ART AND HUMANITIES (AH) is an international, interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed academic journal dedicated to publishing high-quality original research covering all fields of the arts and their intersections with the broader humanities. The journal adopts a flexible publication policy that takes Open Access as the default model while allowing Non-Open Access publication under special circumstances, balancing the global free dissemination of scholarship with the specific needs of particular research contexts.

The core conviction of AH is “Let art and thought meet in the open.” We believe that scholarly research on art and the humanities—whether a deep analysis of a painting, a theoretical interpretation of a literary work, a historical study of music, or a critical examination of contemporary visual culture—deserves to be read, discussed, and cited in the widest possible range. Open Access is our primary means of realising this conviction. At the same time, we recognise that in certain cases—such as those involving culturally sensitive heritage materials, specific funder requirements, or authors’ particular publication needs—Non-Open Access may be the more prudent choice. The journal has therefore designed a flexible dual-track publishing mechanism that honours the spirit of openness while respecting the plurality of contexts in scholarly publishing.

AH operates a Hybrid Open Access Model, with the following specific policies:

Default Model: Full Open Access

In the vast majority of cases, AH operates as a Diamond Open Access journal:

  • Free for all readers: All articles published under the Open Access model are immediately, permanently, and unconditionally available to readers worldwide. No subscription, no registration, no paywalls.

  • Zero or minimal cost for authors: AH completely waives Article Processing Charges for papers recognised through peer review as being of exceptional scholarly quality. For other Open Access papers, the journal charges only a minimal fee far below industry standards, solely to sustain basic operations. Authors from under-resourced regions and the Global South may apply for full or partial fee waivers.

  • Open licensing: All Open Access articles are published under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0). Authors retain copyright of their work and grant anyone the right to share, adapt, and reuse the material, provided appropriate credit is given.

Special Cases: Non-Open Access

In the following special circumstances, upon author request and with the approval of the editorial team, articles may be published under a Non-Open Access model:

  • Funder mandates: Certain research funders or collaborative projects impose specific copyright or access restrictions that conflict with the CC BY licence of full Open Access.

  • Cultural heritage and intellectual property sensitivity: Content involving culturally sensitive materials, materials still under intellectual property protection, or materials closely tied to community interests—such as visual materials, oral histories, and image-based works—may raise ethical or legal concerns if made fully open.

  • Authors’ specific publication needs: Authors may request Non-Open Access publication based on reasonable grounds such as career development, institutional evaluation requirements, or future publication plans.

  • Legal and compliance requirements: Laws and regulations in certain countries or regions impose specific restrictions on the dissemination of certain content (e.g., materials involving state secrets, personal privacy, or cultural property protection).

Under the Non-Open Access model: articles will be published under traditional subscription or paid-access arrangements; copyright arrangements and licensing conditions will be negotiated separately with authors; the journal will clearly mark the access status in the article’s metadata to ensure full transparency. The proportion of Non-Open Access articles will be strictly controlled to ensure that the journal’s overall Open Access character is not diluted. The editorial team retains final decision-making authority over the approval of Non-Open Access publication, and this decision will not affect the academic standards of peer review.

Aims, Scope, and Core Areas

AH is rooted in the rich scholarly traditions of the arts and humanities while actively responding to new trends in contemporary artistic practice and humanistic inquiry. The journal’s fundamental position is that research on the arts should not be confined within the narrow frameworks of single disciplines, but should unfold at the intersections of art history, aesthetics, cultural studies, philosophy, literary studies, musicology, theatre and performance studies, film and media studies, design studies, and related fields. We welcome research that offers deep analyses of artworks, artistic phenomena, and art institutions, as well as boundary-crossing scholarship that establishes creative dialogues between the arts and other areas of the humanities.

The journal covers all fields of the arts and especially welcomes high-quality submissions in the following areas:

Art History and Visual Culture

  • Art historical studies across all periods and civilisational regions

  • Contemporary reconsiderations of iconography, stylistic analysis, and formalist methods

  • Theorising visual culture: from ways of seeing to scopic regimes

  • Studies of museums, galleries, and the history of exhibitions

  • Curatorial studies, institutional critique, and alternative art spaces

  • The art market, the history of collecting, and art patronage

  • Material culture studies and the biographies of objects

  • History and theory of photography

  • Architectural history and spatial studies

Aesthetics and Philosophy of Art

  • The conceptual history of beauty and the contemporary transformation of aesthetics

  • The definition of art, the ontology of artworks, and aesthetic experience

  • Analytic aesthetics, phenomenological aesthetics, and pragmatist aesthetics

  • Contemporary interpretations of East Asian aesthetic traditions

  • Aesthetic judgement, taste, and the philosophical foundations of art criticism

  • The sublime, tragedy, and comedy in their aesthetic dimensions

  • Art and ethics: the relationship between the beautiful and the good

  • Digital aesthetics, algorithmic aesthetics, and posthuman aesthetics

Fine Arts and Painting Studies

  • Studies of painting techniques, materials, and studio practice

  • Drawing, printmaking, and sculpture studies

  • Chinese painting, calligraphy, and East Asian art traditions

  • Comparative studies of oil painting, watercolour, and Western painting traditions

  • Formal experimentation and the conceptual turn in contemporary painting

  • Public art, installation art, and site-specific art practice

  • The materiality of art and technical reproducibility

Music and Sound Studies

  • Music history, music theory, and musical analysis

  • Ethnomusicology and world music studies

  • Sound studies, acoustic ecology, and auditory culture

  • Popular music, jazz, and contemporary music cultures

  • Music and social movements, music and politics

  • Music education, music psychology, and music therapy

  • Digital music, electronic music, and sound art

  • Opera, musical theatre, and intermedial performance

Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies

  • Theatre history, performance theory, and performance analysis

  • Dance studies: the body, movement, and choreography

  • Performance art and social engagement

  • Intercultural theatre and performance in the age of globalisation

  • Theatre education and applied theatre

  • Happenings, body art, and performance art

  • Theatrical space, stage design, and technology

  • Contemporary reinterpretations of Shakespeare and the classical canon

Literature and Language Arts

  • Comparative literature and world literature

  • Critical studies of poetry, fiction, drama, and the essay

  • Literary theory and critical methods

  • Narratology, rhetoric, and stylistics

  • Translation studies: theory and practice of literary translation

  • Crossovers between literature and the visual arts

  • Digital literature, electronic literature, and new media narrative

  • The history of literary criticism and literary institutions

Film and Media Arts

  • Film history, film theory, and film criticism

  • Documentary, experimental film, and avant-garde cinema

  • Animation, games, and interactive narrative

  • Television studies, streaming, and platform culture

  • New media art, digital art, and internet art

  • Film and philosophy: image, time, and memory

  • Documentary ethics and the politics of representation

  • Transnational cinema and global media flows

Design and Applied Arts

  • Graphic design, industrial design, and product design studies

  • Fashion studies: clothing, the body, and identity

  • Craft traditions and contemporary design

  • Design history and design theory

  • Sustainable design and ecological aesthetics

  • User experience design, interaction design, and human–computer relations

  • Urban design and the art of public space

  • Critical thinking in design education

Cross-Cultural and Global Perspectives

  • Postcolonial art criticism and decolonial aesthetics

  • Theorising non-Western artistic traditions

  • Globalisation, locality, and artistic identity

  • Migration, diaspora, and transcultural artistic expression

  • Intersectional analyses of art, race, gender, and class

  • The Silk Road, maritime trade, and transregional artistic exchange

  • Outsider art, vernacular art, and the boundaries of the mainstream art world

Arts Management, Policy, and Education

  • Theory and practice of arts management

  • Cultural policy, art law, and the creative economy

  • Arts education: curriculum, pedagogy, and aesthetic education

  • Community art, socially engaged art, and public cultural services

  • Creative cities, cultural districts, and urban regeneration

  • Art and the Sustainable Development Goals

  • Art dissemination and the digitisation of cultural heritage in the digital age

Cross-Disciplinary Dialogues in Art and the Humanities

  • Art and science: the historical entanglement of science, technology, and art

  • Art and medicine: art therapy, health, and well-being

  • Art and religion: the sacred, ritual, and spirituality

  • Art and politics: resistance, witnessing, and the public sphere

  • Digital humanities: big data, visualisation, and the reshaping of the humanities

  • Environmental humanities and ecological art

Interdisciplinary Methods
AH consistently welcomes boundary-crossing scholarship from history, philosophy, literary studies, anthropology, sociology, cultural studies, media studies, archaeology, linguistics, psychology, psychoanalysis, digital humanities, and related fields, provided it carries a clear connection to research on the arts.

Why Choose AH?

  • Spanning all fields of the arts: From art history to digital art, from musicology to design studies, from literary studies to film and media research, AH provides a unified scholarly platform for every branch of the arts and humanities. Whatever your area of focus, you will find conversation partners here.

  • Open Access as the primary principle: As an OA-first journal, your research becomes immediately available to readers worldwide with no economic barriers upon publication. Scholarship in the arts and humanities can thereby reach beyond academic circles and be freely accessed and used by artists, curators, educators, and the public, maximising its social impact.

  • A flexible mechanism respecting special publication needs: We understand that art research sometimes involves complex emotional, cultural, and legal contexts. AH’s Non-Open Access option ensures that when necessary, your research can be published in a prudent manner without compromising scholarly quality.

  • Zero or minimal financial burden: Papers recognised through peer review as exceptional are entirely free of all charges. Other papers incur only minimal fees far below industry standards, and authors from under-resourced regions and the Global South may apply for waivers. We are committed to ensuring that economic conditions never become a barrier to scholarly publication.

  • Rigorous and efficient review: A mature double-anonymous review system with professional, constructive feedback helps strengthen your scholarly work. Our reviewers come from all fields of the arts and humanities worldwide and are well equipped to appreciate the distinctive value of different academic traditions and critical approaches.

  • Inclusive of multiple disciplines and diverse methods: AH welcomes historical research, philosophical inquiry, formal analysis, ethnographic studies, oral history, digital humanities methods, practice-based research, and many other paradigms, provided the work is rigorous and insightful.

  • Open copyright and reuse rights: Under the OA model, the CC BY 4.0 licence ensures that your research can be freely used in teaching, exhibition curation, art criticism, and public education, maximising the real-world social value of your academic work.

ART AND HUMANITIES warmly invites art historians, aestheticians, literary scholars, musicologists, theatre and performance researchers, film and media scholars, designers, curators, artists, and all thinkers and practitioners concerned with the future of the arts and humanities to join us in building an academic commons that takes openness as its primary spirit, respects the plurality of contexts, pursues depth, encourages dialogue, and keeps its borders open. Whether as author, reviewer, or reader, your participation is an essential part of this community.