The making of Scottish visual arts television programmes from 1952 to 2018

McCluskey, Ann (2024) The making of Scottish visual arts television programmes from 1952 to 2018. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

Abstract

The thesis provides a history of Scottish visual arts television programming between 1952 and 2018. While the production of visual arts programmes has been given academic attention, Scottish visual arts productions have been entirely neglected. Given that Glasgow became the key site outside of London for BBC arts programming production in the decade following 2010, this oversight demanded empirical investigation and historical contextualisation.

Broadcasting sits within politically charged territory in the UK, and where national identity and constitutional politics meet has been a particularly volatile radio and televisual environment in Scotland. The introduction of marketising principles following the 1990 Broadcasting Act transformed television arts programming in the UK, while the 1979 Home Rule referendum and 1997 vote for devolution in Scotland have impacted on policy and cultures of production at the BBC and also at STV.

This research project tracks these shifting dynamics through a case study method and examines the impact on presenter-led productions focused on Scottish visual arts. The thesis identifies four distinct culture of production periods aligned with broadcasting policy between television’s arrival in Scotland in 1952 and the launch of the BBC Scotland channel in 2019. The production studies approach investigates commissioning rationales and the impact of marketising discourse on broadcasting formats and presenting personae in visual arts programming. In the first two decades of the twenty-first century, Pacific Quay in Glasgow was a UK production hub for arts programming of prestige, notwithstanding that the arts as a genre was ‘in jeopardy’ as a mainstay of public service broadcasting. The thesis identifies that devolution served the forms of marketisation unleashed at the BBC, while the latter was adopted by programme makers to produce new formats of programming innovative in the UK arts firmament. The confluence of these factors witnessed a period of innovations in visual arts documentaries formats and flourishing arts production within Scotland.

• Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
• Qualification Level: Doctoral
• Subjects: P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN1990 Broadcasting
• Colleges/Schools: College of Arts & Humanities > School of Culture and Creative Arts
• Supervisor's Name: Schlesinger, Professor Philip and Boyle, Professor Raymond
• Date of Award: 2024
• Depositing User: Theses Team
• Unique ID: glathesis:2024-84400
• Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
• Date Deposited: 25 Jun 2024 10:54
• Last Modified: 25 Jun 2024 11:01
• Thesis DOI: 10.5525/gla.thesis.84400
• URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/84400