As part of this year’s programme of events under the theme ‘Gendering Technology’, my students on the MA in Global Media Management took a study visit to London’s Victoria & Albert museum. In the morning we visited the special exhibition ‘Videogames: Design/Play/Disrupt’, which was prefaced by an introduction from exhibition curator Marie Foulston. In the afternoon we were introduced to the V&A’s brand new Photography Centre by Dr Mihaela Brebenel.
The ‘Videogames’ exhibition investigated the work of groundbreaking designers, creative player communities and the critical conversations that define the medium today. In addition to exploring other themes in games design, students were able to observe how gendered influences representation, production, and reception in the process of making video games. Students were also asked to consider how digital culture and its artefacts are presented in an institutional space like a museum, within a temporary exhibition (Videogames) and as part of the permanent collection (the Photography Centre). Following the transfer of the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) Collection, which has enabled a dramatic reimagining of the way photography is presented at the V&A, the new Photography Centre opened on 12th October 2018. The V&A’s photography collection comprises over 300,000 images dating from 1839 to the present, and the first phase of the centre will more than double the space dedicated to photography at the Museum.
You can find a selection of images from the study visit below.
