The change from School to university has been large but different to what i imagined. I knew it would be a ‘jump’ and i wanted to do a foundation course not to figure out which pathway i wanted in art, as i always knew i was painter and am going to pursue painting as a career in the future, but rather to help me calibrate to university level before starting my degree as well as being able to try new aspects of art such as textiles, photography etc which i wasn’t able to try at school on such a ‘touch and go’ basis.
Through the initial stages of the foundation or the pathway phase, we did just that and tried a variety of new methods such as silk screen printing, sewing, weaving, knitting with workshops for using the darkroom and tutorials on photoshop, and from this i feel like i have learned a great deal of rudimentary skills which i wanted to dabble in i would be able but at any greater level i would need further teaching.
The only thing i have found at uni is we haven’t been pushed as much, and i don’t mean a teacher breathing down your neck, but rather that the work load has been fairly light and i have found it frustrating that the project briefs have been relatively short and pretty constraining as just as i was able to get my teeth into one project we had to change so what i have done is continue to develop the bacteria project in my free time. As well as this i haven’t been able to paint much as the studios lack wall space, i have recently managed to sort this out just in time for FMP, which did frustrate for a while but i will get back into it. Overall i have learnt a lot from the initial part of the foundation and part two (bacteria) but to me it does feel like the course is more orientated around vis-comm and fashion rather than fine art, but with the ability to take the reigns for our FMP it shouldn’t really matter and i’m excited to see what i can do
Harry Toller 