Summer school, Day 3: 12th August

Moving away from the sketchbooks and the personal aspect, this lesson was more about future options and opportunities. At the start of class we all spoke about whether we were interested in university and career options; a mind map was made of jobs that certain courses could lead to, including: graphic designer, landscape artist, illustrator, fashion designer and more. 

Kat asked us what GCSEs and other qualifications were needed for certain jobs and this then led to the group visiting the UCAS website and sampling examples of different courses and what was needed to get on to them. A different amount of UCAS points and level of passes is needed for different courses and universities and I need to look further into this. 

The rest of the day was independent learning. In order to gain more research and possibly some inspiration, my friend Heather and I decided to spend our afternoon visiting the Cooper Gallery. The exhibition that we visited is titled "Yorkshire Made me" and is full of great men and women from different professions and areas from all around Yorkshire, it has brought them all together in one exhibition to celebrate Yorkshire Day. (I have quite a lot to say about the exhibition along with photographs, so I have decided to write it all in a seperate post, Cooper Gallery: Yorkshire Made me.)

This was the last day of Summer School, overall I found it to be very helpful towards my sketchbook work and really informative towards my UCAS work.

Summer School, Day 2: 11th August

This time we looked further into what a sketchbook is and what makes one up. Kat brought out a huge pile of old sketchbooks from previous students and I'll be honest; what I saw slightly surprised me. I had known that sketchbooks could be creative and that the purpose was to make it your own, but I saw that they could be more than just sketches with a few scribbled annotations — they can be personal and busy and crowded; sketchbooks are made unique through different formats and ways. Pages can be ripped, burned, cut and coloured; or they can be left crisp and white, which is what I've always done and which is what some people prefer. 

The content of each sketchbook differs from person to person and as I was looking through the sketchbooks I selected and was asked to comment on them, I realised that it is sometimes difficult to make each page different to the last. Below are a few pages/sketchbooks I enjoyed and why.

This page was one of my favourites because of this section here, the cording. I don't know if this was intentional but it looks like the shape of a tree, which I enjoyed because of a similar silhouette I painted in my sketchbook, and the colours spattered over it are a lovely combination in my opinion.

This sketchbook was very personal and when I flicked through it, I felt a little like I was intruding and that I shouldn't really be looking. The pages made me start thinking about including some more personal aspects into my own sketchbook and to possibly start including my own troubles, like this student did. 

I loved this section, due to the amount of colours and how intricate and delicate the weaving appears. Another aspect I enjoy is the number of different materials involved, in my opinion it shows thought and creativity and makes the weaving look even better due to how it mixes it up — I would possibly like to learn this technique myself. 

After looking at the sketchbooks we discussed with Kat what was possibly missing from our own sketchbooks and one thing mentioned (as discussed last entry) was a personal aspect which I think needs to be mixed more into my annotations. Questions asked were related to family, friends and possibly objects; I realised that I needed to start writing in my annotations why certain people, places and objects were being included in my sketchbook, what/how much they mean to me, who people are to me and even how we met.

 

Summer School, Day 1: 10th August

When I first heard about Summer School I wasn't entirely sure what it would involve but I felt curious to find out, to find out about the upcoming academic year and to try and get back into the feel of college before it properly began.

Day one Kat spoke to us about Art and Design and the difference between the two; the group discussed how they are all linked and that all art — whether landscape, portrait, installation, photography, and more — needs a design. I found out that art is subjective; I agree with this, everyone certainly has different opinions on art and what makes it up. In my opinion, art needs a story behind and needs to evoke an emotion within the viewer, making them question the piece and become curious about what they are viewing.

The group made a mind map of different art styles: for example, landscape based art, interior design/3D, illustration, fine art and others. My favourite is portrait drawing. I adore trying to capture a person's likeness, essence and personality all in one image (whether the portrait is a painting, drawing, photograph, collage...)

We viewed Picasso's Weeping Woman and were asked our opinion; my thoughts on this painting are that it's slightly eerie, in all honesty. It isn't a painting I particularly like because I feel the colours aren't linked to the emotion the woman is feeling, and I don't favour abstract art. However, it is obvious that the woman is distraught/distressed and that Picasso thought about her expression and emotions and how he felt he would convey them. 

"Why is she crying?" was inquired and this led to us being told that whoever is on our sketchbook needs to have a reason for being there, and that they must mean something to us. We then spoke about personal life and annotating our sketchbooks with explanations about  certain people and what they mean to us. 

This lesson made me start thinking about making my annotations more thought out and to include more family and friends, and to make my sketchbook more personal.