27This practical module teaches the fundamental techniques of armed and unarmed theatrical combat. Students undergo stage fight training designed to enable them to act out physical conflict in a safe and technically proficient way, while maintaining characterisation and creating a convincing illusion of reality. Throughout the semester, students work in pairs under the combat coach’s supervision. At the end of the module, they engage in an assessment by performing a fight scene that they have selected and rehearsed. The exam gives students the option of obtaining a stage combat certificate issued by The Academy of Performance Combat.OptionalTeaching Practices 2026-27CAR2004Level 52026-27Throughout this module you will develop and deepen your knowledge and practice of teaching and delivery in a your chosen discipline. you will practice, analyse and discuss various possible strategies for working in a variety of environments, including more challenging environments, such as integrated settings and with hard-to-reach groups. In addition to the practical exploration of teaching and delivery, you will investigate the key policies and legislation surrounding the teaching profession. This module has a strong industry-facing element, and will provide key knowledge and tools for students wanting to move toward teaching and delivery as part of their career.OptionalThe Craft of Creative Non-Fiction 2026-27CRW2003MLevel 52026-27While students are introduced to prose fiction writing and essential narrative techniques at level 1, the field of prose writing is much wider than short stories or novels. In areas such as travel, historiography, literary journalism and biography, writers frequently employ similar techniques to those used by novelists to make events and characters more vivid. This module will encourage students to use their creative and technical skills to write non-fiction, including but not limited travel writing, life writing, articles, reviews and journals. Particular attention will be paid to balancing the need to convey factual information with the creative potential of narrative, language and form. This module will allow students to research a field they wish to investigate such as current events, the arts, history or some aspect of science. Students will learn both how to conduct research (through archival research, observations, and interviews) as well as the fundamental techniques of telling a true story. Extended over two semesters, it will enable students to engage more deeply with a chosen field of non-fiction, for example to produce chapters that would contribute to a book as well as features.OptionalThe Craft of Fiction 2026-27CRW2006MLevel 52026-27This module will explore the role of fiction writing with an initial emphasis on the short story. Many writers begin with the short story. Through writing short stories they are able to experiment, learn the fundamentals of narrative composition, and have the satisfaction of completing something to a high standard in a relatively short period of time. This module will introduce students to the work of a range of fiction writers, whilst helping them to develop their skills in crafting prose. They will be asked to study particular stories each week, but also expected to pursue their own interests in reading. The skills required for writing short stories are also key to working in other forms, so this module will help students to develop as writers, whatever their plans and ambitions may be.OptionalArts and Cultural Industries 2027-28DRA3056MLevel 62027-28 Acknowledging what happens in process and production are is as important, if not more important, than what happens with a final artistic product. This module offers you invaluable opportunities to develop a detailed understanding of the arts as an ecosystem in relation to the wider world. You'll be introduced to the organisational infrastructure of the creative sector, enhancing your core employability skills for life after graduation, and equipping you for a career in the arts. You will learn directly from industry professionals working in a variety of creative contexts who we invite to speak to you in a series of talks and presentations; you can speak to them, ask questions, and develop your professional network. You will also learn though lectures, discussion, group and individual working, and via research tasks designed to provide you with real-world guidance for working in creative and cultural industries. You'll also be encouraged to keep abreast of government policy and issues such as audience accessibility and diversity within the arts, and ask how the current political climate shapes this generation of arts organisations, makers, producers and companies.CoreExploring 3: Investigating Creative Practice 2027-28CAR3001Level 62027-28This module will provide students with an opportunity to develop their independent practice and explore a project of their own creation. This will allow students to extend their knowledge of practice, scholarship, and praxis as they curate their own project, identifying a topic of interest for further exploration and dissemination.CoreLaunching Practice: Degree Show 2027-28ART3018Level 62027-28In this module, students are expected to develop, finish and exhibit signature artworks in a gallery or negotiated venue appropriate to their practice. The module aims to support the student in creating a professional representation of their practice in the media(s) of their choice. Refining and consolidating students' practical specialisms, the module situates individual practice at its core. Staff supervise and support students to focus on the fundamentals of making in terms of criticality, process and materials to produce finished artworks for a professional public exhibition. Students work together in organising and promoting the exhibition and accompanying digital catalogue.CoreLocating Practice 2027-28ART3017Level 62027-28Locating Practice is an exploration of gallery, studio, and site-based approaches to Fine Art, either in studio/gallery settings or in the City of Lincoln and beyond. This Module develops the practical and theoretical dialogues studied in levels 1 and 2 and develops them in preparation for the creation of art in the wider physical world inside and/or beyond the traditional Gallery. The module aims to prepare students for the demands and timescales of independent practice and its professional evaluation. Subjects include Audio, Art and The City, The Gallery and the Studio, Walking and Performance as Art, Pervasive Media and Digital Practices, the Located Body and Evaluating Practice.Core

              What You Need to Know

              We want you to have all the information you need to make an informed decision on where and what you want to study. In addition to the information provided on this course page, our What You Need to Know page offers explanations on key topics including programme validation/revalidation, additional costs, contact hours, and our return to face-to-face teaching.

              How you are assessed

              Assessment will include finished artworks and documentation, presentations, essays, catalogues, and evaluations.

              Student Work Showcase

              Visiting Experts

              A range of artists and professionals are invited to deliver guest lectures and tutorials as part of the Lincoln School of Creative Arts' visiting artists programme. Recent speakers include Assemble (2015 Turner Prize winners), Ming Wong, Mark Titchner, Cath Keay, Jordan Baseman, and Joshua Sofaer.

              Facilities

              All Fine Art students have access to studios and workshops, as well as the University’s on-campus public gallery, Project Space Plus, where students regularly exhibit their work. Students can make use of software that supports their documentation and practice, and have access to photography, video, and audio facilities; acrylic resist etching, digital imagery, and screen printing equipment; and facilities for wood, metal, plaster, plastics, and resin work.

              A exhibition of student work in the on-campus gallery

              Field Trips

              Students on this course may have the opportunity to undertake field trips. Mandatory field trip costs are covered by the University but optional study visits, to locations such as Venice, are at your own expense. In the past, students have enjoyed a fully-funded trip to Dartington to work collaboratively with other students from the Lincoln School of Creative Arts.

              Networking

              Students are encouraged to take advantage of the networks and connections that they may be brought into contact with during their studies. Recent successes as a consequence of Fine Art's networks have seen students gain residencies at the Art House in Wakefield, Mansions of the Future in Lincoln, and the Surface Gallery in Nottingham.

              The Art of Wellbeing

              Work from BA (Hons) Fine Art students support the healing and recovery of patients as it is integrated into Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust’s (LPFT) multi-million pound regeneration of the city’s mental health wards.

              YouTube video for The Art of Wellbeing

              Throughout my three years, I was challenged, supported, and believed in. This course has an equal balance in educating you within the arts while developing your practice as an artist. The support and the design of the course makes the idea of working professionally as an artist a reality.

              Sophie Baker

              BA (Hons) Fine Art

              What Can I Do with a Fine Art Degree?

              Lincoln’s Fine Art degree aims to empower students to develop technical, critical, and professional skills. It aims to prepare students to enter careers throughout the creative industries. This may include working as freelance artists, curators, administrators, and writers, as well as roles in art therapy and teaching.

              Entry Requirements 2025-26

              United Kingdom

              104 UCAS Tariff points from a minimum of 2 A Levels or equivalent level 3 qualifications.

              BTEC Extended Diploma: DMM

              T Level: Merit

              Access to Higher Education Diploma: 45 Level 3 credits with a minimum of 104 UCAS Tariff points

              International Baccalaureate: 28 points overall.

              GCSE's: Minimum of three at grade 4 or above, which must include English. Equivalent Level 2 qualifications may be considered.


              The University accepts a wide range of qualifications as the basis for entry and do accept a combination of qualifications which may include A Levels, BTECs, EPQ etc.

              We may also consider applicants with extensive and relevant work experience and will give special individual consideration to those who do not meet the standard entry qualifications.

              International

              Non UK Qualifications:

              If you have studied outside of the UK, and are unsure whether your qualification meets the above requirements, please visit our country pages
              https://www.lincoln.ac.uk/studywithus/internationalstudents/entryrequirementsandyourcountry/ for information on equivalent qualifications.

              EU and Overseas students will be required to demonstrate English language proficiency equivalent to IELTS 6.0 overall, with a minimum of 5.5 in each element. For information regarding other English language qualifications we accept, please visit the English Requirements page
              https://www.lincoln.ac.uk/studywithus/internationalstudents/englishlanguagerequirementsandsupport/englishlanguagerequirements/

              If you do not meet the above IELTS requirements, you may be able to take part in one of our Pre-sessional English and Academic Study Skills courses.

              https://www.lincoln.ac.uk/studywithus/internationalstudents/englishlanguagerequirementsandsupport/pre-sessionalenglishandacademicstudyskills/

              If you would like further information about entry requirements, or would like to discuss whether the qualifications you are currently studying are acceptable, please contact the Admissions team on 01522 886097, or email admissions@lincoln.ac.uk

              Contextual Offers

              At Lincoln, we recognise that not everybody has had the same advice and support to help them get to higher education. Contextual offers are one of the ways we remove the barriers to higher education, ensuring that we have fair access for all students regardless of background and personal experiences. For more information, including eligibility criteria, visit our Offer Guide pages. If you are applying to a course that has any subject specific requirements, these will still need to be achieved as part of the standard entry criteria.

              Portfolios and Interviews

              Successful applicants will be invited to an interview, where they will have the opportunity to go through their portfolio with a member of the academic team.

              If you are invited for an interview you will have the opportunity to show a traditional and/or digital portfolio with you. This will form the basis for a discussion of your current interests in Fine Art and how you would like to develop your ideas and practice at Lincoln. You will need to clearly describe and explain the work you bring with you. Interviews are designed to make sure we're right for you, and you are right for us. We understand they can be daunting, but try not to worry. 

              A range of work is useful, but as a guide we would recommend that your portfolio should consist of no more than 10 to 15 pieces. We'd like to see a range of images and examples of video, audio, or photographic work as applicable to the work you have made. 

              Fees and Scholarships

              Going to university is a life-changing step and it's important to understand the costs involved and the funding options available before you start. A full breakdown of the fees associated with this programme can be found on our course fees pages.

              Course Fees

              For eligible undergraduate students going to university for the first time, scholarships and bursaries are available to help cover costs. To help support students from outside of the UK, we are also delighted to offer a number of international scholarships which range from £1,000 up to the value of 50 per cent of tuition fees. For full details and information about eligibility, visit our scholarships and bursaries pages.

              Course -Specific Additional Costs

              Most students will need to buy materials appropriate to their practice. These might include (but are not limited to): paint, wood, and other relevant materials. Materials costs for this course will depend on the medium you choose to work in, but will typically range from between £100 and £500 per year.

              Students may benefit from a range of subsidised study trips (which include transport, accommodation and admission charges as appropriate), activities, and events which aim to benefit and enhance their studies and practices.

              Optional study trips may also be available, and the full costs of these will be incurred by the student where offered. These range from approximately £20 for a day trip to £400 for an international trip of between three and five days. All costs incurred need to be paid upfront. Participation in study trips is not graded.

              Find out More by Visiting Us

              The best way to find out what it is really like to live and learn at Lincoln is to visit us in person. We offer a range of opportunities across the year to help you to get a real feel for what it might be like to study here.

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              Three students walking together on campus in the sunshine

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