The 14th International Journal of Art and Design Education Conference will explore the theme 'Ecologies'. The conference will have a hybrid format, with one online day and one in-person day in Bristol:
Thursday 6 November 2025 | Online
Saturday 8 November 2025 | Arnolfini, UWE Bristol
Ecologists seek to explain the relationship between humans and their environment. The ecologies of an art and design classroom encompass constellations of behaviours, personalities, curriculum, pedagogies, and assessment practices, while interconnected challenges to funding, resources and subject expertise threaten ecological collapse in some sectors of arts education.
In the theoretical field, ecological thinking can open up the relations between art and education, schooling and the creative economy, or the dynamics that define art, craft, and design disciplines.
Exploration of the interplay between students’ lived experience, contemporary art practices, or the political intent of policymakers could help to define new, more inclusive models for artistic education.
Understanding of disciplinary conventions in drawing or the plastic arts, and their interaction with new posthuman technologies, may point to probable or preferable futures for art education.
Paradigmatically, as the fragile ecologies that govern our natural world are threatened by human activity, and post-truth diplomacy tests the social contract, what role does the art classroom play in climate justice, and civic equity?
‘Talbot explores our relationship with the natural and technological world, weaving together themes of rebirth, transformation, sustainability and human resilience amid systemic ecological collapse.’ – Arnolfini, Bristol’s International Centre for the Arts
Inspired by the concurrent exhibition of works by artist Emma Talbot at the in-person conference venue, Arnolfini, the conference call for papers invites submissions from colleagues in art and design pedagogy, gallery education, working in creative education at any level, formal or otherwise, students and researchers in the field, and those working in related disciplines to reflect on the ecologies of art and design education.
To submit a paper, register or find out more, please visit the NSEAD website.
Related links:
Conference webpage (NSEAD website)
Abstract submissions (Microsoft Forms)
Conference registration (Eventbrite)
