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Reconnecting practice: pedagogies of fashion thinking
No full textBroadly speaking, the issue of sustainability in the fashion industry is nothing new (Fletcher, 2016; Gwilt,2014; Siegle, 2008), and it continues to gain momentum; unsurprising, given that, despite the warnings, there are more garments in circulation than ever. However, although the inherent problem with ‘Fast Fashion’ lay in the over-production and over-consumption of clothing, to, ultimately, satisfy the consumer’s desire, we cannot blame the consumer. We must return to the first stage of the cycle; the designer, and contemplate how we, the educator, can awaken the student’s relationship to their practice, with a sustainable and conscious mind-set.
In her 2015 Anti_Fashion Manifesto for the next decade, Li Edelkoort (2015) stated that we are witnessing “the end of fashion as we know it”, making reference to the impact of ‘Fast Fashion’ on the future drivers of the fashion eco-system; today’s ‘Generation Y’ fashion design students. Edelkoort declares that the expectation to create accessories, brochures, to arrange shows, photography, and communications, only serves to dilute the essence, and purpose, of 21st century, sustainable, fashion design thinking.
Within a year of the publication of Edelkoort's manifesto, Kate Fletcher's 'Craft of Use' (2016) project paid homage to the 'tending and wearing' of garments as much as their creation, revealing the expression of fashion 'in a world not dependent on continuous consumption', where garments, whilst 'sold as a product, are lived as a process'.
This paper considers these two globally renowned fashion educators’ predictions and practices, and demonstrates ways in which their influence has served as a bedrock in the advancement a BA (Hons) Fashion curriculum, in the context of sustainability, and a conducive re-alignment of fashion design thinking and practice, pedagogically.
A case study will demonstrate the methodologies applied by a final year BA (Hons) Fashion student through a graduate collection that articulates a holistic approach to sustainable design practice. From mindful practice at the initial stages of exploration, to a collection that takes a non-binary approach, not only in its aesthetic, adaptable sizing and fit offer, but in offering solutions to wider social, economic, and consumptive issues
Horizontal discourses in adult art and design education
No full textThis article draws upon research from a longitudinal study (2011-2014) that sought to capture the experiences of adult students as they studied their degrees in art and design in the United Kingdom. Due to the entry qualifications to higher education held by these students they were perceived by their institutions as being ‘non-traditional’. They also tended to be mature students with a variety of backgrounds and life experiences. The project entailed the participants meeting with the researcher twice a year during the duration of their higher education. The methodological approach that was used is based on narrative inquiry. Bernstein’s (1999) theories that relate to horizontal discourse (everyday talk that is informal and specific to the context in which it is enacted) informed the analysis of the participants’ stories.
It is suggested that informal, day-to-day dialogue is as important as the formal, specialist discourse about art and design in the studio. The sense of belonging seems of particular importance for those learning in an art and design studio where the students are diversified due to their age. It prevents a sense of exclusion among ‘mature' students who stand out with their appearance, clothes and behaviour. In conclusion, the author suggests establishing a relevant curriculum and developing a strategy fostering better social integration of "mature" students, which can greatly affect their sense of belonging to the group as well as educational experience directly related to the studied subject matter
Swap editions: BREX-Kit group exhibition and multiples edition
No full textProject launch and group exhibition, Creekside Projects, Deptford, London. Curated by Robin Tarbet, 21st - 24th March 2019. SWAP Editions invites artists to each create a small artwork as an edition. The multiples are then published into sets and each artist receives back a complete set containing all the works in that edition. SWAP Edition No.4 > BREX-kit is archived as part of UCL’s Special Collection. SWAP Edition No. 4 : BREX-kit launches in the weeks before the UK is officially scheduled to cease to be a member of the EU at 11pm on the 29th March. To mark this outcome SWAP Editions is 'taking back control' and invited artists via an open call to submit proposals for artworks to be included in a set of editions that combine to make up BREX-kit > 'a survival guide come puncture repair kit' themed collection of artworks published as we enter the Brexit era. Edition No.4 : BREX-kit > brings together the work of Giorgia Castiglioni / Laura Copsey / Matthew Dowell / Camila Lobos / Nadège Mériau / James Moore / Scott Robertson / Tania Robertson / Jason Rouse / Aleksandra Stanek & EJ O'Reilly / Dawn Woolley / Ellie Wyatt / Pandora Vaughan. The pack for this edition is designed by Barnaby Mills and Ginny Davies. In March of 2019 SWAP Edition No. 4 : BREX-kit participated in the Small Press Project event 'Visions of Protest' 8th - 9th March with an exhibition and presentation at the Slade Research Centre, Slade School of Fine Art - University College London, before the official Launch and Exhibition for Edition No. 4 : BREX-kit at Creekside Projects in Deptford 21st - 24th March 2019
'Kannan Arunasalam: the tent' review
No full textA review of the exhibition Kannan Arunasalam: The Tent at The Tetley, Leeds, 16 February-2 June 2019. Discussing the works The Tent (2018), Kerosene (2011) and Paper (2011).The article highlights the film makers use of documentary conventions and how he has adapted these for the first gallery-based presentation of his work
‘Should I, shouldn’t I?’: A self-reflexive study in unpacking ideologies of race while devising a critical studies fine art programme
No full textThis chapter develops British journalist Kurt Barling’s (2015) provocative statement in order to think about race and its associated systems of oppression in what may be deemed as an equally controversial or a less desirable way. Barling’s The ‘R’ Word challenges us to imagine moving beyond race as a fixed identity construct. He unpicks the way in which matters which may not have anything to do with race often get taken up as such, due to the practice of ‘race-thinking’ as a type of systemic way of thinking that reduces all human variation and interaction to ‘one stable variable associated with an individual, namely their “race”’ (Barling, 2015: 148). Then, in taking the idea of race-thinking further, whether it be a social practice or group, he discusses the practice of ‘racialisation’, as a historically specific ideological process which transposes racial meaning onto a previously non-racial relation. This chapter gives a counter perspective to the dominant ways in which we understand racial oppression, within the context of inclusion and diversity debates. It does not focus solely on how white people are eternal oppressors but, rather, focuses on showing how non-white bodies can also occupy such spaces, by unpacking these ideologies of race, and legacies of whiteness. Whiteness as a privileged system of power has historically benefited some white bodies, whilst excluding others. As Henry (2007) points out crucially in Whiteness Made Simple, whiteness operates ‘as a conceptual framework and not a mere way to describe white people which is where I think many fail to have the right conversation and thus draw the wrong conclusions as they focus on complexion and not on a system of power’ (Henry, 2007: 160). By engaging with intersectionality as an analytic tool to unpick overlapping social categories (Collins, P. and Bilge, S. (2016), we can begin to unpack ideologies of race that limit whiteness and blackness to a matter of skin colour, or that make matters of race synonymous with discussions for and about Black people. We can do this by focusing on the right conversation, the systems of power and oppression, and the ‘autonomy of the individual’ within these dynamics. I take an interdisciplinary approach to these debates, drawing on the thinking of key theorists from a range of disciplines that range across critical race theory and cultural studies, critical pedagogy, gender studies and fine art practice and theory. However, I focus particularly on two major thinkers for whom destabilizing power relations within an educational context and liberationist thinking: the feminist and social activist bell hooks and Brazilian educationalist liberation thinker Paulo Freire
A case study of collaborative practice: working to promote cross-curricular thinking and making within schools.
No full textWithin the changing landscape of secondary education, the role of making and creative thinking is increasingly marginalised within the curriculum. As a result, we are seeing an emerging skills shortage for those contemplating studying not just fashion and textiles or other creative disciplines but also courses that value the ability to work creatively and blend a mix of attributes at a higher level. The case study outlined in this short paper, documents a project undertaken as part of the Crafts Council’s (2017) Make Your Future initiative which looks to partner schools, art teachers, makers and higher education institutes, with the aim of promoting craft and making to the next generation. The project saw Wadkin and Pratt collaborate with a selection of key stage 3 students across two schools, with the aim of encouraging greater take up of Textiles and Fashion as a GCSE subject, helping to develop essential skills for creative thinking and improving motor skills in relation to making. Drawing upon the textile heritage of the North of England, United Kingdom (UK), students developed contemporary fashion print outcomes that reinterpreted traditional woven textile techniques for the sportswear market. The focus was on improving hand skills through analogue design methods, while linking with technology, science and mathematical concepts to further cross-disciplinary thinking. In addition, key stage 3 students involved with the project were introduced to roles within textiles and fashion not currently explored within the curriculum. The project culminated in a collaborative exhibition at Leeds Arts University, celebrating the work produced across a number of institutes involved in similar projects across the region. As a result of this project, participants were given the opportunity to develop and explore competences required within the fashion and textile industries thus promoting the need for universities to work with schools in order to protect creative education, foster essential skills and inspire the next generation of designers and creative thinkers
Soft Pictures – re-making the Hattersley
No full textThe exhibit ‘Soft Pictures – Re-making the Hattersley at Futurescan 4: Valuing Practice, University of Bolton, 23rd-24th January 2019, comprised a collection of created work based on a site-specific investigation of the derelict weaving shed at Sunnybank Mills, Farsley, Leeds, United Kingdom (UK), from 2014-present. Specifically, it focused on two old Hattersley looms which were left in the space.
The work is a product of an exploration of thinking through practice. This has evolved around the relationship between my textile practice and the subject matter which pre-occupies it - the transient nature of the derelict (both building and machine). This is investigated through the prism of making, un-making and re-making, as a means of opening up a dialogue between textile and place. Derelict buildings are deconstructed spaces, in a state of entropic transformation and open to many interpretations. The investigation of this perception of change (or decline) through textile practice aims to unpick ideas of entropy and alterity and how this is interpreted. Time spent on the site progressed my initial documentary response of the ‘Soft Picture’ (Calderoni 2013) to a more active direct engagement with the space and machinery, resulting in the prolonged process of wrapping a loom. This was initially inspired by the work of Christo and Jeanne-Claude but rapidly became more about the meditative act of binding the machine. Further experiments around the machine entailed making casts of machine parts, as if cataloguing for a museum, and then taking the parts themselves and re-coating them in bright colours, re-making them into Meccano-like toys. All are active processes of making and re-making as a means of striking up a conversation with the un-making state of the site itself. The processes of making, unmaking and re-making have served to raise both physiological and philosophical questions for further exploration. The site is due for demolition in summer 2019 which will facilitate yet another journey of making investigations
A Conversation About Ethics
No full textThe output is a video in which Broadhead and Tobias-Green discuss what ethics is and why it matters. The content of the video was written/improvised and performed by Broadhead and Tobias-Green. The video was directed by Hooper.
Research Process: the aim of the project was to create a video which contemplates ethical practice-based research in an informal presentation format. A loose script was written by Broadhead and Tobias-Green for the content discussed within, which was followed as a framework for improvisation to create a clear structure for their naturally flowing conversation.
Research Insights: the video has provided a platform for Broadhead and Tobias-Green to share their thoughts on ethical research practice with one-and-other, generating an output which provides a clear outline of ethical practice from their combined wealth of experience.
This film provides the viewer an understanding of what questions they need to be asking themselves when they embark on a research project, and the best practice to follow before collecting data to produce an output.
Dissemination: the film was shared at the Media Practice Education/Media Communications and Cultural Studies Association at Solent University, South Hampton 21st-25th June 2021
They also ran
No full textThe output is an artefact, a photograph informed by the Race Tech archive, capturing a dog participating in a sporting event. Research process: Race Tech is the dedicated technical facilities provider that has maintained British Racing at the forefront of global broadcast technology for more than 70 years, its archives include filmed photo finishes from all major races since 1945 as well as images from the Olympic games and other sporting events. Through archival exploration, Williams became interested in the representation of competitors who aren’t competing for the results. He scanned numerous negatives, specifically analysing images of dogs that were in danger of being erased and forgotten because they were not winners. He selected one image in particular that typified his findings. Research insight: During the process of analysing a small element of a much larger archive, Williams considered the technical approaches employed to evidence events. He found that these approaches result in very specific visual outputs with aesthetic qualities. The way in which the disregarded dogs are represented is somehow erased or distorted by the machinery recording the event; only the competing bodies are worthy of recording, the rest are written out of this point of history. The indexical relationship between the subject and the photographic is diminished in the case of the losing dogs. Dissemination: The artefact was exhibited as part of ‘Make Good’, Leeds Arts University, 27 September 2019 and within ‘Peers’, Vrij Paleis Amsterdam, 29 September 2019 as part of the ‘Unseen’ Photography festival
Emergence
No full textThe output is a creative project comprising a series of thirty paintings responding to the theme of 'Emergence'. The series was exhibited in ‘Emergence’ alongside three other artists. Research process: The work produced for this exhibition was the result of the development of ongoing artistic practice over the course of a year. This series of new paintings was exhibited alongside three other artists. The paintings were hung in groupings that alluded to tenuous relationships between the works, and foregrounded the spatial play between individual works and the space of the gallery. Research insights: Thematically the work produced for the exhibition explored the idea of emergence in terms of visibility and concealment. This new series of paintings allude to architectural spaces that are negated or concealed by grid like structures. Previous themes of uncertainty, illusion and negation were reconsidered through a shift in scale and support, resulting in an attentiveness to the object nature of the painting and the potential for experimental configurations. Dissemination: The research was disseminated through a group exhibition curated by Rebecca Wild at AIR Open exhibition in 2018. The exhibition brought together the work of four prize-winners from the AIR Open exhibition of 2017 at which Virgoe was awarded the Jacksons prize