Module: FAR4001-40 Studio Practice: Strategies and Behaviours

Level: 4

Credit Value: 40

Module Tutor: Jenny Dunseath

Module Tutor Contact Details: j.dunseath@bathspa.ac.uk

1. Brief description and aims of module:

Through a variety of teaching and learning methods this module will introduce you to the relevant strategies and behaviours that form the basis for an inquisitive, experimental and reflective art practice. Taught and self-directed enquiry will promote an investigational approach to making and thinking. Through practice led workshops you will be exposed to a range of practical, theoretical and professional processes, methods and ideas. Individual and group sessions will help you reflect and evaluate your own learning, develop confidence in discussing your ideas and processes and support you to begin to recognize how your developing contextual research and subject knowledge locates and informs your own art practice.

2.Outline syllabus:

This module is studio centered so you will be allocated a studio space from the outset. Studio based workshops and discussions will introduce you to the practices, processes and ideas of other artists and present strategies for collecting, developing, processing, and evaluating your own material, contextual and theoretical information. Key to this module is experimentation with a range of methods, materials and processes in order to establish an inquisitive practical and material enquiry. The acquisition of new skills and the nurturing of established ones will be central and encouraged through an engagement with the technical workshops and facilities. One to one tutorials with a variety of tutors and group critiques with your peers are a fundamental part of the teaching and learning philosophy within this module. Through this dialogue you will be supported to present and analyze the methods, processes and outcomes you are exploring in order to realize your ideas.

You will attend talks by the artists/practitioners who work with you on the course along with lectures or workshops by other artists and professional. By attending and reflecting on these talks you will begin to establish a broad contextual research practice. Alongside this you will be expected to identify, explore and process other contextual research relevant to your emerging interests and present this research in a folder. Study trips to key exhibitions will also form the basis for your contextual research (knowledge/understanding of the subject area).

Talks and workshops from the core team, visiting artists and/or other professionals from the field will support your applied engagement with relevant professional development skills. These will include:

- Workshops that use practical making, writing and group discussion to introduce approaches to critical thinking and tools for writing about your work.

- Practical workshops that introduce you the skills and good practice essential to documenting your work

- Practice led workshops that introduce a range of ways that artists use digital platforms for the dissemination of their work.

- An introduction to the ethics of the discipline

Testing out possibilities for the works development beyond the studio in projects, exhibitions and events will encourage a growing confidence in the work, introduce alternative forms of practice and explore possible strategies for dissemination.

3.Teaching and learning activities:

The following list identifies the teaching and learning activities central to the subject. They reflect the bespoke nature of learning within the discipline of fine art. They will be delivered as either level specific or in certain cases with cross level content.

Module briefings and year group meetings: The module coordinator will meet the whole year group at regular intervals throughout this module. In these meetings key teaching and assessment processes will be outlined. These sessions will also provide a space for you to discuss and reflect on the course as a group.

Studio based individual and group tutorials: During this module you will meet with a tutor/s regularly to discuss and reflect upon your developing understanding and practical progress. These core tutorials will be timetabled and may be with a small group of peers or on your own. Peer led reflective dialogue will be central to the teaching and learning on this module. In addition to these timetabled core sessions you will be able to sign up for tutorials with a variety of tutors both from the team that teach on the course and from other visiting practitioners.

Critiques: Working as a small group, facilitated by a tutor, you will present your work to each other. These sessions will promote critical, reflective, constructive peer review exploring the content, context and the display of the work presented.

Academic facilitated workshop (practice/subject): Working in groups these sessions will be facilitated by an academic and take place in your studios. These sessions are designed to explore the concepts and debates within the discipline of Fine Art. They may take as a starting point an event, text or artworks or through more practical activities draw attention to the strategies, ideas and behaviors of other artists.

Technical workshop: These sessions will take place in the school workshops and be run by one of our team of technical demonstrators. They will not only introduce you to some of some key practical skills, how to work safely and confidently but to the philosophy of the workshops as spaces to experiment, test out ideas and think through making. More specialized, advance workshops will occur throughout the course and your engagement with them will be dependent on your developing ideas/enquiry.

Study trips: Scheduled visits to galleries and museums will play a key role in providing access to current practice and cultural debates. These visits will help you contextualize your own work.

Artists’/staff talks/ lectures: The team that work with you on the course will talk about their own working practice as artists/curators/writers/educators, they will talk about their works context and their own professional journeys. Visitors from a broad range of disciplines will give talks and lectures on their work and their professional trajectories.

Independent study: Working independently is central to the teaching and learning philosophy of a Fine Art course. Working in your studio, in the library or the workshops you will begin to develop and reflect upon the ideas, debates covered in the module

Professional practice lectures/workshops: These timetabled lectures and taught sessions will introduce, explore and refine relevant professional development skills.

Assessment Item 1:

• Assessment Type: CW

• Description: Presentation of art works and (experimental) development work

• % Weighting: 80%

Assessment Item 2:

• Assessment Type: CW

• Description: Research Folder

• % Weighting: 20%