NUS FE zones Conference, Palace hotel, Manchester, 30th-31st October

NUS Further Educations zones conference 2012

      When I signed myself up for this conference it wasn't something that I knew a great deal about. NUS to me was getting 20% off ASOS and I was completely unaware of all the hard work and effort that goes on behind the scenes to make sure that we, as students, have the best, the fairest, and the most profitable learning experience throughout our years of studying. I like to try new things though and I saw the conference as a learning opportunity, a chance to learn more about both NUS and further education, which given my current studies as a foundation student could not be more relevant to me, and also a chance to meet new people and to push myself out of my comfort zone. I definitely did all of these things.

      The theme of this years conference was "Explore. Dream. Discover.", a theme I think relevant to any study whether it be fe or he, and as Art and design students at Ravensbourne I think this is something we are particularly good at. Having the creativity to challenge what is happening within the education system, to reimagine our learning and our welfare, is a fundamental characteristic of all those I met involved with NUS and with their student unions and it was inspiring to see people's passion for their fellow students and for what is right. Most attending the fe zones conference were presidents/vice-presidents of their student unions within their colleges of thousands of students, officers who work everyday to improve student life and education; leaving me, a mere foundation student on an fe course at a university, a little bit like a duck out of water; but as someone pointed out to me it is us students that all this work is for, and its important that we understand all the work going on on our behalf.

      I attended a number of different workshops over the two days relating to different aspects of fe, problems which need to be tackled and ways in which these can be solved. Fe encompasses a much wider range of study outside of art foundation courses and so I tried to attend sessions relevant to fe students at Ravensbourne. With a lot of current focus on qualification reform, the future of apprenticeships, unemployment issues etc, I found some of the sessions, though interesting, were not really issues faced by students doing an art foundation course.

      One of the issues which really interested me is that of FE loans, and the opposition of the governments plans to implement loans for students over the age of 24 studying a level 3 course. I can understand that the idea of having to pay fees and taking out a loan, compared to a free course is going to discourage mature students from going back into further education, but with my art foundation course having a fee for those over 19 I find it unfair that this does not comply with age limits across the rest of further education, and don't see the equality in no loan being available  for this age gap between 19-24. The government have said that any mature students studying an access to higher education level three course will have this loan debt written off on completion of an he degree. An art foundation is arguably a platform to higher education enabling you to build up a better portfolio for a much stronger degree application in design and I think that financial support for art foundation students should reflect this.
      NUS is working to tackle the issue of loans and though it is unlikely that they will be able to deter the government from implementing this they are working towards making sure the detrimental impact this has on mature students is reduced. As a young foundation student planning to go on to university debt from student loans is inevitable for me so perhaps I find it hard to sympathise with those older, already with financial loans and mortgages etc to whom these fe loans will have a significant impact. I've no doubt that the fe committee at NUS will do everything they can to ensure a positive outcome from this issue.

     Student Unions work so hard to ensure they are responding to the needs of students and it is important that their work is recognised and accounted for. I attended a workshop on accountability in a world of freedoms which raised the interesting ideas of where freedom can take us, the opportunities and risks that it presents, and how by demonstrating accountability SUs gain commendation for their work. We looked at different ways to do this and it was really interesting to hear from a mix of colleges, things that they have been doing to ensure transparency between what the SU team do, students and staff. I think you can learn so much more through discussion and other people's experiences and I feel this is one of the main strengths of the whole conference. Some of the most interesting ideas came from other students, or officers, and not just those leading the workshops.

Just as it is vital student unions are held accountable for their work and actions, these unions should have the chance to hold the presidents of NUS to account for all the work they have been doing in the past year, to question outcomes, to commend achievements. There was a large session in which we did just this with both Toni, president of NUS FE and Liam, president of NUS. Having been out last night and feeling very tired first thing in the morning the specific details of what they have acheived went slightly over my head (fortunately this information is in my delegate guide) but I could see the positive impact their work is having on fe students across the country and how humbled they felt by the gratitude they received for their work.

     I think perhaps the most inspiring aspect of the whole conference was not batman serving us dinner (which was super hero fancy dress themed) or the Manchester Bangor society making me feel out of breath just watching their energetic dancing, but the after dinner speaker,  Adrianne Peltz, NUS president USI. She spoke about her struggle from poverty in South Africa and the limits this placed on her education, to her moving to Northern Ireland to have her baby and the problems faced there with further education and how this frustration at the faults in class and education systems drove her to fight for better and to fight for improvements and got her to the position she is in today. I found it inspiring to see how sheer determination, in knowing that her capabilities surpassed what the system expected of her, could lead to such a strong character who continues to stand against what is wrong with the education system and supports the development of further education.
      Seeing people like her, and other students who campaign for what is right, made me reflect on myself and what little impact or effort I have had on making a positive change. I ran a Disney film club at school last year but that's not going to change the world! I have a great deal of respect for these people with the courage to change the system and have a much better appreciation of everything that goes on behind the scenes of my everyday student lifestyle.
   
       As well as learning a great deal, contributing in discussion of what policies need identifying for change over the next year, attending workshops and hearing speakers, I had a lot of fun on the conference. I got to network with people from across the country who mocked my posh, southern accent, walk down a street more gay than Brighton, and stay in a hotel room by myself with two double beds! It's true; there ain't no party like an FE party.

Life Drawing

We had a whole day of life drawing of a middle aged woman called Maria.

30 minutes

Each one was 30 seconds

I felt like Leo DiCaprio in Titanic, except the model was not so stunning and the setting not so romantic,

 25 minutes

15 seconds for each drawing

12 minutes

Left hand drawing.

Digital Crystal: Swarovski at the Design Museum (Exhibition Review)

DIGITAL CRYSTAL: Swarovski at the Design Museum

With over 82.5% of us having access to the internet in the UK (Digital Life, www.tnsdigitallife.com/), and spending over four times the golbal average on digital technology (Western Europe, www.emarketer.com), what does this mean for the future of our memory and interaction with physical objects? In a world moving away from permanently capturing thoughts and experiences, we must examine these changing relationships and find new ways of reconnecting to our past.  Digital Crystal: Swarovski at the Design Museum seeks to do just this in collaboration with some of the most current, creative talent through the emotive medium of cut crystal.

Crystal is a beautiful, timeless material which has retained it’s elegance throughout centuries of use; the exhibition being a dazzling maze of enchantment and thought provocation. You enter into a dark room, surrounded by the striking, fast paced moving images of digital crystals growing, forming, changing. Semicondutor, the creators of ‘The Shaping Grows’ (still of the moving images below) became interested in the idea of inclusion in the formation of crystals, and how they can take up parts of the surrounding environments and end up containing these materials whilst “playing with the natural form and landscape on it’s smallest, atomic level.” (Joe Gerhardt, Semiconductor, http://digitalcrystal.designmuseum.org)


The constant changing environment created within the room causes us to question the nature of how we remember things, how occurrences within our lives shape who we are, how our experiences become fabricated within our being; just as mineral particles become ingrained within crystals.

The exhibition continues to challenge our perceptions of memory through crystal pieces in which all designers have responded uniquely to the brief. The striking light reflections of almost 2000 suspended crystals, digitally controlled to slowly explode and reconstruct to form a chandelier in piece ‘Pandora’ (pictured below), created by duo Fredrikson Stallard, echoe how within our own minds we are constantly reinventing ideas and reshaping our knowledge.

“Crystal is all about the refraction and reflection of light” (Ian Stallard, Pandora, www.digitalcrystal.designmuseum.org) and in the way the light is reflected off the crystal pieces we are caused to reflect on our memories and question the idea that if these crystals are digitally controlled does that suggest that the future for our memories is that of digital control?

Thought Cloud’ by Maaten Baas (below) disposes of the dystopian future of virtual emotions with bright crystal clouds erupting from someone’s head and breaking through the darkness of their home and arguably the future of where society is headed. Marcus Tremento’s ‘Holo Centre Table’ captures a crystal in 3D photographic form, questioning the future of the physical nature of capturing a moment, whilst ‘Lolita’ by Ron Arad ironically incorporates digital technology, allowing tweets or texts to be written on more than 1000 white LEDs hidden within its crystals, in an exhibition examining the impact of this technology on our memory.


With all of us affected by these changes to technology do we have time to reflect on the nature of how we process and retain information or emotions? Digital Crystal allows you to do just that; to be lost in the beauty of the crystal reflections, the digital imagery, and your own mind and thoughts on the future of our interaction with both the physical and mental environment in which we live.

Design Museum

I went to the design museum, as instructed to do so for 3D design research. It's a cute little place, not very big really.
There was an exhibition on sport, which if you're into sport i'm sure is great. It was quite interesting. They had some Stella McCartney Adidas clothes which I really liked because I really like her. Did you know she did her art foundation at Ravensbourne too?

They also had an exhibition on in collaboration with Swarovski. If you know me, you will know that I like anything the sparkles (over the last week I bought a pair of sparkly shoes and two pairs of sparkly trousers). So I was absolutely mesmerised by the whole exhibition.  

There was a really cool video of computerised crystals forming (see below). It was so colourful and interesting I could have sat and watched it for ages.

Although I have to say my favourite piece was this giant collection of hanging crystals that were electronically programmed to separate and reform into a big mass shape. I don't think I have ever seen anything so beautiful, except maybe Damien Hirst's diamond skull, and a pair of bejewelled Louboutin shoes I saw in Harrods the other day. 

I've just picked out the highlights of the exhibition for me but there were a few cool things, like lazers forming 3D jewels and holographic images which appear when you approach them from certain angles.
I have to say I didn't find what is on at the moment to be what I was expecting from a design museum, but I suppose design encompasses so many different fields of art work that anything goes.

3D Design- Day 3

I spent the entire day glueing together spaghetti to hold plastic balls. It is literally as simple as that. Except using a hot glue gun on spaghetti is not simple, because the spaghetti goes soft, and snaps. And trying to suspend and balance three balls off the ground using only thin spaghetti is not simple either, when the weight of one ball can cause the supporting spaghetti to break. But I like a challenge and eventually I managed it. I didn't want to just create a tower to hold them off the ground. 

We then had to cover the structures in paper to try and make them strong enough to withstand a basketball being dropped on them. Only one person in our class managed to do this and their structure did not get completely crushed by the basketball. That person was not me. 

This was what it looked like before it was completely destroyed. I didn't take a picture of it afterwards. It wasn't a pretty sight. 

That's all the pathways done now. I'm still going to choose Fashion & Textiles but it's been really interesting to try out everything else and learn some new things. 

3D Design- Day 2

Today was all about making bridges. In the morning we made paper bridges, just small ones, focusing on something visually exciting and interesting. Then in the afternoon we made actual big bridges a few metres across between two tables which we then had to drive a remote controlled car over.

The pictures of the bridge aren't great, sorry.
We had bamboo, cardboard, elastic bands and parcel tape.
The bridge was only allowed to have 2 points on the ground besides the table. We decided to put a jump in the middle of our bridge because we're dare-devils. but technically speaking this means its not really a bridge. It was cool to watch the car fly over the gap though. Kind of like something out of a James Bond movie, but not quite.
Once we had made, and tested our bridges, we pulled them all apart. JOB DONE.

Body

On our self-directed study days we had to create a piece around the theme of body, how we see ourselves, how we see others, essentially whatever we made of the idea. 

Mine turned into something really weird, a bit confusing, but I think intriguing. 

I decided to work with the idea of distortion, how the way we view our bodies can be different to the way others see us. I was also inspired by having to draw what we felt last week, and how difficult it was to translate one sense into another, and how this can be distorted to change our perceptions. From this I chose to use images of my body, focusing on lines and curves, and by using extremely cropped images and fixing these together I was able to create a weird form in which it becomes difficult to identify which body parts are which. 

Here's a fun game: Guess the body parts. 

Map of Everyone and Everywhere I Know

As promised here is my completed map:

THE FRONT- A map of the world and all the places I have been too.

THE BACK- A timeline of my life with images representing different stages of my life, places I have lived or visited.

I liked the some of the thread shows though on both sides of the map, creates links and unison between the two sides.

I like that the images sewn into the map are clear on the timeline side, but on the world map they look like masses of light, almost like a birds eye view of the world at night, with the places i have visited being lit up.  

Concepts and Processes- Day 3

We had to record every birthday present we've got for our birthdays and we were only allowed to use text. I don't really think like a graphic designer so I found it difficult to make it look good without using images. I didn't like mine I just think it looks disconnected and random and just visually not that nice. But here it is:

We then had to cut out all the white space in our drawings so that it became a more fluid structure which could be adapted into 3D and hung on string.

 Its not really very easy to see what it looked like. But with everyone's text attatched to string in a large triangle we created a sort of weird and wacky environment. Which was filled with silhouettes of presents that everyone in the year had been given. 

My silhouettes are below. 

 

Here's the whole group's presents:

Concepts and Processes- Day 2

In the morning we had to create "a map of everyone and everywhere we know". I decided I wanted to make mine on fabric and sew it. I planned it all out on paper but now I need to actually make it. Its currently in production. I'll get a picture of it up tomorrow when it's done.

In the afternoon we went to the Tate Modern to see the installment/live art piece that is currently taking place in the turbine hall. The piece is set up by Tino Sehgal.

Sehgal has risen to prominence for his innovative works which consist purely of live encounters between people. Avoiding the production of any objects, he has pioneered a radical and yet entirely viewer-oriented approach to making art. His works respond to and engage with the gallery visitor directly, creating social situations through the use of conversation, dance, sound and movement, as well as philosophical and economic debate. - Tate Modern

It's basically lots of people, who are dressed just like ordinary people. When we arrived they were walking up and down the hall in unison, then they started running up and down. and then they were running everywhere, chasing each other, dancing. Then suddenly they all stand still, the lights in the hall go dark, and they start singing, in chorus. (The acoustics in the tate turbine hall are so good, they should do concerts there). and then they disperse again and start running around.

Whilst this is going on the public, eg Me, are just sat around the hall (I sat right in the middle), watching everything. Occassionally someone would come and sit down next to you and start telling you a story. We had an old american man whos cat sort of saved his life, and a swedish woman who is fascinated my babies and giraffes.

It was really interesting. We were in there for an hour which was quite chilled. The artist apparently hasn't released much information about what it all means, what the reason behind it is, as he wants the public to  develop their own interpretations of it. When it finishes we should know more about the whole idea. Interesting to see, a little odd, but kind of cool.

Concepts and Processes- Day 1

IT'S FRESHERS!!!

Which means a week with lots of partying, lots of fun, not much sleep, and sadly some work. But I'm on concepts and processes this week and the brief is basically a bit crazy and off its head anyway, so even if i'm still drunk rolling into college i don't think it will matter. (jokes obviously!)

Today we had to draw: the palm of our hand, with both our left and right hand, what the inside of our mouth (left) and the back of our head (right) feels like. 

In the afternoon we had to trace round ourselves on a bit of paper, and then block in areas of the drawing. 

Pretty crazy day of stuff.



Here's some shots of my group and our paper bags: