VA6011 - Sites of Production / Sites of Presentation

Seminars will introduce you to the module and the themes and ideas that we will be working with. However, the core learning will be through making supported by regular individual tutorials and group crits. The studio and project spaces are the primary location for learning, supported by opportunities to bring work into public realms. You will also have access to technical instruction, enabling you to develop the technical skills necessary for a professional public practice.



Briefs will be provided that allow for the individuality of your creative practice and potential collaborations, focusing instead on the transitions across different thresholds of visibility. These will consider different audiences, of which your peer group and tutors are only one.



The module centres on you establishing and developing a critically informed arts practice through artmaking and sets a foundation for your semester 2 Final Project module in which you will refine your artmaking and present your work in a major public context.

You are supported by the provision of a studio space and access to the project spaces.



Technical facilities are available, including the wood, construction and casting workshops, the print studio (including screen-printing, etching, lithography), the Mac lab and digital print (including industry standard digital imaging, moving image and audio software), analogue darkrooms (black and white and colour processing and print) and digital photographic studios. You have access to specialist materials in all workshop areas. Resource areas include our technical resource centre and the university gallery. You have twenty-four-hour access to the university library.

Your learning will be supported by subject specialist academics and by expert technicians. Academic support is provided within the group sessions, which will be constructed so as to support both your art-making and written reflection. We provide you with on-going formative feedback through the teaching you receive. Technicians run the demonstrations feeding in their own technical expertise and knowledge.



Your learning is clearly mapped out to you on the module page on the University online Learning portal. This includes your assessment brief, guidance notes and key dates for the semester to help you organise and plan your time. Other teaching materials, notices and guidance are made available to you through the eLP. This is accessible to you on campus or externally through the Internet. You will have a University email that we contact you through. All timetabling is through the online University Timetabling system. Reps represent you in regular meetings with the Programme Leader.

All modules at Northumbria include a range of reading materials that students are expected to engage with. Online reading lists (provided after enrolment) give you access to your reading material for your modules. The Library works in partnership with your module tutors to ensure you have access to the material that you need.

Knowledge & Understanding:



1. Demonstrate a critical understanding of the core theories and contexts that inform your artistic position.



2. Test, extend and evaluate your theoretical and practical knowledge through a range of practical outputs.


Intellectual / Professional skills & abilities:


3. Critically reflect on the conceptual and material connections of your practice in written and presentational form.



4. Apply critical judgement, analysis and an advanced level of technical competency in the selection and application of appropriate materials and processes.


Personal Values Attributes (Global / Cultural awareness, Ethics, Curiosity) (PVA):

5: Plan and implement a self-directed creative project, including setting priorities, time management and attendance.

Summative Assessment:

A new body of practical artworks (70%)

A text (800 words) (15%)

An annotated supporting visual document (4 slides) that will include the documentation and critical analysis of a public presentation relevant to your work. (15%)



Summative Feedback:

Feedback is individual and provided in the context of the assessment criteria given to you at the start of the semester in the module guide. Written feedback is delivered within 20 working days via the eLearning Portal.



Formative Assessment:

To prepare you successfully to undertake the summative assessment(s) on this module, formative assessments will be set by the module team. These may take the form of in-class tasks or projects, developmental activities undertaken between classes, or learning exercises/activities set over a longer period. Feedback (written and/or oral) will be provided to help you learn from, reflect on, and develop in light of these formative assessments.

MLOs

The assessment task tests all of the MLOs.

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What are the places in which artist make art? How do these differ from the places in which the art is then seen by others? Often how people experience our work allows us to learn new things about it that might not have been visible in the studio. Sometimes these sites of presentation can be where the work is truly made complete.



This module is about thinking and making in ways that understand the differences and similarities between sites where we might make things, and sites where this making is shared with others. Sometimes these places are architecturally the same but functionally different – in an ‘open studio’, for example. Sometimes they involved significant shifts in scale, as might be the case with public sculpture. For many artists in the 21st Century, the Internet itself is a site in which production and presentation are often blurred. This module allows you to examine how your own sites of production and presentation interact and help you to consider ways in which this interaction influences both your making and your making-public. Perhaps this will help you imagine new places in which your work might be made or seen and even new publics with which it might interact?