CARDIFF SCHOOL OF ART AND DESIGN
BEING A CSAD STUDENT ART & DESIGN IS MY PASSION, WHAT WILL THE COURSE BE LIKE?
WHERE WILL I WORK? Our students work in new and newly refurbished buildings, linked by a glass walkway on the University’s Llandaff Campus, close to student accommodation. We offer brand new purpose build studios and workshops, in high quality architectural spaces, with much design statement furniture
It is our passion too! We are a proper school of Art & Design in a proper University. We have designed your studies to be centred on: your unique skills; your creative ideas; and your ability to contextualise these in a professional situation. In three years, you have every chance to become a CSAD graduate who possesses not only the talent, but also the confidence, experience, and insight, to thrive as a creative professional in today’s world. You want to do things your way: the freedom is yours to choose, to collaborate and make contacts with an employer, gallery or voluntary organisation or even begin to build your own business or creative professional practice. You may elect to join a research group or exhibit your work. You also have the chance to travel and study in Europe or at one of our partner universities in far away places.
IS EVERYONE LIKE ME? Perhaps not exactly like you, but you need to be among people who will share in your passion. Our entrance expectations (300 UCAS points), as well as rigorous, but friendly, interview process, create a community of students who are as serious about their studies in art and design as you are. People who are at the top of their game will teach you. CSAD staff, both academic and technical, as well as some of our administrative team, are creative practitioners in their own right. Academic and technical experts will give you the individual attention you need to build a successful career. You are encouraged to reflect, question, and create, drawing on their experience of leading edge practice, research and professional development. Our brilliant historians, philosophers and theoreticians will challenge you to think much wider and deeper.
WHAT ARE THE EXTRA STUDY COSTS? We try to keep additional costs to an absolute minimum and we work hard to ensure that your assessments are not determined by how rich you are! All cost of materials associated with the development of your technical skills are met by the School. We do not charge for use of equipment, other than in the FabLab. Expensive things such as trips abroad are always ‘extras’ and not compulsory. You will be charged for materials needed for your individual work, where we are unable to provide these through recycling or by other means. We keep the costs down by our ability to buy in bulk and negotiate with suppliers. Your work is yours to take away and of course many of our students sell some of what they produce.
WHAT EQUIPMENT AND MATERIALS WILL I NEED? What you use will depend on what you have chosen to study. You might decide to buy some of your own tools, a laptop and a camera. You will certainly need sketchbooks. Your programme will advise you on anything special that you might like to have.
You need really excellent, well lit, and spacious studios and workshops and a place to work, without hot-desking – and that’s what we provide. Come to one of our visit days and see what we mean when we say our School of Art & Design is an ideas and creative factory.
HOW MUCH TEACHING WILL I GET? Art & Design is second only to medicine in terms of the commitment required. We expect our students to spend 40 hours per week on their studies. About half of that time will be some kind of formal teaching: in seminars, workshops or studio. Our studios and some workshops are open (and occupied) from 8am until midnight. It’s a busy place.
WHO WILL I BE TAUGHT BY? Everyone in the School has some connection with some kind of art, design, architecture and making practice. Everyone who teaches will be an active artist, designer, theorist or technical specialist. Our Professors and senior staff in the School teach on our programmes, as do recent graduates and external specialists.
Everything and anything we have in our extensive workshops are available for you to use: from traditional things like plaster moulding and woodwork to our hot metal foundry and our computerised rapid prototyping workshops. We are also home to the only MIT FabLab in a UK university.
WHAT DOES THE LLANDAFF CAMPUS HAVE? Apart from CSAD and being next to the river and parks, the campus has a student union building with a café and bar, a gym, five coffee and snack bars, a shop and playing fields. The campus is also home to the Cardiff Metropolitan University Schools of Management, and Health Sciences as well as the Library, the Learning Centre, Student Services, the UMax job Shop and the iZone, plus a bank with a cash machine.
WILL I HAVE A SPACE TO WORK? IS THERE ANY CHOICE IN MY STUDIES? There is a lot of choice. Our modules are designed to allow you to choose where to place the emphasis of your studies. You can concentrate on pure creative practice, or veer towards either an enterprise or a research focussed career. You can choose from a whole range of opportunities in the second year from travel and exchange, to starting your own business, working with a research team or learning a new skill.
IS THERE A LOT OF WRITING AND THEORY? You cannot study art & design at a good university without understanding something of the historical contexts and theoretical ideas that leading artists and designers rely upon. You can shape this study too, with choices of historical and theoretical seminar groups. You also have a choice in the form, type and length of dissertation you write; for example, in your third year, you can elect to submit a business plan, rather than a dissertation.
WHAT ABOUT MY DYSLEXIA OR OTHER DISABILITY? Dyslexia is a very common condition amongst artists and designers. If you have it, or think you have it, we can provide specialist diagnosis and help for you throughout your studies. If you have some other disability, then that is no problem whatsoever to us, as long as you contact the University Student Services as soon as you enrol and notify them. It’s much harder to help you, if we don’t know about your disability.
Yes. The type of space will vary according to what you are studying and what you are doing. Our studios are zones of activity based on the kinds of creative work to be found in the School. We have a significant number of workstations of different types for makers, designer and artists, within studios that simulate professional environments.
CAN I GO ON AN EXCHANGE OR TRAVEL ABROAD? Yes. We have exchange partners all over the world in every continent, as local as Paris to as far afield as Australia, Korea, the USA, India and even the Reunion Islands. You can study there and keep the credits you earn. At various times, we run trips abroad, to places like Rajasthan, Morocco, Berlin, Venice and to a workshop in the Dordogne.
ARE THERE ANY WORK EXPERIENCE OPPORTUNITIES? You have the chance throughout you studies to work with professional artists, designers, employers, buyers and galleries. We can arrange work placements. Many of our programmes use ‘live’ projects for real clients. You have the opportunity to learn how to start your own business and everyone learns what it takes to be employed or to support their own practice after graduation. We even have an incubator unit to help graduates build their own business.
BEING A CSAD STUDENT