Research interests
Aesthetics and philosophical issues in the creative and performing arts
Non-linguistic communication
Interdisciplinary research
Overview
Prof Michael Biggs MA PhD FRSA FHEA is Emeritus Professor of Aesthetics at the University of Hertfordshire, UK, and Member of the Board of the National Research School in Architecture, Sweden. He has been Chair of the Interdisciplinary Panels at the Belgian Research Council (FWO), Visiting Research Professor at the Federal University São Paulo (USP), Presbyterian University Mackenzie São Paulo (PUM), and the University of Lund, Sweden; and Adjunct Professor at the University of Canberra. Following his doctorate at University of Reading, UK (1994) he was postdoctoral Research Fellow in Philosophy at the University of Bergen. He has degrees in both Fine Art and Philosophy. He was elected as Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (1989), Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (2007), and member of the Honorary Committee of the British Wittgenstein Society (2008). His research has been funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council 
, The British Council , the University of Bergen 
, the Swedish Research Council 
, Riksbanken Jubileumsfond , Australian Research Council 
. and the European Union 
.
In philosophy, his interdisciplinary research focuses on the boundary of images and text, and how iconicity, notational conventions and grapholinguistics influence our recognition and interpretation of graphic signs. This inquiry sits within the frame of the philosophy of language and epistemology, and how new knowledge is both facilitated and constrained by what we can say and how we can write it down. Understanding how these benefits and hinderances impact knowledge production has applications in research methodology, hermeneutics, and business. The outcomes initially had application in the pre-interpretational representation and analysis of Wittgenstein's manuscripts, but have since been broadened into to knowledge representation, and how our notational systems can be mobilised for knowledge creation. He is the graphical advisor to the Bergen Electronic Edition of Wittgenstein's manuscripts [Nachlass] for Oxford University Press and the open source Nachlass project at wittgensteinsource.org which has been inscribed in the UNESCO Memory of the World programme, and revised Wittgenstein's published works for Blackwell, Routledge (1998) and Intelex.
In the arts, he has been involved in the development of doctoral programmes in Art and Design in the UK and has contributed to national and international conferences on the subject. He was the principal organiser of the international biennial Research into Practice conference and founder of the Professional Doctorates in Design and in Fine Art at the University of Hertfordshire. He has international experience as a supervisor and examiner of traditional and practice-based PhDs, and of PhD by published works. He is a former member of the Visual Arts advisory panel for the Arts and Humanities Data Service [AHDS] and former member of the College of Peers of the AHRC. He is a reviewer for MIT Press, Blackwell Publishing, and other international presses.