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Victorian College of the Arts

 

40 Years of VCA

The Centre for Ideas marks a radical departure from the conventional teaching models in arts education. It embraces the whole Faculty providing a range of perspectives on contemporary culture.

The Faculty of VCA and MCM is unique in its assemblage of different schools and artistic practices. The opportunity for students to mix and learn together in a critical context provides a resource from which students will draw throughout their careers.
 The Centre for Ideas Common Curriculum is an interdisciplinary course in the Faculty. All undergraduate students in Theatre, Production, Dance, Art, and Film and Television take a series of subjects as part of their degree structure. Music students have an opportunity to take Poetics of the Body subjects at The Centre for Ideas. The Centre offers students an exciting opportunity to acquire the knowledge and skills crucial to artistic development in the 21st Century.


Philosophy and the Arts

In 1999, leading up to the philosopher Jacques Derrida's visit to the VCA, a series of interdisciplinary seminars and workshops were held on his work. The outcome was a student exhibition that included performance, sculpture, painting, film, video and installation. Jacques Derrida opened the exhibition and met with the students. The success of these events anticipated the role philosophy now plays in The Centre for Ideas where students explore interconnections between philosophy and the arts.

Professional philosophers working in the areas of ethics, aesthetics, feminism, psychoanalysis, politics and eco-philosophy are frequent visitors to the Centre. The range of lectures, seminars and other events ensures that students have the opportunity to engage with the thought and writings of major philosophers.

Philosophers who have presented seminar programs and lectures, or are involved in the co-supervision of PhD candidates at the Centre, include Alain Badiou, Genevieve Lloyd, Andrew Benjamin, Raimond Gaita, Kate Rigby, Simon Critchley, Claire Colebrook, Kevin Hart, Russell Grigg, Michel Onfray, Adrian Parr, Dimitris Vardoularkis, James Phillips, Louise Burchill, Ashley Woodward, John Armstrong, Justin Clemens, Holger Heine, Graham Priest, Agnes Heller and the Melbourne School of Continental Philosophy. Jean-Luc Nancy (Strasbourg), and Alexander Garcia Düttmann (London), are both Honorary Professorial Fellows at the Centre.