2014 2015 school brochure painting

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BA (Hons) Painting

The Painting course offers its students a challenging opportunity to study both the technical and contextual aspects of Drawing and Painting in a dedicated and spacious studio  environment.

Through a sequence of both objective and subjective projects, which explore the grammar and various forms of painting, the course offers an informed context that allows for the development of a personal visual language, as  well as a fuller and critical understanding of the subject.

Drawing is at the core of the Painting course and is embedded within the programme in a variety of ways.

Fig 48 Catherine Ross. BP Fine Art Award. 2014

Fig 49 Jack Dunnett. 2014/Year 1

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CCS Critical and Contextual Studies

Course Structure and Content

Year 1 will challenge students’ understanding of their skills; it will explore how and in which ways those skills can be applied.

Studio projects in Semester 1 focus on the core activities of research and idea development.

The curriculum seeks to expand the understanding of what research can be, and in what ways the thinking, inherent within idea development, can become visible. Semester 2 sees the students apply this learning within two studio projects that run over the course of the semester.

These projects act as an introduction to both the technical and conceptual aspects of the visual language of painting.

Year 2 will build on the foundation provided in Year 1. Students are allocated their own specific studio space and assigned an academic / personal tutor who will provide support and challenge on a ‘one to one’ basis throughout the session.

Over the course of the year students undertake a sequence of projects that act as an introduction to the visual language of Drawing and Painting. These equip students with a variety of methods and procedures essential to the study of Painting. There is a weekly drawing programme and a series of illustrated talks spaced throughout the session.

Year 3 of the Painting course demands a significantly different form of engagement than that of the previous two years; projects become more self-directed and engaged with external contexts. In Semester 1 students undertake intensive and wide-ranging research, which aims to extend knowledge and understanding of current practice in Painting and Drawing.

The development of conceptual thinking as an individual is an important aspect of this process.

Studio practice is underpinned at all stages by a contextual and critical studies programme.

This allows students to critically engage with history, theory and contemporary practice within each studio specialism. The CCS programme is delivered through blended learning, including lectures, seminars and group tutorials. Students engage with research, analytical critical thinking and are offered various models of communication for assessment, from essays to multimedia digital submissions. In Year 4 students propose their own topic that leads to the submission of a professionally presented body of research.

In Semester 2 students have the opportunity to develop and apply their research towards a resolved body of work in readiness for selfdirected study in Year 4.

Year 4 places the emphasis on self-directed learning. Students provide a proposal for study and a structure for a study programme.

This culminates in the submission and presentation of a body of work for the Degree Show assessment and exhibition.

There will be opportunities prior to the Degree Show to experience a professional approach to presenting and exhibiting work, most notably the annual pre-degree exhibition in Edinburgh.

Guests @ Gray’s In addition to our course lecture programme, we also have our Guests @ Gray’s lecture programme. Here, we invite national and international artists and designers to the School to speak about their work. We have had a phenomenal list of speakers that have visited the school in the last few years.

Why not visit our blogsite to review them. www. graysartschoolaberdeen.com/ category/guests-grays/ Fig 50 Painting studio space

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Fig 51 SPD Awards

Student Placements What our graduates External Engagement go on to do The Painting department actively engages with the thriving business community in Aberdeen and has collaborated with a number of companies on a variety of projects. In the past, these have included commissions, exhibitions and support for placements and scholarships.

The last few years has also seen Painting graduates from Gray’s enjoy outstanding success in national competitions including the John Kinross Florence Scholarship and the RSA New Contemporaries Exhibition.

Among several prizes presented to Gray’s Painters at the 2013 Exhibition was the premier Painting prize awarded by the Academy, the prestigious Stevenston Award for a Painter of Merit.

Fig 52 Tomasz Wrobel receives the Stevenson Award for a Painter of Merit

Our Painting graduates will have acquired a wide range of transferable skills that equip them appropriately for employment in a diverse range of careers within the Creative and Cultural Industries.

Many sustain individual studio practices, determining their own directions and are actively exhibiting, curating and furthering their careers as professional artists.

Some go on to extend their academic experience though postgraduate study; our s tudents have been successful in securing places on a range of prestigious postgraduate courses.

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Fig 53 Luke Vinnicombe. 2014/Year 2

Fig 54 Neda Ghaffar. 2014/Year 3

A Case Study of Alumni

David McDiarmid | Painter Location: Glasgow

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David McDiarmid graduated in 2013 with a BA (Hons) in Painting, with First Class distinction. Since then he has been included in a number of solo and group exhibitions including ‘Megalmomania’, a solo exhibition at Inverness Museum and Art Gallery, and the RSA New Contemporaries Exhibition in Edinburgh. He has participated in several public engagement projects including the Coast festival in Banff, Aberdeenshire and was awarded a place as an information assistant for the Scotland + Venice exhibition at the Venice Biennale in 2013. In addition to this, David has had the opportunity to travel and study in Europe through the Cross Trust Scholarship to Berlin. He has won, and been nominated for several local and national awards including the Interview 11 ‘Paint Like You Mean It’ prize 2014.

Currently, David lives and works in Glasgow and is collaborating with the charity ‘Sense’ which supports children and adults who are deaf and blind. davidmcdiarmid.wordpress.com