06-11-12 - Digital Surfaces

This week year 1 were introduced to part 2 to the Art and Environment brief, and what they will be working towards over the next 6 weeks. This term we are planning to split the weeks into theme based responses  including Surface, Form and Manipulation. As previous posts and personal work suggest I am a huge fan of Luis Dorados work and in particular his "departure" project.

Responding to the theme surfaces in a digital context can be looked at as a challenge, but with Luis's work as a reference along with Jelle Martens grid based imagery, the relation between tactile and digital surfaces can be communicated. This 1st week was to give the team an initial response task to the work of either artist. Some really strong ideas and responses have already started to unfold with an opportunity to develop these into 3D  the next coming week.

A simple play off on multiple imagery being layered, scaled and repeated to suggest various contrasting and complementary surfaces. The work produced this week was fresh and exciting, and witnessed students really becoming absorbed into uncovering artists styles and characteristics.  These are only 1st years in the start of their 2nd term!! exciting things to come. Below are a few outcomes I managed to snap up.

26-10-12 - Creative videos

Today I had staff development and this time the whole day was based around "teaching and learning". Staff development can often be looked at as a chore, it doesn't seem to stimulate any of the staff involved in delivering the sessions, let alone the staff sitting there trying to absorb the information (perhaps Maslows needs are not being addressed). 

Any how, as we kicked off things with a new mission statement speech from the new principle, I found myself sitting in a sea of multi-colour chairs next to super Sonya! (Sonya is course leader for BA Fashion Design). Sonya has recently started her MA at Ravensbourne and was discussing with me her research module and captivating videos and books that she has found herself drawn to in recent weeks. A good bit of share and care between us took place and we started listing down books, videos and other resources that we felt we could benefit from. 

It got me thinking straight away about them little pockets of creativity you find on the web and that they need to be shard and enjoyed by the likes of all, so below are two little bundles of joy I plan to use in upcoming lessons that explore creativity and being creative. Enjoy

10-10-12 - Print My Cat!

I have been waiting to post some new student work up for ages, so much has been going on in the design studio and I just have not had the time. The next 6 weeks especially are going to see the production of some fantastic design work (all which will be posted up). 

The new cohort of 1st years have been with us now for 6 weeks, and in that short amount of time I have witnessed some great creative work taking place. There seems to be a lot more characters this year? Mischievous designers who just absorb themselves into whatever  is thrown at them. The images below were produced by Liam using traditional mono printing methods. Liam has an obsession for cats and wanted to use this as an initial theme to produce responses from. He suddenly found himself surrounded by a wall of cat prints, all of which actually arrived from an accidental experiment. This just goes to show that experimental printmaking can produce results. I look forward to see how Liam develops these prints, but for now I will leave you with these mesmerising images of the repeated cute cat.