Artistic Research at KMD
As part of developing a new continuing education programme (EVU) in Artistic Research, the Grieg Academy, and the Art Academy at KMD invited all MA students to a joint day dedicated to the topic. The aim was to explore how Artistic Research is understood and practiced across departments, and to investigate the students’ current interests and needs.
Artistic Research is a form of inquiry in which creative and performative practice is central, accompanied by reflection that is shared with the wider field. The forthcoming EVU programme is aimed at artists with MA-level competence who wish to deepen their engagement with this method—whether to strengthen their own practice, to develop teaching, or to prepare for doctoral research and academic positions.
The programme will also be relevant for cultural workers in the public sector seeking to understand Artistic Research, for artists seeking to enrich the reflective dimension of their work, and for employees within research councils and the university sector interested in its approaches and applications.
Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design (KMD), University of Bergen
Art Academy / Grieg Academy / Department of Design
Reflection and Method
This MA seminar investigates the interplay between reflection and method in artistic research. Through a series of presentations and discussions, it explores how artistic processes generate knowledge, and how such knowledge can be articulated and shared.
Invited speakers — Marsha Bradfield (Central Saint Martins, London), Sergej Tchirkov (University of Bergen), and Jostein Gundersen (University of Bergen) — present distinct approaches to artistic research across visual art, music, and interdisciplinary practice. Their contributions illuminate the diversity of methods and emphasize the critical role of situated reflection within creative practice.
The seminar concludes with a collective panel conversation addressing how artistic research might balance openness and rigour, intuition and analysis, collaboration and individual voice.
EVU Group
(Erik Halvorsen, Geir Harald Samuelsen, Thomas Tellevik-Dahl)
This session explored different ways to support and resource creative practice—both the processes involved and the outcomes produced—in order to show the value of art research. A central example was Utterance and Authorship in Dialogic Art: Or an Account of a Barcamp in Response to the Question, What Is Dialogic Art? This PhD thesis demonstrates methods, including the use of fiction and collaboration, for developing outputs that serve as critically reflective accounts, helping to contextualise the practice and highlight its significance. The session also explored how artists can engage with, communicate, and share their research, in their communities and beyond, demonstrating the relevance of their work.
BIO:
Marsha Bradfield is an archivist-artist-curator-educator-researcher-writer whose collaborative practice explores interdependence across art, education, and cultural production. Her recent projects engage with authorship, value systems, organisational structures, experiential learning, and the economies and ecologies of collaboration. Working internationally, her projects have been presented at Tate Modern, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Berlin Biennial, Serpentine, ICA, India Art Fair, and other venues. She is Course Leader of the MA Intercultural Practices at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London.
I will talk about my PhD project Co-Creating Virtuosity, which challenges traditional notions of virtuosity and develops a co-creative approach to musical practice. I will share how my artistic practice has been a driving force behind the research and how it inspired me to formulate the application. The project has evolved over time, and I have found that uncertainty and risk are not only natural but also valuable in artistic development work. This is a field still in development, and we as artistic researchers help shape it through our projects and experiences. Finally, I will say a bit about what motivated me to apply and share some experiences from the process.
BIO:
Sergej Tchirkov (1980, St. Petersburg) is an accordionist, curator, and researcher based in Bergen. He has premiered around 350 works and collaborated widely within contemporary music. As a guest musician, he has performed with various ensembles and orchestras across Europe and has been a guest lecturer at music institutions in both Europe and Asia. Previously, he was Associate Artistic Director of the Studio for New Music and a university lecturer in contemporary music at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow. Since 2021, he has been a research fellow in artistic development work at the University of Bergen, KMD, Grieg Academy, and serves on the boards of nyMusikk Bergen, Avgarde, and Borealis – Festival for Experimental Music.
Jostein will provide an introduction to how PhD programmes in artistic research in Norway are structured, what they include, and the requirements for a PhD submission in artistic research. He will also highlight what distinguishes a PhD project from a working grant or other large-scale projects within the arts and cultural sector.
BIO:
Jostein Gundersen is Associate Professor in Music Performance (recorder) and Vice Dean of Research at the Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design, University of Bergen. After studying in Norway and Germany, he became the Grieg Academy’s first research fellow in the former National Fellowship Programme for Artistic Research in 2005. Since then, he has been deeply involved in PhD programmes in artistic research in Norway – as seminar leader, moderator, coordinator, and now Chair of the National Research School. He has also served as supervisor, member of assessment committees, external member of the Norwegian Academy of Music’s PhD committee, head of external programme evaluation at NTNU, and, since 2021, head of KMD’s PhD programme.
