Fresh Newsletter - Spring/Summer 2014

Fresh

News magazine from the University of Wolverhampton

Faculty of Arts Newsletter Spring/Summer 2014

Animation • Applied Arts • Computer Games Design • Fashion and Textiles • Fine Art • Graphic Communication • Illustration • Interior Design • Photography • Product Design • Video & Film Production • Visual Communication

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Welcome...

Upcoming events:

Welcome to Spring/Summer edition of Fresh Magazine.

Inside this issue we’ve included a photo special from our MA Show last October where our graduating MA students exhibited their work at The Public in West Bromwich.

We’ve also been inundated with news from our current students, staff and alumni who have been busy exhibiting, winning prizes, and securing commissions and new creative jobs.

The Photography Show Saturday 1 – Tuesday 4 March 2014 NEC, Birmingham www.thephotographyshow.com

We hope you enjoy it.

Degree Show

If you’ve got any news for us please email: arts@wlv.ac.uk to be included in our next issue.

Saturday 7 – Saturday 14 June 2014 Faculty of Arts, MK Building University of Wolverhampton, WV1 1DT www.wlv.ac.uk/degreeshow

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New Designers Wednesday 25 – Saturday 28 June 2014 and Wednesday 2 – Saturday 5 July 2014 Business Design Centre, London, N1 0QH www.newdesigners.com

University Open Days

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Saturday 8 March 2014 Saturday 14 June 2014 Saturday 16 August 2014 www.wlv.ac.uk/opendays

The Photography Show

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Tony Blood

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Our BA (Hons) Photography team will be at The Photography Show exhibition at the NEC, Birmingham between 1 - 4 March.

The show which attracts thousands of photography enthusiasts, seasoned professionals and trade visitors will see us exhibit alongside 200 other top brands, including industry giants Nikon, Olympus, Hasselblad, Epson and Sigma.

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Fashion and Textiles Summer School We are currently recruiting for our 2014 International Summer School which will explore luxury brands and the glamour of fashion.

The course, which begins in London, includes a visit to the Victoria & Albert Museum to view The Glamour of Italian Fashion and the Wedding Dresses 1775-2014 exhibitions, and a visit to the New Designers exhibition at the Business Design Centre, Islington.

Students will then travel to Wolverhampton to take part in a series of visits, workshops, lectures and seminars, which will involve the production of a small body of work that illustrates a personal response to the theme of the ‘The Mark of Style’.

For further information, email: short-courses@wlv.ac.uk

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MA Show The School of Art & Design held its annual MA Degree Show in The Public gallery, West Bromwich in October.

Dew Harrison, associate dean for Research and Postgraduate Studies, said: “The exhibition was the culmination of the excellent work undertaken by our Master’s students over the last year or two and shows the diversity of creative thinking, skills and professional approach to practice that they have achieved in that time.

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Bill Swann Allen Richards Emily Waugh Gary Grosvenor Robyn Snelling Justyna Ptak Julie Green Gemma Oldfield

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Ann Kelcey Laura Crosland Manjeet Gill Ilkyaz Ariz Turan Tiantian Zhou Caroline Ali Annika Bitter Constantinos Christofi Daniel Nuttall

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Award-winning Fashion and Textiles students secure UK and Indian industry placements The BA (Hons) Fashion and Textiles degree course aims to prepare students with a range of professional and transferable skills for employment and future career opportunities within the creative industries.

With this in mind, an integral part of the course is the opportunity to work on live projects with established businesses on a local, national and international basis. This invaluable industry backing gives students the opportunity to work with and learn from some of the best designers in the business.

Fashion and Textiles second year students were recently invited to take part in a competition set by the First Steps Babywear Company, which is a major supplier to some of the UK’s leading high street babywear retailers.

Students were asked to research the market focusing on current and future high street trends to produce a portfolio of design work suitable for the Autumn/Winter 2014 season.

Students developed individual design themes that could be used on babywear packs or hanging garments. They also had to gain an understanding of the technical specifications required for manufacturing as well as customer profiling to help focus on who the end buyer would be.

Students were then invited to present their work to senior designers from the company which gave them the opportunity to discuss the commercial balance between the inspirational and technical aspects of the work.

Four students were successful in securing placements. Three of the students, Naomi Welch, Kelly Rowe and Crystal Taylor were offered industrial placements this summer at the First Steps design studio in Walsall where they will gain invaluable insight into the daily workings of the industry. A fourth student, Nivetha Sundar was also offered a placement at the company’s design studio in Bangalore, India. Nivetha, who is on a fouryear Textile Degree course, is on a six month exchange programme run by the Fashion and Textiles department with the National Institute of Fashion Technology in Chennai, India.

First Steps congratulated all of the students who had taken part and were very impressed with the overall creativity and high standard of work which was presented to them.

Yve Houghton, senior lecturer said: “The department is keen to collaborate on live projects with established businesses to increases students understanding of industry to provide creative input whilst establishing valuable contacts and connections for the future.”

From top to bottom: Kelly Rowe, Nivetha Sundar, Naomi Welch and Crystal Taylor

Student focu 24 hour design challenge A team of BDes (Hons) Product and Interior Design students have won a 24hour innovation challenge in France.

The students took part in Innovation 24hr event held at the University’s partner institution Ecole Supérieure des Technologies Industrielles Avancées (ESTIA) in Biarritz in December.

The event is in its seventh year and invites industrial partners like Total, ERDF and Radisson to put forward a challenge to innovate their existing products and services.

This year 3,500 people took part from 40 countries including Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Cameroon, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Senegal, Spain, Tunisa, UK, Uruguay and USA.

The team, which included Level 6 and 7 students won the ‘Best Team Aboard’ Prize.

Dave Henley, course leader for Product Design, told us: “Once again I must thank everyone that contributed and supported us in the success of the project this year.

We had around 20 students take part, from across all undergraduate year groups and even an MA student. This is far more than previous years; so many thanks to everyone for enabling and giving the students the opportunity to be involved with such an exciting and stimulating experience.”

The winning team consisted of Product Design Level 6 students; Bradley Hart, Philip Jeavons, Jamie Gray, Daniel Hunt, Ross McIvor, Ashley Evans and Craig Prentice. Level 6 Interior Design student Rachel O’Nahoney, and Christin Hurmuzi an MA Erasmus student from the National University of Arts Bucharest.

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Photography student featured in New Library, Birmingham exhibition Final year BA (Hons) Photography student Tony Blood has been chosen to show his photography work at the New Library Birmingham in their new contemporary Photography Gallery.

The Photographers’ Wall has been developed as a space in the Library of Birmingham dedicated to photography and photographers.

Launched in January 2014, this first exhibition includes a range of individual works drawn from larger projects made by artists who hail from or are now based in Birmingham and the West Midlands. It also includes images from the nationally designated and internationally significant Library of Birmingham Photography Collection.

The selection of images aims to highlight the wealth of creative talent, the wide variety of photographic practices and the diverse range of projects made, or in the process of being made by emerging and established artists in the region.

Tony told us: “The ‘Pheasant’ image chosen is part of a series that draws on the influence and inspiration from Renaissance painting and contemporary still life photography.

“The work addresses the representation of social issues within the urban and domestic interior symbolising class, identity and the economy. Placing raw meat or dead animal parts alongside everyday objects and possessions gives the work a kind of forensic quality. In this case the pheasant, china cup and sprig of red grapes connote wealth

and opulence as well as the divide in classes.

“The dark shadows accentuate shape and form within the image; typical of Dutch and Spanish still life painting from the 16th and 17th century. In complete darkness, using only the light from a handheld torch, the objects were recorded differently to that of a conventional photograph. The technique is known as ‘painting with light’.”

Tony, who has been exhibiting work since 2011, has also had pieces exhibited at the Herbert Gallery, Coventry, Wolverhampton Art Gallery and the Light House Gallery, Wolverhampton.

Further information: www.tonyblood.com

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BANK Fashion Live Project – Ribbon

2014; and designed new and exciting fabric print and garment ideas for their brand “Ribbon”.

In September Fashion and Textiles second year students worked on a live project with Bank, a national fashion retailer and brand, during semester one for their Contemporary Practice module.

Throughout the assignment the students conducted in-depth market and product research on Bank and their main competitors; thoroughly investigated the forthcoming trends for Spring/Summer

Bank designers visited the faculty several times during the project and were most impressed with the quality of the final work presented, especially with the original styles, creative outfits and the commercial understanding behind the dynamic ranges produced. They are planning to include the best designs in their collection this season!

Michael Rutley, senior lecturer, told us: “It is essential for students to work on ‘live’ industry focused projects. The feedback and support from Bank has been invaluable for all the students who took part.”

The competition involved entrants showing off their design skills by carving a Jack-O-Latern using the SolidWorks design software. The designs were then each shared on Facebook and the design with the most ‘likes’ was deemed the winner.

Bradley’s design, The Beatles, shown left received the most votes; an outstanding 1,019 likes!

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The design took Bradley a whole day to create, he told us:

BDes (Hons) Product Design final year student Bradley Hart recently won the Solid Works Education Conceptual Carving Contest.

Students showing at Weston Park’s Graduate Show Throughout January the Graduate Show at the Granary Art Gallery located at Weston Park hosted an exhibition of works by some of the brightest talents emerging from the UK’s universities and colleges.

Entries came from across the UK from Cambridge to Chester to Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Manchester and there were over 50 works on display.

Four students from the University of Wolverhampton exhibited; Alice Jones, Samantha Fairbanks, Ruth Morby and Georgina Shepherd.

Georgina had four paintings on show: Banks’s, Chapel Ash, First Spring Encounter and Watchout. In addition, one her paintings has also been selected for exhibition at the Atkinson Gallery, Somerset from 24 February to 29 March.

Alice Jones (right) Georgina Shepherd (far right)

Congratulations to Bradley!

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Bradley wins pumpkin carving competition!

It took me around three to four hours to create the different shape of the pumpkins, then another two hours to carve out the Beatles’ faces and finally about two hours to apply the textures and lighting to render the images!

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Alumni focu Bhavik Sharma Bhavik Sharma who graduated last year with a BA (Hons) Fashion and Textiles is beginning to realise his dream of designing womenswear for the UK High Street with his recent appointment at a Leicester-based supplier as a ladieswear designer/pattern cutter.

He designs fast fashion for the commercial market including full product ranges for high street brands such as: Topshop, River Island, Dorothy Perkins, Urban Outfitters, ASOS, Miss Selfridge and also design for international companies based in America. Alongside designing, he creates patterns for designs and liaises with manufactures abroad.

Bhavik told us “My job role also requires me to be organised and up-to-date with trends. Fabric knowledge is key and technical understanding is vital, all these skills I learnt at the University of Wolverhampton, and without them I wouldn’t have this job. I have learnt many skills that have been helpful for me for to take forward and put into practice.”

A Public legacy Diane Soltys, MA Fine Art graduate, successfully won a bursary from The Public, West Bromwich last year and her bursary work was on show at the gallery until it closed on 16 November 2013.

Her work, The Hoodies, was a sitespecific proposal which was assessed by members of The Public and the MA Fine Art course leader.

Graham Peet, exhibitions manager at The Public, said: “Diane’s work stood out as being perfect for The Public. It was humorous but also with an edge.

We could see immediately how it would be liked by visitors but that it had more

to it than at first met the eye. Diane’s beautifully observed and crafted little porcelain figures represented the often maligned urban characters – Hoodies.”

Diane said: “My work confronts the cultural stereotypes of youth today through sculpture and installation, observations of life and current issues of modern society.

“Receiving the bursary from The Public has been a valuable experience not only allowing me to participate on an MA but also to exhibit my work in a national gallery setting. It also has given me the opportunity to make new contacts outside the University and increased my confidence personally, and within my artwork.

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us Illustration graduate secures design position at Penguin/Puffin Books Matt Jones, MA Digital and Visual Communication 2012, was shortlisted for the prestigious Penguin Design Awards last year, and following his success he has now secured a permanent, full-time paid position at Penguin!

Psyched for sport BA (Hons) Illustration graduates Blair Frame and Amy Evans are giving their creative input to a new magazine, Psyched for Sport, which discusses the psychology, motivation and challenge in sport.

Blair, who graduated in 2012, is creative director on the magazine and has contributed the majority of the publication’s illustrations. Meanwhile Amy, who graduated in 2013 and is currently studying her Master’s with us, has also contributed illustrations to the magazine.

Blair, who drives the creative side of the magazine, is an award-winning illustrator, with some of his Psyched4Sport work featuring in the Guardian, on the Creative Review website and in an interview with Creative Huddle.

Whilst Amy already has two fully illustrated books published by the London publisher, Cico books and is working on her third.

It all started for Matt when after being shortlisted for the awards he won the chance to spend a week in Penguin’s design office in London. Following his work placement, Penguin took him on as an intern, and following this they offered him a permanent position.

We caught up with Matt to find out how it all happened and what his new job involves.

Visual Communications course leader, John Clementson said: “We are always immensely proud of our students and it is exciting to see them using the skills they have developed here at Wolverhampton to create some exciting and creative work for the commercial environment.”

Further information, visit: www.psyched4sport.com

What kind of projects have you been working on in your new role?

I illustrate and design book covers for both Penguin and Puffin titles. I also illustrate ‘The Famous Puffin’ character for sales pitches and promo work.

I help in the selection process of other illustrators to commission for other titles that are not my own. I am currently working on a variety of projects including classic Penguin/Puffin titles, brand new titles and already well established brand titles.

How are you enjoying the job - is it what you hoped you would be doing when you embarked on the Illustration course?

It is my dream job; designing and illustrating book covers for one of the largest, most recognisable publishing companies in the world, from an office that overlooks the London Eye and the Thames River!

How do you think the course you studied prepared you for this position?

During my time at the University of Wolverhampton, studying both my BA (Hons) and MA I developed as an illustrator/artist and gained an excellent understanding of the industry I am now in.

The tutors are the BEST and I am still in regular contact with them all since finishing my Master’s. Their support and knowledge of the industry throughout has been second to none.

Left: Blair Frame, Right: Amy Evans

Get in touch If you’re an alumnus of the School, we’d like you to get in touch with us to let us know what you’re up to.

Email: art-design@wlv.ac.uk

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Clothes Show Live 2013: Art School Rebel Final year fashion and textiles students have once again taken the annual Clothes Show Live event by storm at the Birmingham NEC, with a stunning fashion collection entitled Art School Rebel, an eclectic, avant garde collection of outfits incorporating painterly abstract art inspired prints shocking colour and juxtaposing silhouettes.

The stand also revealed the work in progress, showing the design journey from initial sketchbooks and sampling through to a rebellious photo shoot styled by students and photographed by final year photography students.

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Shooting Stars Fashion Show Engage Youth Empowerment Services (EYES), a young people’s charity, approached the Fashion and Textiles department to show their clothes on the catwalk at a charity fashion show at Wolverhampton Civic Hall in December.

Our final year Fashion and Textile students opened the annual charity fashion show with an exclusive preview of their rebellious fashion garment collection. The students also launched their range of Art School Rebel accessories which will be on sale later this semester.

Sharon Watts, course leader for Fashion and Textiles, told us:

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We are looking forward to further exciting collaborations for our students which will hopefully help to raise funds for their final year fashion shows and exhibitions.

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Art in Clay Graduates and Alumni from the School of Art and Design exhibited at ‘Art in Clay’ at Hatfield House in July 2013.

Now in its twentieth year, Art in Clay has become one of the most important ceramic events in Europe. The makers range from young imaginative students and relative newcomers to leading national and international makers.

The show features demonstrations from throwing and hand decoration inside the marquees to kiln firings outside. There was also a full programme of talks and demonstrations.

Paul McAllister, course leader for Applied Arts, said: “The organisers of Art in Clay are long-standing supporters of our graduates and have always given us a number of complimentary stands, alongside work experience opportunities for second year students. This year our students helped out as stewards, announcers, ticket/programme sellers and a variety of other roles, gaining valuable experience and meeting established ceramic artists and networking.

For further information visit: www.artinclay.co.uk

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Nikhil Chopra special lecture at school Critically acclaimed artist Nikhil Chopra gave a special lecture to School of Art and Design students in December, following his three-day live performance at Wolverhampton Art Gallery.

Space Oddity was an 18-hour artistic performance devised by Nikhil Chopra to play out over three days. During this time, he produced charcoal drawings of members of the Wolverhampton community as well as onlookers on the walls of the Gallery, as a way of examining the role of portraiture in the Art Gallery’s collection and reflecting India’s colonial past.

The title Space Oddity is taken from the 1969 David Bowie song, and reflects the transition of the time – women’s rights, the empowerment of the working class, booming Western economies and hundreds of thousands of migrants from former English colonies. Nikhil Chopra has chosen this title to elude to the strangeness of a place, experienced by those who came to England around this time.

This exhibition is part of Shakti, a collaboration with Meadow Arts who have invited contemporary artists of Indian origin to respond to and interact with historic collections of South Asian art at venues across the Midlands and Wales, including Powis Castle and Kedleston Hall. For more information about Meadow Arts and Shakti, please visit: www.meadowarts.org www.nikhilchopra.net

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Jeff goes boing!

One of Jeff Leak’s artist’s book designs was selected for the exhibition Love British Books, an international exhibition of the best examples of contemporary British literature, book decoration and design sponsored by the British Embassy.

The exhibition was first opened in 2012 to mark the 500th anniversary of the first printed book in Armenia and UNESCO’s recognition of Yerevan as the World Book Capital and more recently it has moved via the UK to the Palace of Congress, Tirana, Albania.

The exhibition seeks to showcase work by practitioners representing a cross section of the contemporary art of British publishing craft and invention and also features the work of, among others: Phil Baines, Jonathan Barnbrook, David Crow, Marion Deuchars, Jamie Hewlett, Angus Hyland, Alan Moore, Adrian Shaughnessy, Jeremy Tankard and Johnson Banks.

Jeff told us: “This artist’s book was designed back when I was part of boing! working with fellow designer Giles Woodward. “boing! was a creative consultancy that specialised in working with artists, galleries, authorities, musicians and theatres – arts clientele. The book was originally featured in Creative Review, September 1997. When the recent exhibition was being curated around British books we were very flattered and honoured to have this included among the work of some of the luminaries of the British publishing world. The design features the work of a group of artists whose exhibition was entitled Sweet Life. The book used the simple mnemonic of the supermarket to sell the exhibition.

Each cover was hand cut from fruit boxes and so therefore each one was unique and numbered as such.”

Artist-led projects Su Fahy Oceans is an artwork by Tania Kovats that collects together water from all the world’s oceans and seas gathered with the help of a global network of people drawn in by bringing all the waters of the earth to one place.

Jeff’s design work is shown below: Su Fahy, MA Fine Art course leader, has responded to this project by collecting water from the Severn Sea which is a tidal sea whose waters enter the Celtic Sea and then the Atlantic Ocean - this forms part of the series: Outmoded Rituals which is a photographic document of the Severn Estuary commencing in 2008 and still in progress.

An image from the series is exhibited on the site under the Celtic Sea - and the collected water will feature in a sculptural installation at the Fruitmarket Gallery in Edinburgh in March 2014.

Further information: www.tania-kovats-oceans.com

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Su Fahy

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Scientific animations Samantha Moore, senior lecturer in Animation, has been selected to work with a research scientist at Imperial College London on a large animation project for the Wellcome Trust called Silent Signal.

Silent Signal is an exciting project that partners scientists working within biomedical science with artists working with animation to connect the public to new ways of thinking about the human body.

Samantha’s work, in response to the work of Dr Serge Mostowy, will focus on how the cytoskeleton responds to intracellular pathogens by assembling into septin cages with a zebrafish infection model.

Samantha told us: “The project is progressing well, so far I have put together a sketchbook with drawings of the fish larvae, the septin cage process (from several different perspectives) and some storyboarding of the proposed septin cage dynamics. There is also a thumbnail animated test of the septin loop construction.

“The next stage in pre-production will be to do more animated tests of the different elements of the project (the development of the host larvae, its response to the pathogens, the septin cage construction and decay) based on my sketches but also the sketches done by the lab team.

“We are currently putting together a large arts award bid for the Wellcome Trust and we should hear by next summer whether we have more funding to take the project to its conclusion.”

You can follow the progress of Samantha’s project here: www.silentsignal.org/loop Samantha Moore

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Dean Kelland: one year, four exhibitions and a residency Dean Kelland, senior lecturer in photography, had a non-stop 2013 so we caught up with him to find out what projects have been keeping him busy.

Dean, who uses performance, photography, film and period materials to explore representations of class and masculinity in British situation comedy, began the year by taking up a three-month artist residency at the New Art Gallery, Walsall in January.

His residency explored the idea of the sitcom as a social mirror in relation to three situation comedies of the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s: Hancock’s Half Hour, Steptoe & Son, and Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? The residency was split into three sections, and each then culminated in a free public live studio performance.

Following on from his residency, the New Art Gallery chose Dean to take part in an exhibition of works from the Garman-Ryan collection. The work chosen was a mixed media collage produced during his artist residency period.

Entitled: The Best A Man Can Get, the collage focussed upon the first cycle of the residency and addresses themes associated with representations of masculinity, Pop-Art and Tony Hancock.

Selected by Julie Jones at the gallery the image was also the gallery’s Artwork of the Month and was the subject of an introductory presentation by its selector.

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Congratulations to Julie and Vinod School of Art & Design staff Julie Green, divisional assistant – Visual Communications, and Vinod Govindbhai, senior technician – Digital Media, completed their MA Digital and Visual Communications in October 2013.

They both exhibited at our MA Show at The Public, see photos below:

Following this, over the summer, Dean participated in the: The Ends of Art exhibition at the Beton 7 Gallery, Athens.

Curated by artist and writer Euripides Altintzoglou, the group exhibition focussed upon interdisciplinarity and the pursuit of examining one discipline through another.

Dean told us: “I was delighted Euripides asked me to do it, I showed alongside some great works and really interesting practitioners. I’ve wanted to test the work on overseas audiences for some time as well, so this was a really good opportunity at an important part of the process.”

Back in England, and at home in Wolverhampton, Dean’s short film, No Hiding Place was commissioned by the Wolverhampton Art Gallery. The film continues Dean’s interest in British sitcoms and focusses upon the 1970s period and the programme Whatever Happened to The Likely Lads?

The film which was commissioned to

coincide with the gallery’s celebration of Victorian photographer Oscar Rejlander and the exhibition From Darkroom To Digital is housed in a bespoke installation space in the gallery.

To round up a fantastic year, Dean’s film: The Englishman’s Panacea was commissioned by the IKON gallery, Birmingham for an offsite exhibition at Fletcher’s Walk.

For this exhibition, Dean returns to the iconic British comedy character Harold Steptoe. He stands before a mirror in what is seemingly his morning ritual. Referencing Samuel Beckett’s plays Waiting for Godot and Film, the action is repeated with each new manifestation taking us closer to the identity of Steptoe while simultaneously examining the mechanics of performance.

The exhibition ran from 4 December – 9 February 2014.

For further information please visit: www.deankelland.com

Images above: Vinod Govindbhai, Images below: Julie Green

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ness Photo Archive Project with Express & Star The School of Art & Design has been supporting the Express & Star’s Heritage Lottery Fund bid for funding to digitise its photo archive.

If the bid, which was put together in partnership with the Express & Star and WAVE: The Museums, Galleries and Archives of Wolverhampton, is successful, it will mean anybody with internet access would be able to view our entire picture collection.

The photo archive includes 750,000 photographs which were taken throughout the last century, and is stored in folders at the Express & Star headquarters. Many of the pictures are deteriorating with age, with some folders lying untouched for years.

Tricia Cooper, associate dean, made up the panel alongside representatives of the other two organisations plus members of local heritage groups. They will learn in March if the bid has been successful. If the green light is given, it will take volunteers an estimated three years to digitise the entire collection.

The photos, along with the information attached to each print, will then be uploaded to a website for the public to browse.

After an appeal for public support, more than 100 letters and emails were sent in by local individuals and organisations.

A further 230 people completed an online survey on how they would use the service and 100 people have volunteered to carry out the digitisation work.

MNA brand and communications manager Chris Leggett said: “The bid is the culmination of extensive consultation with the community.

“It has been shaped around the responses of local people, who have told us they believe the photographs should be made available for future generations.

“The Express & Star will not receive a penny in revenue from this project. It wants to share this unique collection with the communities it has represented for generations.”

The National Art&Design Saturday Club We’re now well underway with our National Art & Design Saturday Club programme. With 24 students taking part from 9 schools from across our region.

The programme kicked off on the 5 October with an induction and artist-led practical session from our own Fashion and Textiles graduate Suzanne Spencer.

Suzanne graduated with a first class honours degree with her specialism being in paper craft. She was able to share her skills with the students who spent the morning producing their own pieces of paper folded cards and designs.

Suzanne told us: ’I thoroughly enjoyed meeting and working with the group to develop their own interpretations on the basic folds. Initial brainstorming sessions proved invaluable; allowing the students to feel more comfortable interacting with their new peer group.’’

The following two weeks were led by Maggie Ayliffe, course leader for Fine Art. Students worked in pairs to create collaged portraits of each another using new skills aimed to stretch them – they worked with continuous line drawings, cutting their silhouettes out with no line to follow and arranging their final elements into a considered composition.

Laura Onions, who graduated from our Fine Art course in 2013 assisted Maggie with the course, told us: “Approaching painting or drawing a portrait can initially be a daunting task, one that is often plagued by rules, guidelines and proportioning. The Fine Art sessions approached the face through methods that really pushed the students, encouraging spontaneity in a relaxed environment. I felt that the students really embraced this and created really bold and striking portraits that they probably did not expect to make!”

Next up, came our Photography classes, which continued to look at portraiture within a studio environment with MA graduate Justyna Ptak.

Justyna introduced the students to black and white film photography and then they were split into groups for demonstrations and support with the Hasselblad cameras. Still to come in our Saturday Club programme we have workshops in fashion, where the students will be making t-shirts and scarves; and jewellery-making where the students will make a copper pendant.

The students will also visit the Victoria and Albert museum in London to see the Club to Catwalk exhibition, and a big highlight still to come will be a masterclass with a professional artist who is still to be announced.

Contact us The School of Art & Design University of Wolverhampton MK Building, City Campus North Molineux Street Wolverhampton WV1 1DT

Tel: 01902 322 058 Email: art-design@wlv.ac.uk Web: www.wlv.ac.uk/artanddesign

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