Research by Artists: Critically Integrating Ethical Frameworks

Abstract

The ethical framing of research by artists is an urgent area of concern for artists, research participants, and institutional ethics committees. Three themes emerging from key policy documents and rebuttals from Canada reveal a troubled integration of institutional ethical frameworks into sites of research by artists. First, research ethics review processes uncover unique challenges in situating artists’ research in academic worlds. Second, often overlooked within academia, non-institutional practice standards present relevant ethical framing for artist-researchers and reviewers. Third, the perception of institutional “ethics creep” as manifest in censorship lingers as a specter over the integration of research ethics structures in sites of research by artists. Finding parallels with community-based participatory research, a relational framework is proposed for critically integrating ethical frameworks into art research.