ABSTRACT
This introduction outlines the central concerns of this book: the formation of research collaboration and ecosystems in a regional context in the UK; the higher education institution (HEI) impact agenda and its effect on power relations within cross-sector research partnerships; current contexts shaping the work of regional public art collections in the UK; and resultant changes in understandings of British post-war art histories. The book offers a pioneering evaluation of the mechanisms and motivations that underpin collaborations between HEIs and regional publicly-funded museums, concentrating on partnerships that conduct art-historical research into post-war collections. It argues that making histories of public collections a focus of collaborative research enables us to interrogate the relationship between art collections, place-based art histories, and regional cultural economies. Through original case studies, it demonstrates how regionally-rooted, collaborative research can help us to rethink the geographies of British art practice and history after 1945, and to understand the complex relationships that form between regional collections, cultural histories, regional identities and present-day cultural ecosystems.
