Course summary

There are no rules in illustration. On this course you’ll explore the excitement of the blurred boundaries between contemporary disciplines. You’ll challenge and interrogate the way you think about illustration, imagery and style. Illustration is a way of seeing and understanding the world. Through a variety of techniques, traditional and digital, you’ll discover how to connect and communicate with different audiences across a range of contemporary platforms. What you will learn The course proposes a dynamic learning experience based upon critical discourse within a vibrant creative studio environment. Individual development is supported and nurtured through experimentation, exploration, innovation, and risk-taking. The progressive structure of the course promotes the development of visual thinking and autonomous individual learning. The course offers the opportunity for you to explore diverse outcomes, based upon a reflective and critical understanding of the historical and contemporary contexts in which illustration continues to evolve. The broad based ethos of the course does not prohibit specialism however, and you are encouraged to understand and locate your practice within a range of contexts. This breadth of practice is essential for an exciting dialogue that emerges from the more traditional ideas of illustration through to the newer emergence of challenging and exciting hybrid forms. Individual units are designed to be adaptive to the changing nature of contemporary practice and developing theoretical positions. You are supported in the development of a broad and diverse response to a range of strategies, processes and techniques. You will build an appropriate portfolio of skills for the development of your individual practice, potentially including drawing, printmaking, photography, animation, utilising both digital and analogue approaches. The curriculum acknowledges that the creative process is informed and nourished by your development as an independent, critically self-reflective learner. The Course Team consists of a range of active practitioners and this enhances the currency of the learning experience. Visiting lecturers and industry liaison members also place considerable emphasis on the realities of working within the professional environment and the wider creative community. Approximately 54% of your time will be contact hours, including scheduled teaching sessions, but also supervised time in the workshop or studio. 100% of assessment for this course is coursework based. By the end of the course you will be able to...

• Relate the specialist knowledge and skills that you have developed to contemporary practice.

• Make coherent visual statements integrating observation, analysis, interpretation, and speculation.

• Develop and refine arguments through a continuing engagement with cultural, social, environmental, theoretical and historical contexts.

• Use research skills with an understanding of relevant protocols. Provide reasoned solutions, recognising the uncertainty and limits of knowledge.

• Critically evaluate discourses and practices, making informed judgements using an appropriate range of sources from both within and beyond the field of illustration.

• Apply transferable skills, exercise initiative and personal responsibility.