FOUNDATION D EGREE IN art enterprise
Welcome from the Principal I am delighted to have this opportunity to welcome you to Leeds City College.Thank you for choosing to study a Higher Education course with us. We have received external recognition that our HE provision is among the best in the region, following an HE inspection, carried out by the Higher Education Quality Assurance Agency in May 2011. (The QAA inspects all Universities and colleges.) I am delighted to report the inspection results were excellent and confirmed the very high quality of our HE programmes. We regularly seek the views of our students on the quality of their courses and use this information to make improvements. Student satisfaction is consistently high, with students commenting on the level of support provided and the quality of feedback they receive on their work. At Leeds City College we know that the whole HE experience is at the heart of student success. That’s why, in addition to the actual teaching and learning experience, our campuses have a friendly, supportive atmosphere and we offer a wide range of additional personal support services which cater for all individual needs. We hope you enjoy your time with us.
This Start Up Guide aims to provide you with a quick overview of the course* and it’s content, and will also introduce you to some of the key staff and stakeholders (these are established ‘creatives’ involved in the development of the course). For more detailed information, you will need to refer to the Course Handbook. Now that you have enrolled, the aim is to offer you all possible help and support to enable you to gain the qualification, prepare you to be successful in the creative industries and also for progression onto a BA (Hons) Degree Top-Up course if you should choose. The team is looking forward to meeting you and hopes that your time in Leeds is both enjoyable and successful. Best wishes to you in your future studies. Philip Welding Curriculum Area Manager, Foundation Degree in Art Enterprise *validated by Teeside University
The Foundation Degree in Art Enterprise does ‘what it says on the tin’ - it’s all about making art in the real world. It’s about running your own studio, forming your own artists’ collective, organising public-facing events, working collaboratively and finding out about how artists have done this in the past, developing entrepreneurial skills, working with creative mentors and examining their working practice, developing small-scale production techniques and processes, academically challenging the taboo of art and money, writing and presenting proposals for creative enterprises, making funding applications, marketing your work using creative approaches such as social media, running educational workshops based on your own practice, curating exhibitions and working with established galleries and curators - in short, doing what most art students tend to do once they’ve finished their degree. Lying at the heart of all this, and running through the entirety of the course is your own personal creative practice that will be developed both in your studio space and with specialist facility providers, as well as using a range of college-based resources.
for more info go to: artenterpriselcc.blogsot.com
Painting is something that you need to do, if not every day, then certainly most days. It is almost like being a pianist: if you stop, you lose something. John Berger
STUDIO PRACTICE #1
This module is all about you developing ideas and skills for your own creative practice, whether this be painting, printing, animation, sculpture or photography - or whatever your chosen discipline.
Level 4 : semester 1 & 2 : September 2014 - June 2015
You will also be required to document all these activities in either a book or video documentary/scrapbook.
In addition to the day-to-day running of the studio, the key outcomes are: • the production of a portfolio of work • a collaborative public-facing project that has been devised and produced by everybody in the studio.
It is well recognised, that in order to produce any finished art work, it is essential that you fully explore your ideas on a continual basis, in an environment conducive to creative development, that is why you will be provided with your own studio space, independent of the main college building, where you will have almost unlimited access. The results of your creative explorations for this module will both inform, and be informed by, all the other modules of the course - providing the focus for the other modules, and absorbing what you have learnt from them into your own practice as an art entrepreneur.
non-sexual frottage : jamie stonestreet
“There is nothing so stable as change�. Bob Dylan
PRODUCTION SKILLS
A key feature of any art enterprise is the ability to produce affordable art, and for the artist, this usually means producing limited edition works using small-scale production processes. This module will introduce you to a range of these processes that will be delivered at inc workshop, Fab Lab, as well as Leeds City College, and will include:
Level 4 : semester 1 : September 2014 - January 2015
• 3D: laser cutting, ceramics, 3d scanning, woodworking, model making, picture framing • PRINT: screen printing, letterpress, bookbinding, zine production • LENS-BASED MEDIA : dark room processing, video-making, digital photography, post-production. Your evidence for this module will be: • a range of sustainable products using different processes • a production handbook that documents the range of small-scale production processes that you’ve been introduced to It is expected that the skills that you have developed through these different processes will become absorbed into your own creative practice, giving you a greater breadth of work, as well as offering you the potential to place your work in a commercial arena through contacts with retail outlets.
A fab lab (fabrication laboratory) is a small-scale workshop offering (personal) digital fabrication.We are equipped with an array of flexible computer controlled tools that cover several different length scales and various materials, normally limited to mass-production.
FACILITY PROVIDERS : inc WORKSHOP & FAB LAB AIREDALE
Inc Workshop is located in Sheepscar, a 10-minute walk from Leeds City Centre. We are fully equiped with industrial level kit for Screen Print, Woodwork, Upholstery, Picture Framing, Laser Cutting and Jewellery
“Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way�. Edward de Bono
You will do this through the close-study of a functioning creative enterprise, utilising a process of shadowing, interviewing and engagement in the field. This will provide an insight into a range of potential enterprise options, as well as establishing a more contextualised creative practice. To provide the evidence needed for this module, you will need to:
• Produce a Blog that reflects on your personal and creative attributes in relation to career goals The case study coupled with the more inward-looking gaze of the blog; a self-reflection on strengths and weaknesses, will ultimately form a consideration of the steps necessary to achieve your ambitions.
Level 4 : semester 1 : September 2014 - January 2015
• Deliver a 10 minute Presentation of a Case Study based on research into a Creative Enterprise that will include Q&A, and is designed to support the rest of your group
THE CREATIVE ENTREPRENEUR
So that you can get an understanding of how to exist as a creative entrepreneur, it’s important that you see how others function in both the art world and the creative industries.
PHIL WELDING Curriculum Area Manager for Higher Education. I am a photographer and educator, working in Leeds. My photographs combine a documentary approach with a sometimes cinematic and ‘built’ fiction, to create narratives that speak of the real world yet transport us elsewhere. It’s not usual to talk about influences in these kind of situations, but it seems appropriate so I will.
The early black and white conceptual photography of William Wegman, before Man Ray (the dog) entered the scene coupled with Keith Arnatt’s work - something about the humour that had an immediacy akin to an advertising approach - really sucked me in. I see this in the photographs by David Shrigley now. Duane Michals, Calum Colvin, Starn Twins contrasted with Martin Parr and Tony Ray-Jones. This led on to people like Thomas Demand, then Joan Fontcuberta, Taryn Simon, Christian Patterson, Chanarin and Broomberg. Although quite diverse in many ways, there are common elements that inform what I do in ways that are quite satisfying - it is in writing this that I am reflecting on their significance.
scannergram : bethan walton’s shoe : size 5 by luke pearson
“If you got to ask, you ain’t never going to know” Louis Armstrong
when being asked to define jazz
REALISATION SKILLS
At this point in time, you will have spent a whole semester developing your own creative ideas, as well as learning a wide range of small-scale production techniques. You now need to consolidate both of these and apply them to the creation of a product range. Central to all of this will be the product development process, encompassing prototypes, researching outlets and existing products, organising focus groups etc, in addition to negotiating with facility providers to secure the necessary resources. Drawing on your aesthetic language, the module seeks to enable you to recognise the potential of transferring ideas across different disciplines and how this can both enhance your original idea, and open up different markets for your work
Level 4 : semester 2 : January 2015 - June 2015
To complete the module, you will have to: • Write a proposal for a product range and deliver a pitch to a panel of judges • Produce a set of products based on your personal practice, using small-scale production processes that can attain sustainability. You will also need to show evidence of costings. The experience and knowledge you will gain, will equip you with the practical and organisational skills necessary to function in future creative production projects.
non-sexual frottage : jam jar by jonny bass
Level 4 : semester 2 : January 2015 - June 2015
“I think it is in collaboration that the nature of art is revealed”. . Steve Lacy
ART & COLLABORATION
Increasingly, the notion of the artist as an individual is being challenged by a growth in collective and collaborative activity - something that has, more recently, been heightened by the creative potentials for group projects using the internet. However, this is nothing new, and this module seeks to examine the historical presence of collaboration through an exploration of the ‘Art Movements’. By looking at how the ‘movements’ worked collaboratively to create an identity and direction for their work, through their manifestos, group exhibitions and other collective activities, you will be able to contextualise current approaches and identify future opportunities. The outcomes of this module are • a 15000 word written assignment on an historical example of collectice practice • a 10 minute presentation with 5 minutes of Q&A on a contemporary art collective or collaboration with links to your own practice. Through exploring the theoretical terrain of ‘new collectives’ in the overlap between art, business and social networks, you will be able to theorise and articulate the identity of your own artists’ collective, as well as utilise the potential that it holds for your future career as an artist / creative.
KEVIN O’HARE Curriculum Area Manager for Visual Arts Since 2007 I have been pursuing a project entitled Plastic Games that uses the 1970s Connect Four game as a motif.
collaboration reverberate around the making of the works. I am particularly pleased with the draw or Stalemate games. These all-over abstract images openly invite associations with 20th century art. There are all and nothing nods to Neoplasticism, Op, Pop and Minimalism along with Dada, Conceptualism and Process Art.
I print ‘live’ games played with friends and strangers. I game in a series of formats from felt through to woodcuts, stamps and screen prints. Ideas around competition and
I envision an endless series of works with high and low pretentions. I am currently working on a series of ‘formal’ stalemates whereby the result is clearly manufactured for decorative effect and could not possibly be the result of competitive play. I see these as childish analogues to the constant staging of political ‘stalemates’ that simplify and control informed debate.
“There’s no such thing as art, there are only artists” E H Gombrich
In order to achieve the module, you will need to: • Devise and run educational workshop/s, residency projects or installations based on your personal practice, either within an educational or community based institution • Produce a portfolio of work that has a consistent vision At the end of the course you will have developed sufficient knowledge and experience of creative and operational practice, to sustain an existence as a practicing artist outside in the big world.
Level 5 : semester 1 & 2 : September 2015- June 2016
Building on this you will start to shape the direction that your future creative career will take, both creatively and in the way you operate. As well as building a body of work that will form the basis for your End of Year Show, you will also secure studio space for your group, formally create an artists’ collective and run educational workshops.
STUDIO PRACTICE # 2
Just like in your first year, the Studio Practice module runs throughout the whole year, and is central to everything you do. By this time your work and creative practice will have been developed to create a clearly focused portfolio of visual explorations, that has encompassed many of the skills and potentials that you have learnt along the way.
TONY BAKER Curriculum Leader for Photography & Graphics “In 1976 I took it upon myself, in true tongue in cheek fashion, to call myself an artist - this meant that everything I subsequently produced must, ipso facto, be art. Consequently, I’ve never seen any delineation between its’ various disciplines, and work in whichever suits my needs at any given time*.
Whether this comes down to my education as a fine art student at Leeds Poly - which back then, on the cusp of Punk Rock, Patrick Heron described as being the most cutting edge art school in Europe - or whether it’s just in my blood, I don’t know. Whatever the case, it’s what I do - and whether it be my educational or personal art practice, it will always contain that sweet smell of Rock’n’Roll”. *I have been known to take photographs, make videos, write and perform music, produce illustrations, curate exhibitions, design stuff, write stories, make books, print posters, write jokes and other stuff.
“There’s obviously nothing wrong with selling your art only an idiot with a trust fund would tell you otherwise. But it’s confusing to know how far you should take it.” Banksy
ART & MEDIA
As well as having a product (your portfolio of work) and a business structure, you also need to both engage with an audience and market yourself. This can take on many forms ranging from advertising campaigns to word-of-mouth, and in this now-established digital world that we live in, the possibilities are endless.
Level 5 : semester 1 & 2 : September 2015- June 2016
Drawing on the highly innovatory opportunities for creative activity, such as social networking, blogs, on-line exhibitions, digital portfolios, and a whole host of guerrilla-type adaptations of more conventional applications, this module will introduce you to the potential that contemporary media provides (physical and digital), as well as get you to explore it for yourself. You will need to: • Deliver a 10 minute presentation including Q &A, on the research that you have conducted into artists using the media to engage with an audience and promote their work (1000 word count) • Document how you have used media to promote your work to a wider audience Through your research you will be able to apply this knowledge to your own practice and develop an individual approach to engaging your immediate, and wider audience.
TOM POULTNEY Lecturer in Photography and Art & Media My work covers a variety of subjects from commercial portraiture, product photography and personal projects and installation work. I come from an art background and my photographs have been featured in galleries across the country, national press and art magazines, billboards & advertising.
DRINK UP :
images from a project investigating the decline in popularity of working mens clubs in Leeds.
I am a lecturer in photography having worked at Universities and Colleges across the north. I regularly run private tutorials and workshops across Yorkshire to private and commercial photographers.
“As an artist I cater almost exclusively to the rich and well-educated. Sometimes I feel uncomfortable with this� Hans Abbing
You will be assessed on producing the following: • a business proposal including a feasibility study and evidence of funding applications • a report that covers the process that you went through in drawing up a formal constitution for an artists’ collective Throughout this process, you will have developed a clear knowledge of the underpinning business skills needed with which to sustain a future as a functioning artist.
Level 5 : semester 1 & 2 : September 2014- June 2016
Based on the experience that you will have gained from working collectively on collaborative project/s during your previous year, you will be shown in this module how to draw up a formal constitution for an artists’ collective, which, in turn will help you make funding applications for future creative projects. To support this you will also learn and develop business planning skills, such as conducting feasibility studies on which to base a sound business proposal.
THE CREATIVE ENTERPRISE
In order to exist as a practicing artist, it is essential that you set up formal structures within which to operate, this way you will be able to secure funding for your projects, as well as raising your profile within the creative community.
a key feature of the art enterprise course is the involvement of local creative enterprises, known as stakeholders
STAKEHOLDERS : EAST STREET ARTS & DOTS PRINTHAUS
East Street Arts is a contemporary arts organisation in Leeds. Our mission is to focus on the development of artists through our events programme, membership activities, professional development and studio/facility provision.
Dots printhaus is a print workshop run by Joe Duffield and Jonny Akers, who also work with designers, Stuff & Things Collective. “Our enthusiasm for creating a printed piece by hand is always growing and our will to improve from day to day will continue to be a driving force behind our work�.
scannergram : connotation by samuel barran
“Art is a lie that makes us realise truth� Pablo Picasso
“Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art�.
book sculpture by simon murray
Andy Warhol
This module aims to provide you with a context for understanding the commercial practice of art, both in its’ historical development and in contemporary markets.
• a 2500 word essay discussing the relationship between art practice and the art market, with reference to historical and contemporary art • a 10 minute presentation (1500 word equivalent) with Q& A, critically discussing an ethical issue relating to art and patronage Through exploring the space between economic and artistic spheres you will gain insight into the challenges faced by creative practitioners in today’s world - which also witnesses the greatest growth-rate of artworks ever something often attributed to capitalism and it’s’ reward and promotion of innovation - but is this the case?
Level 5 : semester 1 : September 2015 - January 2016
You will need to produce
ART & COMMERCE
Money and commerce is often perceived as a dirty word when it comes to art, yet without it, what are deemed to be ‘great works of art’ would not exist. These tensions between aesthetic practice and market economies throw up a cultural dilemma for many artists concerned with ‘not selling out’, who at the same time wish to sustain an existence as an artist - ‘to sell or not to sell...that is the question’.
PUBLIC EXHIBITION & EVENT
‘If an artist isn’t locked up, slaving away in their metaphorical garret, then they’re out there shamelessly promoting themselves’ - although this may be a bit of an over-exaggeration, there always exists a propensity for an artist to show their work, and the most obvious outlet for all this is in an exhibition. In this module, you will get the opportunity to explore the world of exhibitions, through working closely with curators and gallery directors as well as curating your own exhibitions including the climactic End of Year Show. For this you will be required to:
Level 5 : semester 2 : Januaryr 2016 - June 2016
• produce a case study of two contrasting exhibition co-ordinators / curators • organise, co-ordinate, curate and present two exhibitions, one of which is in a formal gallery context The content for these exhibitions will generally be derived from the studio practice of yourself and other members of your group, however, in some cases you may work on curating exhibitions as part of a gallery’s existing exhibition programme. Documentary evidence and a report evaluating the whole process must be produced alongside the organisational and creative process. (Equiv. word count 2500)
Leeds Gallery Munro House is an independent commercial art gallery in Leeds, specialising in Photography, Illustration and Fine Art , and is run by Ellie Halls Schiadas and Matthew Andrews.
DEAN CLOUGH GALLERY & GALLERY MUNROE HOUSE
The Dean Clough Gallery is a perfect example of art & commerce working side by side, based in Halifax it houses nine galleries in addition to many businesses. Vic Allen is responsible for all exhibitions at Dean Clough “As an artistic director I am a pluralist. I always want to reflect the variety; I just want to reflect the debate in the area.�
CONTACTS 0113 2162138 PHIL WELDING : KEVIN O’HARE : 0113 28462 34 TONY BAKER
:
0113 2846220
TOM POULTNEY
:
0113 2162138
LLEGE HOUSE: PARK LANE CAMPUS & CO 0113 3861997
INC WORKSHOP : 0113 3912547
fab lab aired ale : 01535 606703
making art in the real world