On  12 / 2 / 15 the MFA 1st year participated in Art Parlour. This was a workshop run by UAL alumni from across three colleges. The workshop was aimed to open discussion about life after college for a fine art student.

 

The morning session, run by Rosalie Schweiker, looked at communication, in particular using diagrams.

Rosalie encouraged us to think about our practice by asking us to fill in diagrams she had created. I chose to fill in a drawing of a bowl of jelly. In the jelly there were kiwis, a fruit that stops the jelly setting. The jelly was to signify our art practice and the kiwis a metaphor for things that hold us back. It was a light-hearted look at visual communication but with a more serious agenda.

 

In the afternoon Holly and Scott took a more confrontational approach as we discussed topics such as artistic rigour, context, networking, approaching curators and the profile of Wimbledon Art College. We had read two texts on the working artist, these prompted discussion on where we saw ourselves after the course. We touched on other topics such as the arrogance of painting, and paying to exhibit, both subjects encouraged fierce debate.

 

Outcomes: Initially I felt quite deflated by the discussions but on further reflection I appreciated the way they had shaken us up and given us food for thought and prompted lots of debate.

I took quite a few positives from the day. I enjoyed being shown the fast diagrammatical way of communicating, putting a sense of fun into bringing across ideas. We decided as a group to instigate a reading group for relevant texts. We took on board the need to be more constructively critical of each other’s work.