Dr Adam Walker
Lecturer
Fine Art
Adam Walker is a writer, artist and academic. Their practice is research-led, critically and reflexively considering structures of inequality, not least their own complicit position amid these. Text lies at the centre of their practice, including its extensions into digital terrains as code and data. Interruption and impropriety are sought: subtexts and counter-texts that interrupt dominant textual flows. The works are sometimes written; other times they spill into performance, moving-image and digital forms, and have been exhibited, performed, published, and commissioned by institutions including the Serpentine, ICA, Tate, and Tyneside Cinema.
Their latest book 'Textual Actants (Infrastructure)' was published in 2026 by Ma Bibliothèque. Their previous book 'Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care' was published in 2023 by Routledge.
They are an Editorial Board member of the Sternberg Press / Manchester School of Art 'Tomorrow's Art School' series, and are an Associate Editor of 'JAWS: Journal of Art and Writing'.
Their current research projects include: coediting a volume on art writing alongside Professor Susannah Thompson (MMU) and Dr Laura Haynes (Glasgow School of Art) to be published as part of the Sternberg Press / Manchester School of Art 'Tomorrow's Art School' series; and writing a new monograph on art writing practices as modes of potential structural disruption.
Adam holds a PhD from the Royal College of Art following previous study at the University of the Arts London and University of Cambridge. Previous academic appointments include The Royal College of Art, Glasgow School of Art, and King's College London.
PhD supervision enquiries welcome, particularly for research relating to:
- Art writing and text
- Care
- Labour
- Infrastructures
Current PhD students:
- Fiona Stirling: 'A practice-based research Inquiry investigating the implications of time and space on paintings made by mid-life contemporary women painters'.
Research
Exhibitions
Walker, A., 2022. Un/building, King's College London, 30/5/2022 - 30/5/2022.
Walker, A., 2021. Void Screams, Tulsa, Oklahoma, 8/2/2021.
Performances
Walker, A., 2024. 'Textual Actants: Infrastructures of Contemporary Art Practice. Part 1 - The Things in Play', rtm.fm, 31/7/2024.
Walker, A., 2024. 'Textual Actants: Infrastructures of Contemporary Art Practice. Part 2 - A Tour of the Monuments of Charleroi, Belgium', RTM.FM, 5/9/2024.
Books
Walker, A., 2026. 'Textual Actants (Infrastructure)', Ma Bibliothèque.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care', Routledge, New York.
Walker, A., McGarry, E., 2019. 'Rights to...', Serpentine Gallery.
Book Chapters
Walker, A., 2026. 'Technospheric Speculations: Materiality, Textuality and Impropriety'. In Danielle, C. (eds.) Art and Capitalism A Contemporary Perspective, Routledge.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Ana-Conclusion'. In Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care, pp. 133-142, Routledge.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Being'. In Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care, pp. 73-85, Routledge.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Bodies'. In Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care, pp. 45-72, Routledge.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Care'. In Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care, pp. 114-132, Routledge, New York.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Introduction'. In Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care, pp. 1-18, Routledge.
Walker, A., McGarry, E., 2023. 'Rights to...'. In Egan, J., Gatens, L., Graham, E., Khalaf, A., Thorp, A. (eds.) How We Hold: Rehearsals for Art and Social Change, Serpentine Galleries.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Text'. In Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care, pp. 89-113, Routledge.
Walker, A., 2023. 'Work'. In Art, Labour, Text and Radical Care, pp. 21-44, Routledge.
Walker, A., Sagar, I., 2022. 'Foreword'. In Blackshaw, G., Baluch, S., Fraser, M., Heidorn, N., Hermon, R. (eds.) I care by..., pp. 9-8, Royal College of Art, London.
Walker, A., 2021. 'Caring, Carelessly'. In Blackshaw, G., Kivland, S. (eds.) CARE(LESS). A SUPPLEMENT TO ON CARE, Ma Bibliothéque.
Media
Walker, A., 2021. 'Workers Leaving the Factory'.
Journal Articles
Walker, A., 2026. 'Copyediting: A Play', JAWS: Journal of Art & Writing, 11 (2).
Non-Peer Reviewed Articles
Walker, A., 2023. 'A Rolling Series of Encounters', Soanyway Magazine, 2 (14).
Walker, A., 2023. 'Life, art and (child)care', textur, 5, pp. 37-45.
Walker, A., Hartshorn, J., 2023. 'Tissue', The Posthumanist, 2, pp. 40-41.
Walker, A., 2021. 'Acting Beyond the Present: Thinking Care as Radical Reflexivity', Autonomy.
Conference Papers
Walker, A., 2026. 'Textual Actants (Infrastructure): Archival Writing-Navigating', Between Then and Now: Performing Archives, Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, UK, 23/6/2026 - 24/6/2026.
Walker, A., 2025. 'Boundaries, Frontiers, Thresholds and Influencers: Magic Mirrors of Freedom', Historical Materialism Conference 2025, SOAS, University of London, 9/11/2025.
Walker, A., 2023. '6 Weeks in Kyiv: Holding Scores Fluid', Performing Scores/Scoring Performance, HOME, Manchester, 12/7/2023.
Walker, A., 2021. 'Practicing, Theorising, Being', My PhD has No Words, University of Reading, 19/7/2021 - 19/7/2021.
Presentations
Walker, A., 2025. 'At the Conjuncture: Art and the Imagination', California Institute of the Arts (CalArts).
Other Outputs
Walker, A., Sagar, I., McGarry, E., Hartshorn, J., 2023. 'Care writing collection'.