That was basically my understanding of where the costs will come from. Her PhD is basically going to involve comparing three or four artists from different parts of the UK so that will involve a fair bit of travel. Also the thing about the thesis is very true and i'm worried it will cost more than she expects.

From the sound of her research it is basically academic so this does look quite promising. I think i've been a bit of a pessimistic grump basically because I'm from a science background where everything costs a fortune; sounds like it isnt really like that in the arts. I'll get her to look into whether her department has a pool of money for PhD students.

Cheers

Hey all,

My girlfriend is tempted to do a PhD in Art History self funded and i'm a little concerned how difficult its actually going to be. For science PhDs i understand that the research costs can be pretty crazy, around 10 - 20 thousand a year on reagents and other lab equipment but obviously this doesn't apply for the arts.

However I'm guessing its still going to cost quite a lot. The tuition fees and the maintenance aren't an issue but what I'm wondering is, how much per year are the "research costs" in an art based PhD? Significantly less than science degrees or around the same?

Cheers