My name is John Byrne and I am currently a Reader in ‘The Uses of Art’ at Liverpool John Moores University’s School of Art and Design. I am also Director of ‘The Uses of Art Lab’ at Liverpool School of Art and Design and Coordinator/Manager of the ‘Constituencies’ Research Strand of the L’Internationale/EU Funded project ‘The Uses of Art: The Legacies of 1848 and 1989’. I am also a member of ‘The Autonomy Project’ Editorial Board.

This site and blog is initially a response to students and colleagues who have asked for more information on the projects that I am (and have been) involved with. It also offers me an opportunity to bring some of that information together in one place, to identify points of overlap between the projects (past and present), and to develop an on-going blog which signposts and updates my current work/research.

Over the last decade or so my work and research has been defined by an interest in the relationship of art to use, use value and the kind of job or labour that the work of art has now become. This, in turn, has led me to become interested in the kinds of challenges that use and use value present to the production, distribution and reception of art that would resist,  engage with, or offer alternatives to the current conditions of global neo-liberalism.