My Proposal

• Minimum of 1 workbook page. Write a Proposal (use the 'how to write a proposal’ resource)

A proposal is simply an outline of the direction you intend to head in, a beginning of the journey towards your exhibition.

In your visual journal, create an artist’s proposal that outlines the themes, established practice, techniques and media, formal concerns, and sites you wish to investigate.

Note that a proposal is not ‘set in stone’. As you create more work, it is anticipated that you will frequently revisit and adapt your proposal according to the development and clarification of your ideas.

The following prompts are intended to step you through the creation of your proposal.

·        Identify the themes you wish to investigate. For example, one that exclusively relates to the formal properties relevant to sculpture, or one that is inwardly-oriented such as personal identity (with reference to memory, childhood, gender, or ethnicity), or externally-oriented such as popular culture, consumerism, the environment, gender roles, self-image, history, current politics, and so on.

·        Record why you have chosen this subject matter. Why do you find it interesting?

·        Brainstorm your theme by teasing out as many things as you can think of that are relevant to it, for example, feelings, materials, and visual and sensory imagery such as related objects, colours, textures, or materials.

·        Identify at least three artists who investigate similar themes. Create artist pages with images of their work into your journal and annotate them. Annotations need to be relevant to the materials and techniques the artist has used, the concepts and ideas they are conveying, and how these ideas have been conveyed. For example, if you choose consumerism as the theme, Eve Armstrong’s performance-oriented Trading Table project, in which she exchanges objects, skills, and ideas with her ‘audience’, may be relevant.

·        Identify materials and media appropriate to your ideas or theme. For example, with the theme of consumerism, methods relevant to mass production such as casting may be appropriate, as might using recycled objects and materials.

·        Identify the formal properties related to your theme (repetition may be an appropriate formal property to work with if your theme is consumerism).

·        Brainstorm the sites you would like to work with and articulate why they are relevant.

Responding to the ideas you have discussed in your proposal, produce approximately one to two pages of visual imagery relevant to your theme. This imagery can already exist (for example, from National Geographic magazines, 1960s wallpaper, black and white photos of your grandfather, and so on) and/or can be imagery that you personally record (for instance, by taking your own photographs or by digitally scanning items such as a piece of lace handed down to you from a family member who has passed away). Assemble this information in your visual journal and make annotations about why the visual is relevant to your theme.