Talk:Courtauld Institute of Art

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University ratings[edit]

(I'm posting this to all articles on UK universities as so far discussion hasn't really taken off on Wikipedia:WikiProject Universities.)

There needs to be a broader convention about which university rankings to include in articles. Currently it seems most pages are listing primarily those that show the institution at its best (or worst in a few cases). See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Universities#University ratings. Timrollpickering 00:15, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Date format[edit]

Is there any particular reason for this UK-oriented article to use the YYYY-MM-DD date format? It is atypical of UK usage and style recommendations (see e.g., the MHRA Style Guide, p. 52) and is directly at variance with the sources quoted – the Guardian RAE 2008 page, for example, is time-stamped "Thursday 18 December 2008 00.07 GMT". It's my personal opinion (only!) that this date format is more of an obstacle than an aid to comprehension. If no-one objects, I propose changing to ordinary DMY format; my own preference is also to omit the day from website access dates, as they add no useful information. Thus 2012-03-09 would become March 2012. I find that more straightforward. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 18:51, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'll give this a day or two more for possible objections to surface, given that the article is an important one. I'd also like to improve the references, convert bare links to full citations and so on. Would anyone object if I changed the referencing system to list-defined at the same time? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:52, 14 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

List of faculty members etc.[edit]

I'm wondering whether having a list of faculty members in this article is really necessary, or indeed in keeping with Wikipedia practice. I had a quick look at at the articles on a few other academic institutions, and it seems to me that in general they list notable faculty members, past and present, rather than all current staff. Would that be more appropriate to this article also? The list of current staff is readily available on the Courtauld website, and could also be spun off into a separate List of faculty members of the Courtauld Institute if that seems desirable.

I've also wondered more than once whether the Courtauld Gallery and collection do not merit an independent article of their own. That would make this one much shorter, of course, but might also allow it to be more detailed. I note that the Courtauld website separates the two. Thoughts?

I keep asking myself why the list of notable painters represented in the gallery uses the "Monet, Claude" format for their names. We don't usually use that format when talking of artists; it'd be more normal to say "Monet" or "Claude Monet". The rendering of Van Gogh and van Dyck in this way is questionable, and that of Fra' Angelico frankly laughable (Fra' is short for frate, "brother"). Any objection to rendering these names as [first name(s)] [last name]?

Just a minor formatting detail: I'd suggest removing the two-column layout recently introduced for references – that works well on large screens, but on small ones it just makes everything that much harder to read. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 18:12, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I just reduced my screen down to a very small size and it still worked well. Not sure why it doesn't work for you? Philafrenzy (talk) 18:22, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's not a big deal; it just makes long references appear as kind of paragraphs, instead of a single line extending across the page, and thus that much less easy to read. Is it important to you? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 20:16, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No, not important but I think it is supposed to prevent them being strung out across the screen as on widescreens it leaves a large white space on the right. It might look OK to you if your screen is not so wide. By all means change it back if it makes it more usable for you. I don't know if there is a policy on it. I am working on filling out the staff bios only at the moment. Philafrenzy (talk) 21:17, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Have you seen the guidelines for university articles: WP:UNIGUIDE? I know that the Courtauld is far from being the typical university, but if that structure is applied, we should only mention those staff members that are notable, have their own Wikipedia articles or should have articles created. Itsmejudith (talk) 21:25, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, there is no point mentioning every academic for the sake of it. Of course the difficulty is knowing which ones are notable without doing enough to write the article anyway. I have stuck to the Professors as that status at the Courtauld is probably inherently notable. Reluctant to delete the others at this stage before further research. Not sure about a spin-off list. Would it be list of everyone or just those not important enough to have their own articles? Philafrenzy (talk) 22:02, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not a fan of the current format for lists of notable artists, which is also used at Collection of the National Gallery, London, Royal Collection and Wallace Collection. Aside from the odd format of the names the categorization by national school is something art history moved away from some time ago. And rather than just tallying up the number of works by each artist it would be much better to name those works. So I would prefer a list of the kind used at National Gallery or Uffizi, arranged chronologically by artists' birth dates.
As regards a separate article for the Courtauld Gallery (the link is currently a redirect), I'd be all up for it. Ham 05:19, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
A separate article for the gallery would be a great help to this article from the point of view of its quality as a university article. On the list of faculty, it shouldbe reduced to those who currently have a Wikipedia article. If someone is sure that another member of staff is also notable, then an article should be created for him or her. Itsmejudith (talk) 05:44, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well, for better or for worse, I have taken that as a consensus and gone ahead and made a new article for the Courtauld Gallery. I hope that is OK. If so, I'd be grateful if others would take a look and perhaps correct some of the more obvious errors that I will inevitably have made. I also split the faculty list out from here, though I remain unconvinced that it needs to be in this wiki at all. On notability of the staff, I personally don't know what to think. The ones I've looked at all have an impressive list of published articles, so to my mind are completely notable for that reason alone; but I wonder if it might be best to consider creating articles only for those who have been mentioned in other, perhaps more "mainstream", sources? I'm with Ham on the format for notable artists/works in a collection; but since the split, this is no longer the place to talk about that... Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:06, 27 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Split is very helpful, thanks. Re notability of faculty members, we need to be guided be WP:PROF. Published papers aren't enough to make an academic notable in WP terms. Itsmejudith (talk) 22:19, 27 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for producing the chapter and verse for what was merely a vague hunch on my part. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 20:32, 28 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As a belated comment on this, no, I don't think we should keep a catalog of faculty members. Just look at how the page was created in 2013 and then never meaningfully updated in seven years. CapnZapp (talk) 10:11, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

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Courtauld Institute of Art Student's Union listed at Redirects for discussion[edit]

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Courtauld Institute of Art Student's Union. Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. signed, Rosguill talk 20:23, 7 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

List of... naming consistency[edit]

The two spun-off articles are currently named

I am sure you see the inconsistent naming. CapnZapp (talk) 10:09, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Now that the second list has been nixed, this issue is satisfactorily resolved as far as I'm concerned. Cheers CapnZapp (talk) 08:48, 27 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor[edit]

I thought it would be trivial to confirm the current claims, that The Princess Royal is Chancellor and that Deborah Swallow is Vice.

But as it turns out, Professor Swallow is Director (specifically "Märit Rausing Director") and her Dean and Deputy Director is Alice Bovey. I cannot find a single mention of any "Chancellor" on its web site at all. There is a Governing Board, but it is chaired by "The Lord Browne of Madingley". Since I'm sure the previous claims weren't added in bad faith, maybe it's as simple as a new organization?

Not an expert on this, CapnZapp (talk) 10:20, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 7 April 2024[edit]

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Lightoil (talk) 17:17, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]


The Courtauld Institute of ArtCourtauld Institute of Art – Make shorter (WP:CONCISE, WP:PRECISE). It is also the case for worldwide higher education institutions' Wikipedia entry titles. For example, when "The" is part of the official institutional names of "The University of Chicago", "The Ohio State University", and "The University of Hong Kong" (may refer to their registered logos and institutional documents), we omit the "The" as prefix for their Wikipedia entry titles. With WP:TITLECON, I propose this move. Cfls (talk) 13:03, 7 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.