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Performing and Visual Arts

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Why do human beings create art? What means do we have to understand their economic, cultural and legal universe? What rights do artists possess? In what way does the actual manner in which art is made, shown and sold transform our understanding of art history?

The arts have a complex social existence in India. They range from traditional painting and sculpture, theatre and dance, to modern practices like the cinema and multimedia. Arts practice – alongside opportunities for formal and technological innovation, curation and publishing, for arts and media production, or simply for further research into its complex social locations – has seen major growth in the twenty-first century. The global value of the Creative Economy is $985 billion in 2023 and will become 10% of world GDP by 2030.

The Performing and Visual Arts Division takes an Integrated Arts approach. The Integrated Arts is an innovative and multidisciplinary approach to artistic and creative practice in contemporary times. As imagined at Ahmedabad University, technical expertise or formal training in specific art forms (such as dance, music, theatre, painting, photography, etc.) is complemented by skills and sensibilities that are relevant across various performance and visual arts disciplines. Integrated Arts is about understanding a range of foundational principles that will enable the practitioner to develop competencies that they can apply in creative projects and/or arts disciplines of their choice in the future.

The idea is for a student of arts to be influenced by a wide range of creative art forms within a liberal arts educational environment.  Drawing from the globally expanding Creative Industries sector, such an approach explores ways by which art can enable exciting and significant conversations between, for instance, music, painting, theatre and dance, with photography, filmmaking and design. Art today works in growing partnership with science, legal studies, engineering, and management. It discovers in new media and new materials an aesthetic dimension to new frontiers of knowledge. In the Integrated Arts programme, the student will be exposed to all these many aspects of contemporary art practice. Even while obtaining this multi-faceted exposure, the student will have the flexibility of specialising in a particular art practice and learn that form in the context of related practices.

This division of the School of Arts and Sciences offers both practice and theory-based interdisciplinary courses, by not only blending the Visual Arts and the Performing Arts but also by collaborating seamlessly with other Divisions and Schools at Ahmedabad University. Courses currently on offer include Painting, Drawing, Music, Photography, Storytelling, Dance and Theatre, as well as courses in art history, cultural heritage and cultural theory. In the near future, the teaching and research base will extend to Sculpture, Design, Graphics, Illustration, Printmaking, Ceramics, Textiles, Sound Art, Digital Art and New Media. The programme will introduce students to the diversity of indigenous art forms (including India’s powerful folk, tribal and classical traditions) as well as historic and present-day practices of art in the Global South alongside the North.

Our aim is to produce highly skilled graduates who can be powerful actors in the world through the medium of art. They can also simultaneously use their technical expertise and conceptual strengths, drawn from the University’s broad-based liberal arts curriculum, to work in industries such as media, fashion, design, advertising, journalism and digital arts, among many others.

Over time, the Performing and Visual Arts Division, with a unique Black Box performance space in the School of Arts and Sciences building, and other performance and exhibition venues, aims to become a hub for interactive creative collaboration across Ahmedabad, bringing theorists and practitioners to the city from around the world.

Performing and Visual Arts

Academics

Programmes

The Dual Degree Programme in Integrated Arts is a multidisciplinary arts degree dedicated to producing a new generation of artists, policymakers, art curators, managers, and academicians in the ever-expanding field of the Performing and Visual Arts, from the traditional crafts to New Media Art, and in the Creative Industries. 

The five-year programme, offered to those seeking rigorous and holistic education in Performing and Visual Arts, provides intellectual preparation within the liberal arts tradition while building skills and capabilities within specific art forms. Students will acquire in-depth technical and creative skills in their chosen field of practice while being exposed to an integrative knowledge of various art forms. 

The student can choose to specialise in a particular art practice such as music, theatre, dance, photography, or painting or build their entire educational programme through the integrated arts framework.

Major in Intergrated Arts (Performing Arts/ Visual Arts)

Admissions

Students with a demonstrated interest and aptitude in Performing and Visual Arts (in practice as well as in history and theory) are encouraged to apply to the dual degree programme. Applicants must submit a sample of their existing work/practice, for example, a portfolio or a performance video, along with their University application.

Eligibility

  • A demonstrated interest in Performing and Visual Arts (practice-based and/or historically and theoretically oriented)
  • Being a practitioner in any art form is a bonus but not a prerequisite

Admission procedure

  • University-wide application form
  • Personal interaction
  • Review of portfolio/sample of work

The portfolio/sample of work must include at least ONE of the following:

  • 5 artworks (or photographs of the same) that demonstrate any proficiency the student might have in the visual arts (or photographs of artworks such as installations or sculptures)
  • Video recording under five minutes of any kind of performance (mp4 format)
  • Documentation of previous theatrical works
  • 2 Samples of writing about art (minimum 300 words), such as a reflection on a painting or paintings, sculpture or sculptures, other artwork, review of a musical performance, play, film, etc

In The News

26 March 2025

A Comparative Study of India and China Shows How Women Forge Their Futures Through Education

10 March 2025

Ahmedabad Students Win for Research on Food Delivery Platform Market Impact

17 February 2025

Study Shows Temperature Driven Changes in Structural Colouration in Insect Wings

9 February 2025

Healthy Family Communication Can Boost Student's Problem-solving and Coping Abilities

29 January 2025

Ahmedabad University Student Develops New Forensic Tool To Address Forensic Challenges

20 January 2025

Study on Genome Editing for Sustainable Food Security

21 October 2024

Anil Karthik, Integrated MS, Class of 2024 to Study Immunology at a German University Associated with Notable Nobel Laureates

25 July 2024

Mansi Parekh, Integrated MS, Class of 2024 Joins University of Western Australia to Study Biotechnology

24 June 2024

Junk-DNA Could be Useful in Assessing Risk of Insect Extinction

22 June 2024

Ahmedabad University Professor’s Work Included in Google's Quantum Computing Framework Cirq

3 June 2024

Ahmedabad Student to Study Current Biology Methods at EMBL Lautenschläger Summer School

21 May 2024

Study Reveals Possible Role of Invasive Catfish in Threatening the Sustenance of Fingerling Rohu

14 May 2024

Ahmedabad Research Scholar’s Study on Oral Cancer wins ISEV Scholarship

22 April 2024

Research Reveals Firelighters and Power Plants as Big Contributors to Pollution

17 April 2024

Ahmedabad Student Wins Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship Award at the California Institute of Technology

26 March 2024

Unlocking Nature's Defences: Humic Acid and Clay Shield Zebrafish Larvae from Phthalate Toxicity

22 March 2024

Study Shows MicroRNAs can be an Effective Treatment of Drug-Resistant Breast Cancer

16 February 2024

Contemporary Climatic Trends Might Predict Ectothermic Insects’ Population Dynamics in the Future

A Comparative Study of India and China Shows How Women Forge Their Futures Through Education

26 March 2025

Ahmedabad Students Win for Research on Food Delivery Platform Market Impact

10 March 2025

Study Shows Temperature Driven Changes in Structural Colouration in Insect Wings

17 February 2025

Healthy Family Communication Can Boost Student's Problem-solving and Coping Abilities

9 February 2025

Ahmedabad University Student Develops New Forensic Tool To Address Forensic Challenges

29 January 2025

Study on Genome Editing for Sustainable Food Security

20 January 2025

Anil Karthik, Integrated MS, Class of 2024 to Study Immunology at a German University Associated with Notable Nobel Laureates

21 October 2024

Mansi Parekh, Integrated MS, Class of 2024 Joins University of Western Australia to Study Biotechnology

25 July 2024

Junk-DNA Could be Useful in Assessing Risk of Insect Extinction

24 June 2024

Ahmedabad University Professor’s Work Included in Google's Quantum Computing Framework Cirq

22 June 2024

Ahmedabad Student to Study Current Biology Methods at EMBL Lautenschläger Summer School

3 June 2024

Study Reveals Possible Role of Invasive Catfish in Threatening the Sustenance of Fingerling Rohu

21 May 2024

Ahmedabad Research Scholar’s Study on Oral Cancer wins ISEV Scholarship

14 May 2024

Research Reveals Firelighters and Power Plants as Big Contributors to Pollution

22 April 2024

Ahmedabad Student Wins Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship Award at the California Institute of Technology

17 April 2024

Unlocking Nature's Defences: Humic Acid and Clay Shield Zebrafish Larvae from Phthalate Toxicity

26 March 2024

Study Shows MicroRNAs can be an Effective Treatment of Drug-Resistant Breast Cancer

22 March 2024

Contemporary Climatic Trends Might Predict Ectothermic Insects’ Population Dynamics in the Future

16 February 2024

Today at Performing and Visual Arts

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People

The People

Faculty

PhD and Post Doctoral Fellows

  • Kathyayini Das, Assistant Professor

    Kathyayini Dash

    Assistant Professor

    PhD (University of Cape Town)


    Research Interests: Interdisciplinary Artistic Research, Practice-as-research and Practice-based Research Methodology in Theatre and Performance, Archive Studies, Migration Studies, Embodiment Studies, Decolonial Studies, Affect Studies


  • Aditi Deo, Assistant Professor | Ahmedabad University

    Aditi Deo

    Assistant Professor

    PhD (Indiana University)


    Research Interests: Performance Practice, Technologies, Pedagogies, Circulation And Heritage.


  • Rajesh Naidu Assistant Professor Ahmedabad University

    Rajesh Naidu

    Assistant Professor

    Master of Fine Arts in Studio Arts/Painting (Indiana State University)


    Research Interests: representational art, observational art, visual arts, painting, human condition, figurative art, human figure, realism


  • Tejaswini Niranjana, Visiting Professor | Ahmedabad University

    Tejaswini Niranjana

    Visiting Professor

    PhD (UCLA)


    Research Interests: Cultural theory, gender studies, cultural history of Indian music, Inter-Asia studies, translation theory


  • Ranu Roychoudhuri, Assistant Professor | Ahmedabad University

    Ranu Roychoudhuri

    Associate Professor

    PhD (University of Chicago)


    Research Interests: History of Photography; Global Modernism; Contemporary Art; Intellectual History of Art; Art Historiography; Modern South Asia; Postcolonial Studies


  • Deepan Sivaraman

    Deepan Sivaraman

    Professor

    MA (Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design)


    Research Interests: Theatre as a Form of Knowledge Production, Theatre of Scenography, Post-Dramatic Theatre


  • Lakshmi Sreeram, Associate Professor | Ahmedabad University

    Lakshmi Sreeram

    Associate Professor

    PhD (University of Mumbai)


    Research Interests: Indian Music, Epistemology of Raga, Rasa theory, Epistemology of Rasa.


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School of Arts and Sciences

Ahmedabad University 
Central Campus 
Navrangpura, Ahmedabad 380009
Gujarat, India

[email protected]
+91.79.61911502

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