MA Applied Imagination in the Creative Industries

Course summary:

Apply your imagination by framing an original and personal research project and question existing assumptions and boundaries in one or more of the creative disciplines. Investigate your ideas through a series of real-world interventions and obtain feedback from end-users and key practitioners.

This course is part of the Culture and Enterprise Programme.

Great reasons to apply:

• You'll embark on a learning journey that concludes with a very personal research project that has the potential to change your life
• You'll develop your teamwork through the interdisciplinary and cultural cross-fertilization that our programme provides, working in groups to respond to projects that are deliberately created to get your adrenalin pumping
• You'll be challenged by short and demanding projects that deliberately ask questions that defy predictable answers such as, 'Can you design and test a fully operational time machine?'
• If you are already working, you'll have the option to study the course part time and test your ideas within your own professional practice as well as with other students
• You'll participate in a Festival of Applied Imagination at the end of your MA journey, presenting your project outcomes to your peers, to professionals, and to the public.

Anyone Interested.

Course details:

MA Applied Imagination in the Creative Industries is a one-year full-time or two-year part-time multidisciplinary masters course. The course invites its students to apply their creative ideas to the real world. It encourages its students to become problem-finders and change-makers, who are able to function in a wide variety of professional and entrepreneurial situations. The course attracts students from a wide variety of educational and professional backgrounds. MA Applied Imagination in the Creative Industries is a January start/December finish course. This arrangement allows us to fit eleven months of intensive study and research into a twelve-month period. The summer period is used primarily for independent study, although there are tutorial touch points during this time.

MA Applied Imagination in the Creative Industries students learn to use a full range of research processes. These include primary and secondary research, and also intensive practice in action research and in the related skills of reflection, analysis, and project iteration. Students learn to plan interventions, and to record and reflect on new evidence that they have thereby obtained. At the core of what we expect from our students is a process of engagement and testing with external partners and stakeholders. We are a multi-disciplinary course, so the subject matter of the major project is left to the student & what the course team look for is rigour and commitment in the research process.

Fees & Funding:

Home/EU fee Full time tuition fees -

University of the Arts London (UAL) is Europe’s largest specialist art and design university. Its unique creative community is made up of six renowned Colleges, each with its own world-class reputation: Camberwell College of Arts, Central Saint Martins, Chelsea College of Arts, London College of Communication, London College of Fashion and Wimbledon College of Arts.

UAL is the world’s sixth best University for Art and Design in the QS World University Rankings 2018. Offering an extensive range of courses in art, design, fashion, communication and performing arts, UAL is the main talent pipeline to the UK’s creative industries.

Home to a diverse community of over 18,000 students from 129 countries, UAL has a track record for launching and furthering careers. Our graduates can be found in every part and at every level of the creative and cultural sectors, from heads of global business to self-employed practitioners, and on shortlists for awards ranging from the Turner Prize to the Oscars.

Building on UAL’s association with some of the most original thinkers in the arts, students and staff are inspired to challenge convention, generate new ideas and nurture talent. Home to award-winning staff and students for more than a century, UAL’s Colleges are at the forefront of learning, creativity and practice in their specialist subjects. This close-knit College structure offers opportunities for learning and enquiry for people at all stages of their creative development.