In your first year you'll study with our partner, ARU College. This module will provide you with the necessary skills to begin studying at level 4 in art, design and related courses. You'll be introduced to the core skills necessary to succeed in higher education, including researching and referencing appropriately, demonstrating appropriate ICT skills, and communicating effectively verbally and in writing. You will be introduced to practical art and design skills including developing skills of visual storytelling, image-making both in traditional and digital media, visual language and communication, formulating an independent creative response to a broad range of subject matter. You'll also be introduced to the fundamentals of design from a creative perspective, and to some of the key ideas/movements dominating art, design and culture, during the past few centuries. You will work extensively in groups and collaboratively, with students from art and design, architecture and engineering pathways. The module is made up of the following eight constituent elements: Interactive Learning Skills and Communication (ILSC); Information Communication Technology (ICT); Composition and Style; Creative Workshops 1; Approach to Design; Critical and Contextual Studies; Creative Workshops 2; Specialist Project.
This year-long module will introduce you to key areas of fine art practice and will encourage you to approach the development of your individual artistic identity critically and analytically. You will use a range of investigative procedures to establish a coherent direction for your practice, along with an understanding of its context within the field of international contemporary art. You’ll address both intellectual and practical competences within your individual outlook, and will be supported to explore new areas or media. Teaching processes will include tutorials, lectures, seminars, technical inductions, group critiques, student presentations, an exhibition, and several field trips. This includes introductory seminars into sculpture / installation, painting, and photographic media. You will also be introduced to the basic skills necessary for various approaches through technical inductions and seminars. For the end-of-year exhibition you will work on a live brief, developing your key professional practice skills, including curatorial practice, project management, team work, advertising and marketing, exhibition promotion and poster design, and the technical aspects of exhibition installation. You will be encouraged to locate issues and problems within both your work and the work of others, employing a self-motivated approach to problem solving within a system of tutorial supervision and guidance.
View the full module definitionThis module examines the critical histories of modern and contemporary art in the West, and beyond, from the nineteenth century to the present day. Through lectures and field trips, you'll learn about some of the key historical people and ideas that have shaped the landscape of modern and contemporary art in which you are working as practitioners today. You'll have the opportunity to gain confidence discussing ideas that are central to critical debates on art and its histories. You'll explore movements such as modernism, postmodernism and appropriation. You'll also have the chance to consider how art has been influenced by technological advances, from photography to recent digital technologies. By introducing you to a critical history of art, this module provides an essential historical and cultural framework through which you can begin to place your own studio practice. Seminars will create opportunities for you to conduct visual analyses of artworks in order to explore how form, content and material all work together to create an artwork’s effects. In this module there will be an emphasis on developing competency in core academic skills that will prepare you for critical and contextual studies in art and design at higher levels. This module will build your confidence in key transferable skills that are necessary in higher education and professional practice.
View the full module definitionThis module explores how critical theory can open up new ‘ways of seeing’ art and show how it shapes the ways in which we think about contemporary art today. You'll be introduced to some of the influential conceptual frameworks that are often used to analyse artworks and exhibitions, such as theories of feminism, Marxism, psychoanalysis, decolonisation and philosophy. Through a series of lectures and seminars, you'll explore how these ideas and approaches can help to connect artistic practice to broader questions of economics, politics, gender, ethics and sustainability. Seminars will create opportunities for you to build confidence speaking about art using a critical vocabulary. They will also provide an important forum for you to use critical theories to discuss and analyse the artworks that inspire you. In this module there is an emphasis on thinking about the critical position of your own developing studio practice. This module will prepare you to speak and write about your own work in relation to wider histories and theories of art.
View the full module definitionOn this module you will explore a variety of approaches to drawing, ranging from individual projects that respond to specific Fine Art contexts within a working brief, to life drawing workshops, using a range of media, which introduce key approaches to observational drawing. You will approach this from a number of perspectives through various exercises / activities, including the relationship of drawing to painting, drawing as a notational processes; collage; use of primary and secondary source material; observational drawing using perspective or chiaroscuro; ideas of contingency and method. Each of these areas will be introduced in order for you to expand and enlarge upon your own drawing vocabulary and practice. As a group you will be guided through introductory presentations, individual tutorials, seminar discussion of the work of other artists relevant to the particular stage or topic. Field trips to the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge and to West End galleries and Tate Modern in London are integrated into delivery, giving you real-world experience of drawing and painting in a gallery setting, and both a historically-based and international context within contemporary art practice. Teaching and learning is creative and applied at each stage, requiring you to respond directly to working briefs with your own imaginative solutions and ideas, and developing your own individual research methodologies. You will be encouraged to introduce a creative, committed and dynamic approach to drawing, together with a coherent and strong relationship with your ongoing personal work undertaken in the Fine Art core module. Your assessment will take into consideration both your research and portfolio of work, and will take the form of a studio review through artwork installations in individual studio spaces.
View the full module definitionThis module complements Fine Art Practice 1, asking you to explore the primacy of ideas, together with their progression and extension, in the context of experimental art. Working briefs will require you to move beyond particular material processes with which you are familiar. You will be encouraged to develop an open, explorative and creative approach within your individual projects, and make use a variety of different media (sculpture, photography, video, live art, drawing, assemblage, etc). These will be used in different ways and for various purposes, including documentation, presentation of themes or ideas, notational processes, or through constructed environments. In this context the module introduces the different traditions of de-materialisation, from Marcel Duchamp through to Joseph Beuys, Bruce Nauman or Joseph Kosuth amongst others, together with more recent practices, such as Matthew Barney or Santiago Sierra. Learning new technological processes is a key aspect of this module, with the option to work within photography, digital imaging and video. Teaching and learning is creative and applied at each stage, requiring you to respond directly to working briefs with your own imaginative solutions and ideas, and developing your own individual research methodologies. This module is ideas-based, asking you to be open to new and innovative ways of working. It will encourage you to be rigorous through experimentation, practice, text-based research and the development and sustenance of ideas, and also introduces technology-enhanced processes for the development of Fine Art work. Activities will include power-point presentations, film screenings, text readings, group seminars, one-to-one tutorial sessions, and a field trip. Research is an important aspect of this module, and a field trip to galleries and project spaces in London is integrated into delivery, giving you real-world experience of the context for experimental art within international contemporary art practice, and its development within institutional frameworks such as Tate Modern Turbine Hall installations. In this way, the module serves as a broad introduction to cutting-edge contemporary art practice on an international stage.
View the full module definitionKnowledge of a foreign language can be a major asset both in your academic and professional life. The Anglia Language Programme offers you the opportunity to study a foreign language as part of your course.
This module will be central to the development of your studio practice and artistic identity, encouraging you to expand and deepen your studio practice. You will explore new directions and test your individual practices, using a range of investigative procedures to establish a broader cultural and visual arts context, helping you develop your artwork within a critical framework in the field of international contemporary art. You will examine in greater detail the intellectual and practical competences within your individual studio inquiries, exploring and experimenting with new media where relevant or necessary. You will continue to explore your ideas by analysing the strengths and weaknesses of your studio work in terms of its practical construction and conceptual rigour, in relation to your level 4 achievements. Teaching processes will include one-to-one tutorials, lectures, seminars, technical inductions, group critiques, student presentations, on-site exhibitions, and several field trips, as well as professional practice sessions covering professional development and employability related content, (e.g. curation, practising artist talks, website building, and support networks).You will also be encouraged to contribute to and participate in off-site exhibition programmes both in Cambridge and further afield, and two on-site Ruskin Gallery balcony exhibitions working to a live brief.
View the full module definitionThis module builds on the histories, contexts, and theories introduced at Level 4, and is designed to enable you to build a framework in which to situate yourself and your developing practice as a critical, creative practitioner. With the support of lectures, seminars, as well as independent reading and research, you will consider your work, as well as the work of other creative professionals, within broader historical, theoretical, and critically informed contexts. You'll also start to engage with the ethical considerations and responsibilities that are increasingly urgent for professionals working in the creative industries today and begin to develop an increasingly detailed theoretical knowledge of your discipline. You'll explore and examine critical issues and debates within a variety of creative practices, through examples that address, complicate and problematise key topics which you will analyse in depth. The curriculum content is responsive, meaning that learning activities are open and flexible, and function in relationship to current events, discourses, and emerging debates.
View the full module definitionRuskin Modules are designed to prepare our students for a complex, challenging and changing future. These interdisciplinary modules provide the opportunity to further broaden your perspectives, develop your intellectual flexibility and creativity. You will work with others from different disciplines to enable you to reflect critically on the limitations of a single discipline to solve wider societal concerns. You will be supported to create meaningful connections across disciplines to apply new knowledge to tackle complex problems and key challenges. Ruskin Modules are designed to grow your confidence, seek and maximise opportunities to realise your potential to give you a distinctive edge and enhance your success in the workplace.
This module provides an opportunity to explore your creative practice through the medium of printmaking. The programme of study will demonstrate how you can utilise a variety of printmaking processes, in conjunction with fieldwork and research, to articulate ideas and explore new possibilities in image making. Both traditional and photo-based printmaking processes will be introduced, allowing you an opportunity to explore the medium of printmaking to align with your individual creative interests. The emphasis throughout the course will be on the integration of technique and practice to explore ideas and concepts. By exploring the printmaking workflow, from the hand-rendered, to the photographic and the digital, you'll experiment with approaches to printmaking to enable a clearer understanding of the medium and how it can be a key component of your creative thinking and wider practice. You'll be expected to complete set tasks and to conduct contextual research to support your work. You'll be expected to share your creative outcomes and research though participation in class discussions. Tutorial guidance will be given to help develop your practice and research.
This module provides an opportunity to develop creative works through a variety of three-dimensional media. You'll be guided through workshops exploring different media options available in the 3D technical facilities such as, wood, plaster and ceramics. You'll also be invited to research and experiment with other spatial practices and approaches, concerning the dynamics of space and the physical movement of the body or audience. The incorporation of other expanded media and materials such as moving image, sound, photography, ephemeral material and digital media will also be introduced as options to also be explored through installation. You'll be introduced to key concepts and the history of spatial and three-dimensional practices and through lectures and discussions. For successful completion of this module you'll continue to conduct your own contextual research, to inform the decisions you are making in the development of your work/s.
The Archive: Creative Futures module invites you to work directly with archives holding visual historic materials, and critically engage with the archive through creative practice. These archival documents cover photographs, illustrations, fine art, graphic design, fashion and many other visual expressions. Additional to the visual material, you'll have access to contextually relevant material such as magazines, publications and even personal notes. The module will guide you in untangling the often challenging and problematic material via a decolonial context. You'll develop critical and creative research tools that allow you to challenge historic societal prejudices often contained within the materials. You'll explore how the material can be considered, challenged and ethically (re)used through (re)invention and (re)contextualisation. As creative practitioners, you'll engage with the content of the archive in a non-traditional way, developing creative responses that celebrate the diversity of human experience. Through lectures, archive visits, seminars and workshops, we'll seek access points to activate the material through your contemporary creative practice. No prior knowledge of historic colonial narratives is needed, the module will provide a space in which these complex themes can be discussed and engaged with. You'll be guided in developing individual and collaborative positionalities, producing ethical responses and meaningful creative outcomes. Throughout the module, you'll prepare your outcomes for potential publication by bringing together ideas, challenges, successes and epiphanies and reintroducing your responses into the archive to continue the circular archival process.
In this module you'll explore how a creative response can be shaped by, and respond to, the unique characteristics of a specific site. You'll investigate the relationship between the production of a creative outcome and the context of a distinct environment. You'll be introduced to and guided through the application of methods and approaches to making creative work for a specific context. You'll consider how architectural, spatial, historical, material, environmental and cultural elements can influence and lead creative and curatorial decisions. Working directly with an external partner site, you'll develop and execute a creative work that responds to the context of the site and its identity. You'll develop skills in adaptive thinking, contextual research, and interdisciplinary approaches, culminating in a public-facing exhibition or installation that reflects the interplay between place, creative outcome, and audience.
On this module you will focus on developing an advanced studio practice, leading to the final Degree Show exhibition in Trimester 2. You will plan, initiate and manage your ongoing studio practice, working toward a range of final outcomes, with in-depth research and development focusing on the specific context within which you are working, and a high level of professional engagement and time management. Throughout this module the varied teaching activities include one-to-one tutorials, critiques and presentations. Additional seminars and briefings will feed into your Personal Development Planning, developed within an enhanced research journal focusing on professional practice, employability skills and future career planning. You will focus on consolidating your research and practice in a final body of professionally developed work, including two key exhibition presentations: the 3rd year Interim exhibition and the final Degree Show. At the outset, you will prepare a proposal for an independent body of work, to be discussed with your supervising tutor. In the first half of the module you will take part in the 3rd year Interim Show, presenting a piece of work from your core module in an exhibition on the Cambridge campus. As a year group you will take on responsibility for producing a creative and professional exhibition, taking on roles such as promotion, curation and coordination. The Degree Show will take place at the end of the module. This is a final public exhibition of your work, giving you a real-word professional exhibition experience. You will develop a Degree Show proposal, produce work to a high exhibition standard and plan, prepare and realise all elements of your exhibition display. You will also be expected to take on responsibilities for the Degree Show as a whole, contributing to its planning and smooth running. A 15 credit component of this module addresses Professional Practice, which focuses on careers for Fine Art graduates, including self-employment, networking, applying for MA Courses, curating, on-line publication and artist’s websites, work experience, developing an artist’s statement, and open-call application writing for competitions and awards. You will be required to submit for a competition at this stage, either internally to ARU or nationally advertised. The module will also include various talks and seminars at related lectures, exhibitions and events in London, Cambridge and elsewhere, including attending Fine Art Research Unit talks and events. You will also take part in a series of presentations toward the middle of the module, engaging with a thorough grounding of both theoretical and practical issues in relation to the given direction of the work.
View the full module definitionThe Research Project is intended to foster your independent study with the individual guidance of a supervisor. For this module, you will devise your own clearly defined project through independent research, with the support of supervisions, lectures, workshops, and field tips. Your project may reflect on, analyse, expand upon, or enhance, your own studio work and interests. Your project will be agreed upon in consultation with academic staff and your supervisor, to ensure suitability and sufficient academic rigour. Your Research Project is an extended piece of work which is intended to strengthen and build upon the work undertaken in your previous years of study. Your project will demonstrate a contribution to knowledge of your field, and show you are able to undertake prolonged and in-depth research that investigates, critically analyses and evaluates your area of study. Throughout the Trimester, you will develop an individual research topic with the support of your supervisor. You are encouraged to take a creative, critical approach to your subject, and there is support for a wide range of topics and approaches. Your project should build upon the links between theory and practice, and engage with critical issues that are relevant to your chosen topic. Throughout the module, you will draw on a range of sources appropriate to your research, that might include: primary and secondary sources; art and design work; archives; databases; visual and material culture; critical literature; multimedia output; your own studio practice; and industry-specific publication. There may be overlaps with your studio-based practice. However, the practice-based work included in the Research Project must academically contribute to the final Research Project in terms of the theoretical and methodological framework contextualising it. At the end of the year, you will have the opportunity to present your work as part of the CSA graduate showcase.
View the full module definitionGaining work experience enhances employability, and work based learning offers you the chance to key gain industry knowledge, skills, contacts and networking opportunities. This module will give you the opportunity to explore a working environment in the industry that you have identified as relevant to your future career. The module will encourage self-managed learning, and serves to enhance your employability by developing communication, personal organisation, team-working, and networking skills and providing opportunities to apply those skills to real-world experiences thereby increasing self-reliance and confidence. The experience can be used as a basis for directing and focusing your career plans and can influence your final year projects. Lectures, group tutorials and seminars will explore skills analysis and reflective writing. You are required to identify, negotiate and agree with an employer (or employers) the terms of the placement or freelance work in association with a module tutor, to ensure that the module learning outcomes can be achieved. You will be given guidance and will be required to submit a placement/freelance registration form and risk assessments for approval by the module tutor. The work may be carried out in a variety of settings depending upon your requirements, areas of interest and availability of opportunities. The minimum period will be a minimum of 100 hours, and you can undertake more than one placement/freelance work for the module. You will also create a workplace diary that logs activity and supports an analysis of the learning achieved during your experience alongside evidence to support your application process. You are also asked to create a reflective report on your work experience. The report will include market and background information on the employer, market sector analysis, an outline your role(s) on the placement(s); academic and vocational analysis; transferable/employability and specialist skills analysis, knowledge and experience analysis; a final evaluation (impact on your final year and career aspirations); and will include copies of the submitted registration and risk assessments and other supporting appendices. Alongside contributing to module sessions and briefings, additional module support will be provided by the Anglia Ruskin University Employability Services through drop-in support and CV Surgery sessions and the Anglia Ruskin Enterprise Academy (AREA). You will also have access to a range of online employability information via the Careers and Employability Portal and AREA network.
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