Fine Art - painting (BA Hons - Single)

Overview

This pathway degree course provides a comprehensive education in Fine Art, while allowing the art student to concentrate on painting. Initially, you will examine painting’s traditions and characteristics, exploring in depth and locating painting within contemporary art practice. You work in workshop and in your own studio space, testing your views against a common evaluative and interpretative framework, with easy access to the busy professional art scene in the East End of London, the world art city. Your tutors are artists with extensive international exhibition records, good experience of teaching in different universities and strong academic achievement. You are encouraged to examine traditional, dominant and emergent models of art practice, including the development of new forms of production, distribution and display. All this is supported and challenged through engagement in critical debate and exposure to Western and non- Western history of art and culture. Optional field trips to art events in Europe and beyond enhance the student experience.

Sir John Cass Faculty of Art, Media and Design

www.londonmet.ac.uk/jcamd/

Course contents

Three levels, each of 120 credits.

Level 1 topics include:

Two year long atelier modules see you develop technical and conceptual skills in figurative and abstract painting, before you develop your own painting projects in which those skills are applied under close tuition. Another yearlong module develops drawing in the expanded field of all four dimensions. Skills of reflection and evaluation are learned. Critical and contextual studies examine what it is to be an artist or critical practitioner in the 21st century, as well as the cultural context and recent art history that inform your art studies, here in the vibrant art scene of London’s East End.

Level 2 topics include:

Two core atelier modules see you develop your own painting projects in critical practice, in response to themes and concepts set out by the course. You are encouraged to learn collectively through experimentation and taking risks. Another yearlong module pursues a general Fine Art subject discipline such as curating or public art, while critical and contextual studies develop your professional practice as an artist – your engagement with the world of work today.

Level 3 topics include:

Your final year sees you spend much of your time in independent study, using skills gained to develop a body of work for a major painting project to lead directly into display at Degree Show. This is accompanied by applied research into presentation and publication for that exhibition. In critical and contextual studies you will write a dissertation. You will graduate with the skills required of a critical practitioner, intellectually and technically equipped to operate as an artist in society and the creative economy.

Assessment

You are assessed via project work, essays, individual and group projects and a final major project and dissertation.

Collaborative and international links

The School of Fine Art has strong outreach and external links, including leading galleries such as Whitechapel Gallery and academic and community oriented projects, such as http://satellite-projects.blogspot. com/ or the research based East Ender Project at http://vads.ahds. ac.uk/collections/EEP.html, the Animal Gaze http://www. animalgaze.org/).

Careers

Students typically take up careers in visual arts, arts administration, community arts, media communications, museum curating and environmental design. Graduates have found work for companies such as the Tate Gallery, Ocean Media and On Demand Productions as Gallery Assistants, Museum Attendants and Junior Producers The programme is also excellent preparation for further research or study.

Student profiles

What our students say

‘This is an enjoyable and rewarding course which provides exciting engagement with current art practice. It allowed me to develop my own approach to the discipline of painting, equipping me with both discipline specific, and a range of transferable skills. It provided me with the experience and confidence to go on to my MA.’ (Elizabeth Vicary)

Applying and entry

In addition to the University’s standard entry requirements, you should also have 280 UCAS points including at least 2 A Levels (or equivalent) in art and design or related subjects. Applicants will attend an interview with a portfolio of creative work. This course is also available as a four-year extended degrees, the first of which is the Foundation Year Art, Media, Design.

Further information
Please contact Admissions or, for further academic questions, contact: Rosemarie McGoldrick r.mcgoldrick@londonmet.ac.uk