Oca Showcase 09 Issue 03

SHOWCASE Open College of the Arts



2009 No. 3

Gareth Dent, Chief Executive reflects on 18 months in post

One of the joys of the OCA is that there is never a slack period. Unlike traditional education, which pulls down the blinds in July and decamps until the autumn, our students continue to start new courses and complete existing courses twelve months of the year. The one annual cycle is the production of a new Guide to Courses. Even in the web age, many people and institutions still rely on a paper prospectus and this is our annual opportunity to set out our stall. It is one we take seriously because we know that, for example, a Guide in a busy public library could be consulted many times. So what has changed and what does this say about the way the OCA is changing? Firstly, all of the courses in the new guide are accredited. They all form part of a pathway to a qualification. This is not because we are against learning for personal development. Absolutely not. As an earlier Secretary of State for Education, David Blunkett, once said: ‘[learning]...helps us fulfil our potential and opens doors to a love of music, art and literature. That is why we value learning for its own sake...’ We want to offer progression, opportunities to develop skills and creativity that we can support over time to enable students to flourish.

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Inside

Cover story continued... 3

Student: Sarah Scales - The Third Way

Tutor: Jim Unsworth - Elephants as metaphor

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Showcase is published by the Open College of the Arts.

Who’s who at OCA

Open College of the Arts

The Michael Young Arts Centre, Unit 1B, Redbrook Business Park Wilthorpe Road, Barnsley S75 1JN Telephone: 01226 730495 Email: [email protected] Web: www.oca-uk.com Registered charity no: 327446 Company limited by guarantee no: 2125674 OCA welcomes contributions to Showcase but reserves the right to edit materials at its discretion. Views and opinions expressed in Showcase are not necessarily those of OCA, nor does the inclusion of an item, insert or advertisement constitute a recommendation. To amend your contact details or to give feedback – please contact Dee Whitmore, Marketing and Events, on 01226 704364 or email: [email protected]

Andrew Watson Andrew joined the OCA in April 2009 as Director of Development. He will be working with Gareth Dent on strategic planning, and helping to push forward developments such as the prison education project funded by the Lankelly Chase Foundation. He will also take a particular interest in music provision (alongside Course Leader Patric Standford), as he is both a harpsichordist and (aspiring!) jazz pianist. Andrew’s CV includes experience with the voluntary sector (working with homeless alcoholics), the public sector (a former local authority Education Officer and Careers Adviser) and the private sector (consultant with

Pricewaterhouse Coopers and as director of his own business).

Kathy Petts Kathy joined the OCA on a temporary 8 week contract in 1991, packing the guide to courses (it was all done by hand back then). 18 years later she is an invaluable member of the fulfilment team as warehouse manager. Kathy has two children and has recently become a grandmother. Her interests include reading, walking and exotic pets including snakes, bearded dragons, spiders and crazy cats.

Success by degrees The OCA would like to congratulate the latest students on their degree success:

BA Honours in Creative Arts • Joan Barker: First Class Honours • Valerie Rath: Second Class Honours (upper division) • Parthenopi Mouskatou Christodoulidou: Second Class Honours (lower division) • Anthony Hobbs: Second Class Honours (lower division)

BA in Creative Arts • Caroline Hockley

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Speaking about her achievement Joan Barker said: “I have been studying with the Open College of the Arts since 2004. I am absolutely delighted to have achieved this award. It would not have been possible without the support of the OCA tutors. I would like to thank Rhonda Fenwick and John Cartmel Crossley (sadly deceased) for their guidance and encouragement. I found the work I produced under their tutorage both fascinating and progressive. I am just so thrilled.” The graduation ceremony will take place at Buckinghamshire New University, High Wycombe on Monday 7th September

key component of the course is that it recognises that intended output may be a short piece to support a video on YouTube or Vimeo rather than a symphony. The third change is even less obvious when flicking through the pages of the Guide. We are now working far more closely with our tutors. New course leaders assist the head office team to understand what works and what doesn’t and what tutors need to ensure students can get the best out of their courses. Course leaders are also increasingly active in the OCA student forums, clarifying points for students and provoking thought around the courses.

Continued from cover... For this reason we have widened the range of level one photography courses, introducing People and Place as a successful new course which leads directly into our level 2 Landscape and Social Documentary photography. It is why we have added Digital Film at level 1. It is also why we have added Visual Studies to the art history stream and why we will add Illustration to the fine art Detail from a photograph by Shirley Plowright courses later this year.

Emphasising the changes has the danger of appearing to say everything needs to change. Yet there is a powerful case for continuity, since the OCA still provides - now as ever - a highly flexible way for students to develop their creativity and skills. Nowhere is that more evident than in the work chosen to illustrate the guide, some of which is reproduced here. The OCA head office is a strange place, oddly distant from the experience of artistic endeavor, and yet three times a year when work arrives for assessment it becomes like an oasis in the desert after the rain, as work of outstanding quality emerges from the packing materials. We know how good our student work is and that doesn’t change. You will however be seeing more of it over the coming months.

Detail of a piece by Penelope Stevenson

Secondly, we are reviewing and updating courses, ensuring the content is relevant to today’s learners. Nowhere is this more obvious than in our composing music courses. Quietly, and with far less fanfare than in photography, the business of composing music has changed. No longer is it the preserve of a tousle haired individual at a grand piano with sheets of manuscript paper, rather the keyboard has replaced the keys and the score can be emailed to the tutor, listened to, tweaked and returned. Equally radically the nature of music has changed and a 3

Student: Sarah Scales

The Third Way When I decided to work towards a degree with the OCA, I was intrigued by sculpture as I had never done any 3D work before, and decided to give it a try, even if it meant getting a low mark, because I know I would be trying out something completely different. I have always enjoyed experimenting with art, and I am happy to make mistakes if it means understanding new approaches and progressing. The Sculpture 1 course offered a whole range of sculpting techniques using different materials such as; relief work, carving, casting, construction and modelling. Having face-to-face tuition was really helpful, and I looked forward to meeting my tutor Alan, who is very supportive and motivates me tremendously. I think that it is really important to be tutored by a working sculptor, one who is also progressing their own work and is excited by new ideas. When I first looked at the course notes I was concerned about the overall cost but I managed to source some materials really cheaply, such as wood carving tools from the

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internet, and wood from a large cedar tree near to my home which was being made safe and cut back. So although the materials described in the course notes seemed daunting, you can find what you need cheaply if you shop around. What I really started to understand from this course was how to see something three-dimensionally, what it looks like from all angles, and how it fits into its surroundings. This approach has really helped me with my drawings and I think about what I am drawing or painting quite differently now, my style is much more freed up and when I draw I am automatically thinking about the three-dimensional form, how it will translate into sculpture, and what techniques and materials to use. I attend a life drawing group weekly and found that it is the quick warm up sketches that often become sculptures because they have more vitality and movement in them.

My favourite pieces that I have produced are often the simplest, least complex and most expressive. I enjoy sculpting with plaster, and the speed with which I have to work; or using windfall branches without cutting into them. I find that striving to be accurate is restrictive and sometimes it’s the imperfections of a piece that make it work and give it energy. With the Sculpture 1 course, I know that I have learned so much in such a short space of time. I would now like to find out more about how to go about possibly exhibiting and teaching sculpture, there are no classes in my area, and I am sure that people would be interested in learning. The other aspect which I didn’t consider before doing sculpture is that they are often free standing and you have to think how your sculpture will stand and balance, not just the finished piece, but all the time that you are creating it too. Every sculpture has its own individual challenges presenting new questions with different solutions. I sometimes visit the V&A museum to sketch and learn about sculptors, and when I am there I also visit the architectural section too, as I think the logistics behind architecture translate into sculpture.

In the meantime, I am looking forward to starting Sculpture 2.

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Tutor: Jim Unsworth

Elephants as metaphor Jim Unsworth has been an OCA fine art tutor for 4 years. After gaining a first class honours degree in fine art at the University of Reading he has worked from studios in London and has sculpture in public collections in the UK and the United States. Jim is one of a small group of tutors running the OCA’s webcam sculpture tuition pilot. Elephants feature heavily in your work, what draws you to

Making large sculptures takes more time. They are heavier and

them as a subject?

inevitably the cost of production is greater. Small sculptures are

Essentially it is man’s relationship to animals, in particular to elephants that inspires me to want to express my ideas through

made after the large ones. Smallness does not possess exclusive

them. I use the elephant as a motif or vehicle to express complex

rights to intimacy, hopefully some of my larger pieces have this

ideas about the world we live in. I see them as a metaphor both

also.

for man’s relationship to animals and for man’s relationship to himself: the nature of wild, captive or tame; the nature of freedom and control; the nature of partnership and individuality. My personal relationship to elephants is particular; childhood memories, early experiences of the circus, of seeing an elephant for the first time and re-living the wonderment that something so visually awkward yet ultimately so sophisticated could exist in the world. The form and spirit of elephants are fascinating - prehensile trunks that often become serpent-like; large, padded, silent feet; folds of skin; a beady eye. They possess a great sincerity and humility often tinged with humour. They have immense strength yet are very gentle. They have both male and female attributes, can be aggressive or placid. They engage with us as equals, and they relate to us with a closeness which is always awe-inspiring and often acutely disarming. Elephants are a great challenge to make. You work at both an intimate and massive scale. Could you describe how you go about planning and making one of the large pieces? There is little difference in how I approach making large sculptures or small ones. The intention is the same. I try to create work with a sense of life and movement, and with a response to the material being used which enhances the idea being expressed. The inventive use of material is crucial in giving the objects that I make vitality and spirit.

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easier to exhibit and produce in bronze. Often the small works are

Is the use of recycled materials driven by economic necessity or is it a statement? Recycled material, scrap steel, does have quite a different feel from steel bought straight from the factory. It has usually been through the manufacturing process and, more often than not, is crushed and misshaped in some unpredictable way. This gives me great opportunities to find more natural and rhythmic forms to make use of as I make my work. Steel that I find in the scrap yard is appropriated, cut, welded and sometimes forged to construct my sculptures. The materials’ original properties are part of the sculptures formulation as it would be with clay, wax, wood or whatever. New steel is better for representing more architectural forms such as the circus podiums which act as foils for the movement above. Who would you say have been the biggest influences on your work? Initially the sculptors who influenced both my work and my approach to making were David Smith, Anthony Caro and Philip King, painters such as Terry Frost, Clyde Hopkins and Mali Morris all of which except Smith taught me at Reading University. I have always looked at and gained so much insight from Matisse, Picasso, Rembrandt, Rodin and Michelangelo especially in their use of material and expression of ideas. How one is formed as an artist is rich and complex and is not always readily understandable, nor should it be. Living one’s life, likes, dislikes, prejudices, personal history all contribute to what forms you as an artist. The amount of stimulus that you get from looking at artists work, of all types, periods and cultures

is incalculable and invaluable. One’s precursors are influential though. Finally what are you working on at the moment? I have just picked up several bronzes from the foundry, some of which have places to go, others don’t. I am continuing to work on a large seated elephant holding a ball in steel. It is about three metres tall. I like to have at least one large piece on the go in the studio where it will be worked on intermittently over time until it is complete. I have just begun a new series of smaller sculptures, some made directly in wax, others in clay. I am hoping to broaden the circus theme to some extent but I don’t know fully where this will lead yet. I am excited though.

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