The Advanced Certificate in Visual Theory and Practice (VTP AC) offers MA and PhD students the core knowledge and the skills to pursue visual research related to their own fields of study. Developed and coordinated by the VTP executive committee, VTP AC offers MA and PhD students across CEU the opportunity to engage with visuality and visual methodologies during their studies. This includes courses on the theory and practice of working with visual imagery as well as one-on-one supervision on a thesis that centers on the analysis of visual material or the production of a visual project. Additional activities include public lectures, screenings, workshops, exhibitions, and other public programs. Through such activities, students will become familiar with, and engage in, interdisciplinary dialogues on visual imagery across humanities and social sciences.
The core of the VTP AC curriculum includes courses that survey theoretical approaches and conceptual analytical vocabulary in critical visual studies, offer a history of visual media, and introduce students to research methodologies and foundational production skills. The mandatory courses aim to provide all the VTP students with a common grounding, including the interdisciplinary skills to critically investigate visual imagery and acquire basics of visual and audio production. Along with taking the core courses, VTP students will be able to extend their knowledge by choosing elective courses combining Visual Theory and the production of moving images in the Visual Practice.
Visual Theory elective courses prepare students to forge innovative connections across disciplines dedicated to the study of production, circulation, and critical reception of visual imagery in historical and contemporary perspectives. Visual Practice electives provide focused training in the creation of still and moving images and equip interested students with valuable skills in their field of study and research. The students can combine theory and practice courses for their VTP AC. The range of issues covered by the courses includes documentary filmmaking, photography, exhibition and curatorship, film and media history and theory, digital culture, data visualization, and more. The range of electives is continuously expanding with the new courses authored by the CEU faculty. VTP AC allows students to design course combinations along each track aimed to enhance their independent research, and analytical and practical skills in an environment of intellectual and creative openness.
Please indicate your interest in pursuing the VTP advanced certificate in our annual registration form available under the VTP requirements.
Oksana Sarkisova, Blinken Open Society Archives, Department of History
Jeremy Braverman, CEU Library’s Media Hub
Vlad Naumescu, Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology