• Offered for Year: 2024/25

• Module Leader(s): Professor Katie Cuddon
• Other Staff: Professor Jane Wilson, Miss Michele Allen, Professor Wolfgang Weileder, Professor Christopher Jones, Ms Eva Masterman, Ms Tracey Tofield, Professor Catrin Huber, Miss Jennifer Douglas, Professor Louise Wilson, Ms Judith King, Ms Catherine Bertola

• Owning School: Arts & Cultures
• Teaching Location: Newcastle City Campus

Semesters

Your programme is made up of credits, the total differs on programme to programme.

Aims

1. To enable the student to carry out sustained individual enquiry.
2. To encourage the student to further develop and apply appropriate strategies for researching and progressing visual ideas and material.
3. To develop the student’s understanding of professional practice and capacity to work independently.
4. To develop the student’s ability to rigorously assess their work and to place it into context.
5. To encourage the student’s participation in debate around issues pertinent to Fine Art practice.
6. To develop the student’s knowledge and understanding of professional practice in relation to an international cultural context.

Outline Of Syllabus

In this module students concentrate on developing a rigorous, well-managed, informed and independent personal practice. Students develop a body of work directed by choices of medium, studio discipline and subject or theme. Emphasis is placed both on consolidating knowledge, understanding and skills developed in Stage 2 of the Programme and on further exploring formal, conceptual and technical aspects of practice. Methods employed in the documentation and public presentation of artwork are explored. The module also includes a period of study of one semester’s length in an art institution abroad. This introduces students to issues relevant to the internationalisation of systems of Fine Art production and ideas of ideological and cultural diversity.

The module proceeds by means of a schedule of tutorials with the student’s studio tutor, group critiques, lectures from the Visiting Speakers’ programme and a programme of practice related seminars. In addition, students may receive tutorials from visiting artists, are encouraged to make use of the surgery tutorial system to request tutorials with specific members of staff and to participate in discipline-specific forums. Also included is the regular upkeep of a studio notebook/sketchbook, in digital or physical form, that records and reflects upon research, progress and outputs. In addition, students are required to write a reflective report on their experience on exchange and its significance for the development of their practice.

Teaching Methods

Teaching Activities

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

Most Guided Independent Study, including project work and skills practice is focused on the individual development and production of experimental and fully realised artworks, including research and preparation such as sketch books, test pieces and technical trials. The regular upkeep of a studio notebook/sketchbook records and reflects upon research, progress and outputs.

Scheduled leaching and learning activities such as workshops, demonstrations, individual tutorials and small group teaching will also be conducted present in person in the Fine Art studios and workshops (or synchronous online if necessary).

Tutorials facilitate the development of the student’s understanding and skills in all aspects of their practice: organisational, developmental, formal, conceptual, technical, contextual and professional. They also nurture the student’s ability to evaluate and reflect, to articulate their ideas and debate issues relevant to their practice. Group critiques foster the student’s ability to reflect critically on their own work and that of others and to formulate reasoned responses to the views of others.

Skills-based workshops allow students to broaden their range of technical skills, exploring new means of making or developing an existing methodology. Students are also encouraged to choose from a range of discipline-specific Forums, which provide the space for conversations within a particular area of art practice, such as Painting, Performance or Film. These groups enable discussion around both technical skills and ideas/artists pertinent to the discipline, helping students situate their work within the context of contemporary practice. Professional practice workshops help prepare students for the assessment submission process, whilst developing skills essential for life as a creative practitioner after graduation.

The Visiting Speakers’ Programme extends the student’s awareness of the spectrum of Fine Art practice and the different ways in which theory might relate to and sustain practice. It also provides a wide range of examples of approaches to developing a practice and presenting and documenting artwork.

Study Abroad will include equivalent modes of teaching and learning offered by the host institution as a natural and enriching part of international exchange.

Nb. Scheduled teaching and learning activities will typically be conducted present in person in the Fine Art studios and workshops. Teaching methods may be liable to adjustment in response to changes to Government and University Covid-19 advice and restrictions. PiP teaching would be substituted by equivalent synchronous and asynchronous online delivery. Where scheduled teaching and learning activities are delivered via non-synchronous online sessions they will be followed by a synchronous on-line drop-in Q&A session.

Assessment Methods

The format of resits will be determined by the Board of Examiners

Other Assessment

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The portfolio will focus on the physical and/or documentary evidence of the student’s creative practice supported by other contextual, research and reflective material. This enables assessment of the full range of a student’s engagement with the module in relation to: sound research and developmental methods; technical processes and materials; identification of subject matter; formal and conceptual considerations; contextual understanding; independent planning, management and direction of their practice; critical self-reflection and professional practice. It will show the basis and development of a viable and effective creative practice and its capacity to develop a body of art work towards resolution.

Where a student is studying at an exchange institution that conducts assessments and awards a mark, we will convert this mark using our mark conversion table. This mark will be used as the studio mark for the semester in question. Where a student is studying at an institution that doesn't have assessments or awards a Pass/Fail, we ask for a digital portfolio to be submitted according to specific guidelines. This portfolio will be marked against the Newcastle assessment criteria by studio staff in Newcastle.

Students should select to take only comparable studio modules at their host institution. Where this isn't possible and an additional Art History or Theory module is selected in order to make up the required number of credits, all module marks will be converted to arrive at a comparable overall mark for FIN3013 with the credit weightings of the modules taken in the exchange institution reflected in that overall module mark.

Reading Lists

• FIN3013's Reading List

Timetable

• Timetable Website: www.ncl.ac.uk/timetable/
• FIN3013's Timetable